Exit Interview: Dean Anna

For the fourth straight year, we’re taking some time in that time between the end of the season and the winter meetings to discuss each player that made an appearance on the St. Louis roster this season.  Whether they played almost every day or never actually got into a game, they get covered in this series.  All stats are exclusively their time in St. Louis.   Just think of this as them stopping by Mike Matheny‘s office for a quick evaluation before heading home for the winter.

Player: Dean Anna

Season stats: 1 game, 1 PA, .000/.000/.000, -0.0 bWAR

Hero/Goat: None

Overall grade: D

Positives: Made it to the major leagues, which is more than Ty Kelly can say….hit .272 with a .737 OPS in Memphis….had 22 doubles, three triples, and three homers with the Redbirds.

Negatives: Even with Jhonny Peralta running on fumes, Anna never got a serious look.  That should tell you something….was only five for 10 in steals in Memphis.

Overview: It seemed a pretty smart insurance move when John Mozeliak signed Anna and traded for Kelly in the offseason.  Not that we expected either of them to be world-beaters (though I think we were kinda hoping for a buy-low, produce-high kinda thing like we saw in the past), but it did seem to be a reason not to have Pete Kozma around all year.  One of these guys would take over that utility player role in the bigs, right?

The reason I’m talking about both of them here is because Kelly never made it to the bigs, eventually getting released in one of the multitude of 40-man roster machinations and signing on with Toronto, where he played a bit better but never put on a MLB uniform.  Anna, on the other hand, stuck around all year long but, as noted above, never got the call.  The club wanted to protect Kozma from being lost on waivers (for his defense, I guess) and eventually Greg Garcia was the one that got to play late in the year.  Anna was called up when Randal Grichuk went on the DL, but went right back down when Peter Bourjos came back from paternity leave.  Not only did we not see him again, very few people remembered he was in the system.

Outlook: Anna’s about to turn 29 and he has 26 plate appearances in the majors.  If he’s going to keep playing this game, he’s going to have to resign himself to being a AAA insurance guy that may or may not ever get a call.  Wherever he is, it seems unlikely that it’ll be in Memphis next year as the Cards have too many issues with the 40-man to keep him on there.  They could try to resign him and it’s possible they will, but it’s not exactly world-shattering if he moves on to do the same thing in another spot.

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NL Central Standings

TeamWLPct.GB
Cardinals9369.574 -
Brewers8676.5317.0
Cubs7488.45719.0
Reds62100.38331.0
Pirates62100.38331.0

Last updated: 10/06/2022

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