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The St. Louis Cardinals have promoted top prospect JJ Wetherholt to Triple-A Memphis, the team announced on Monday.
A middle infielder, the 22-year-old Wetherholt is the No. 1 prospect in St. Louis' system and the No. 19 in baseball, per MLB.com.
Wetherholt was the Cardinals' top pick in the 2024 MLB Draft (No. 7 overall) and has torn through the minor leagues in his one year as a pro. In fact, his speedy promotion makes him the first Cardinals minor leaguer to reach Triple-A less than a year after being drafted since Michael Wacha did it in 2013. He's the first position player to do so since Brett Wallace in 2009.
Wetherholt started the year at Double-A Springfield, where he hit an even .300 in 62 games with seven home runs and 14 stolen bases, leading the Texas League in both on-base percentage and OPS. His promotion came one day after his first multi-home-run game of his professional career.
Overall in the minors, which includes 29 games last year at Class-A Palm Beach, he's slashing .299/.419/.445 in 401 plate appearances.
Wetherholt played his college ball at West Virginia, where he won a Division I batting title by hitting .449 with a 1.304 OPS in 2023. Unsurprisingly, he projects as a plus hitter in the Majors.
“Wetherholt had some of the best bat-to-ball skills in his Draft class, running as high a contact rate as 89.7 percent as a sophomore in 2023,” his MLB.com scouting report reads. “He continued to show a keen eye in the Florida State League and performed well with an all-fields approach against most pitch types.”
With the Cardinals just a game out of the Wild Card, they are certainly contenders in the National League. Time will tell if Wetherholt will factor into that equation this year.
For now, Wetherholt will head to Memphis. But he will also take a quick trip to Atlanta next week, as he is scheduled to participate in the 2025 MLB Futures Game on July 12 as part of the All-Star week festivities.
