BOSTON, MA – MAY 8: Xander Bogaerts #2 of the Boston Red Sox tosses his helmet after striking out against the Chicago White Sox during the eighth inning at Fenway Park on May 8, 2022 in Boston, Massachusetts. Teams across the league are wearing pink today in honor of Mothers Day. Cardinals (Photo By Winslow Townson/Getty Images)
The Cardinals have other options at shortstop that don’t involve Xander Bogaerts, should they choose to pursue that route.
Longtime Cardinals shortstop Paul De Jong was recently demoted after a disastrous start to the 2022 regular season. The 28-year old was hitting .130 with one home run and an OPS+ of 24 through his first 24 games of the season.
Boston Red Sox shortstop Xander Bogaerts is easily the most popular choice to replace De Jong. What if the Cardinals elect to go another, less expensive route to fill in at short? Could they even stick with some internal options?
Cardinals shortstop options not named Xander Bogaerts
Edmundo Sosa
26-year-old Edmundo Sosa represents the first of two internal options the Cardinals could elect to hand the starting shortstop reigns over to. Sosa debuted with the Cards back in 2018 but produced very little in 2018 and 2019 before going off last year.
Sosa appeared in 113 games for St. Louis last year (71 of them at shortstop) and had the best performance of his short career. He hit four triples, six home runs and had an OPS+ of 103 with a slash-line of .271/.346/.389. Sosa finished last year with a 2.1 oWAR and 1.5 dWAR per Baseball-Reference.
Sosa is a player that brings his team value on both offense and defense and his ability to play all over the infield will keep him on the team for the foreseeable future. If he can match his offensive production from last season again, he may have a spot in this Cardinals infield for a while.
To begin the 2022 season, Sosa has 13 appearances under his belt, hitting just .206 and striking out 14 times with zero walks. He will need to turn things around to get another shot at extended playing time.
