Image via Cardinals on Twitter.
The Cardinals announced on Thursday that longtime coach Ron “Pop” Warner has joined the team’s major league coaching staff as bench coach, filling the position vacated by interim manager Mike Shildt.
Warner, 49, has been a part of the Cardinals organization since 1991, when he began his career as a player in the minor leagues. After nine seasons in the minors, Warner spent time as a coach, manager, and most recently an assistant field coordinator.
“He sees the game really well,” Shildt said of Warner, according to MLB.com’s Jenifer Langosch. “He has a real appreciation of how the game is played. He can look in the other dugout and know how matchups work. He is a valuable set of eyes and experience.”
In an interesting twist, Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch tweets that while Warner will perform many of the regular duties of a bench coach, it would be third base coach Jose Oquendo who would serve as manager in the event that Shildt is ejected from a game.
