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Before Addison Russell was called up to join the big league Chicago Cubs, 26-year-old infielder Tommy La Stella opened up the year as the team’s second baseman with Javier Baez being demoted to the Triple-A Iowa Cubs.
He appeared in only two games with the Cubs until suffering an oblique injury which has kept him on the sidelines for the entire first half of the 2015 campaign. According to Jesse Rogers on Twitter, La Stella has been activated from the disabled list and will remain with the Triple-A affiliate in Des Moines, Iowa where he went 9-for-36 in 10 rehab games.
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La Stella was acquired from the Atlanta Braves last November in exchange for right-hander Arodys Vizcaino and three international signing bonus slots.
It just so happened to be Vizcaino’s second stint with the Braves since 2011 and pretty much worked out for both clubs since he tested positive for a performance-enhancing drug that resulted in him being handed an 80 game suspension back in April.
While it’s great to see him finally back in the swing of things, the timing isn’t necessarily on his side. With Javier Baez and Arismendy Alcantara aiming to rejoin the Cubs sometime this season and Addison Russell taking over Starlin Castro‘s position at shortstop, the depth for this team is getting better and better each day.
As we all know, the Cubs have one of the best records in all of baseball behind a strong four-game winning streak and skipper Joe Maddon plugging Kyle Schwarber in left field while Chris Coghlan has moved to second base.
There’s no telling how long Coghlan will hold down the position, but it sounds like Starlin Castro will be getting some work at either the hot corner or second very soon which was also reported by Rogers on Twitter as well.
So it’ll be interesting to see where or how La Stella is used in the future if he’s with the club past this winter. He’s a career .249/.328/.317 hitter with one home run, 31 RBI, 16 doubles with a total of 81 hits in 325 at-bats.