Cardinals Fire Mike Matheny

The St. Louis Cardinals announced on Saturday that manager Mike Matheny is out as their manager. Also leaving the team are hitting coach John Mabry and assistant hitting coach Bill Mueller. Bench coach Mike Shildt will serve as the interim manager for the rest of the season.

Also being promoted are minor league assistants Mark Budaska and George Greer to serve as hitting coaches. This is all according to Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. There is yet to be word on whether or not the Cards will name a bench coach to take over for Shildt, though it's likely that they will not name one before the end of the season.

Matheny has been at the managing helm for the Cardinals for the past six seasons. During that time, he helped the club get to four consecutive players from 2012-2015. It included an NL pennant in 2013. His Cardinals tenure will end with a 591-473, which is a pretty great record, considering what has been going on there lately with that team.

President of Baseball Operations John Mozeliak scheduled a news conference this morning around 11:00 AM to address the firing, releasing this statement below:

“These decisions are never easy, but we felt that a change in leadership was necessary as the team prepares to enter into the second half of the season. I would like to thank Mike for his exceptional commitment and devotion to the Cardinals organization, including many fond memories of our years working together.” 

While many were surprised by the sudden firing of Matheny, he was actually on the hot seat going into the 2018 season, as his team had been struggling the last couple of seasons, including one of the seasons that saw the Cubs win the World Series. If the Cardinals again fail to make the playoffs this season, it would be their third consecutive season without a playoff berth. That would've been unacceptable to the Cardinals brass. That hasn't happened since the 1997-1999 season. And also certainly, the Cardinals didn't expect to take a seat backwards with the latest additions of Marcell Ozuna and Bud Norris. They also some pretty good talent coming up through the farm system.

Lately, however, this team has been surrounded by controversies, mostly in regards to player management. Recent reports have been surfacing that Bud Norris has been "mercilessly riding" 21-year-old rookie Jordan Hicks, who is expected to take over the closer role at some point. Many have described it as bullying in the clubhouse. Matheny's response to the whole thing? Norris was "from a different generation of players." It's still unclear whether this played a role in his dismissal, but it now raises questions about his performance as manager and whether or not it becomes a factor in his next job.

Another controversy that has been brewing is his current relationship with players like Dexter Fowler.  Even Mozeliak recently criticized Fowler's latest performance. Despite all that, this Cardinals team is much younger than previous teams, thus the emotions and the controversies seem to bubbling up more than usual for such a championship-caliber team.

Looks like the Cardinals now will be searching for a candidate who can get the most out of the young players on this team as they gear up for a second-half push towards the playoffs. It could be Shildt or it could be somebody else.