Goold: St. Louis Cardinals keep prospects on the move

More importantly…will Brett Wallace be on CDM’s master list?

“When you look at the age at which the best players in baseball reach the big leagues, it’s younger than most people think,” Luhnow said. “The Scott Rolens, the Jim Edmondses, the Yadier Molinas — all of those players — they make it to the big leagues at 21, 22 or 23. So, that has to factor into it a bit. What it means more importantly is we’re drafting younger players, we’re developing them ourselves. And, we’re pushing them aggressively through the system.”

“Young is good,” Luhnow continued. “There is no doubt. (Players) who make it in their late 20s are often serviceable guys, a bench guy, a late bloomer, but stars tend to make it young. ... We differentiate ourselves as a system if we’re producing stars at the big-league level — average to above-average performers, and those guys tend to be younger guys when they get here.”

...“My thinking was Brett Wallace would start at Double-A (in 2009) and then see what happens from there,” Luhnow said. “That’s still the plan, but the plan with Brett Wallace is you cannot set a plan. You let him tell you when he’s ready to move. This spring, we may be talking about Memphis or something else. ... You cannot just promote if they don’t produce, and we’ve got a lot of upward mobility in our system.”