PRO BASEBALL / JEFF FLETCHER : Cardinals Hanging On to a Good Catch

If you’ve noticed that catcher Mike Borzello’s statistics haven’t changed much this season, that’s because he hasn’t played much.

Borzello, who played at Taft High and Cal Lutheran, had only four at-bats at Class-A Savannah, Ga., before he was moved to Class-A Madison, Wis., where he has seven at-bats in two weeks.

Why, you ask, does he even bother?

“(The Cardinals) asked me about (coaching) last year,” Borzello said. “I knew I had a limited role as a player, so I thought that would be fine.”

Borzello spent the first part of the season in Savannah, where he was among four catchers. He was moved to Madison to replace an injured player, and he became the third catcher there. All this after he played in only 13 games last year.

“I just work with the other catchers and try and help with the pitching staff,” he said. “I throw batting practice once in a while, whatever they need me to do.”

Mike Jorgensen, Cardinal director of player development, said he is happy with the job Borzello has done.

“Mike is a guy that we like in the organization,” he said. “He’s been able to go to a few different ballclubs where he’s been a third catcher. We don’t consider him a prospect but we like him as an organizational guy.”

Borzello, 24, said he would eventually like to move into full-time coaching, but he’s not sure when that will be.

“I haven’t really thought about it,” he said. “I just show up every day and do whatever they tell me to do.”

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Moved again: For the second year in a row, Dmitri Young, a former top draft pick from Rio Mesa High, finished his season at a different position. Young, who had trouble at third base and first base, was moved in midseason to the outfield, where the St. Louis Cardinals intend to keep him.

“He did a good job in the outfield and we were pleasantly surprised,” Jorgensen said. “He enjoys the position and he’s gotten to where he feels comfortable. We played him at first and third, and the way we look at it right now, (outfield) is his best position. We are definitely going to leave him there for now.”

Young, 20, recently completed his first full season at double-A Arkansas, hitting .272 with eight home runs and 52 runs batted in. He also made 16 errors, but most were at first or third base. With Young settled in the outfield, the Cardinals’ main concern is his weight.

“We have him concentrating strictly on an off-season conditioning and weight program,” Jorgensen said. “We want him to lose 20 pounds.”

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Injury update: Former Monroe right-hander Joel Zamudio is on his way to Instructional League later this month.

Zamudio, a ninth-round pick of the Philadelphia Phillies in June, was injured and sent home before he even made an appearance this summer at rookie-level Martinsville, Va.

“My first day pitching I was throwing (in the) bullpen,” Zamudio said, “and I don’t know what happened. It just came. My arm got hurt.”

Zamudio returned home, where he has been running and lifting weights. He said his arm feels fine, but the Phillies didn’t want him to pitch until he returned to Instructional League in the fall.

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Short hops: Former Mission College pitcher Osvaldo Fernandez has a streak of 29 2/3 innings without allowing an earned run for Class-A Riverside. Fernandez, the California League pitcher of the week last week, has given up just four runs during the stretch.

Fernandez defected from Cuba and pitched one game at Mission last spring before the Seattle Mariners selected him in the 22nd round in June. He is 7-2 with a 3.13 ERA. . . .

With his team’s bullpen depleted by three extra-inning games in the previous four nights, former Cal State Northridge standout Scott Richardson, an outfielder, was forced to pitch last Friday for Class-A Stockton.

Richardson got only one out in the 14th inning, giving up three runs and taking the 8-5 defeat to Central Valley.

Things were so bad in Stockton that 41-year-old pitching coach Mark Littell, who pitched briefly in the major leagues in the early 1980s, was activated and pitched on Saturday night. He won.