Jordan Walker became the youngest St. Louis Cardinals player to make the team’s Opening Day roster, and also start as a position player in the season’s first game in Thursday’s 10-9 loss to the Toronto Blue Jays.
It also didn’t take the Redbirds’ highest rated prospect to record his first base hit.
Batting eighth, the 20-year old Walker drilled the second pitch he saw from Blue Jays’ starter Alek Manoah up the middle for a single. Fans greeted him with a standing ovation when he entered the batter’s box, and they had not sat down before Walker ripped his first Major League hit.
“I was just more pumped up than anything,” Walker said of the second-inning single,” Walker told reporters after the game.
“Every time I walked into the outfield, seeing everybody filled up in the stands, it really just kind of hit me that this is where I want to be, and this is where I want to play.”
Jordan also posted the first RBI of his career with a seventh-inning groundout that scored Wilson Contreras and gave the Cardinals a short-lived 7-6 lead. He would end the memorable day with one hit in five at-bats.
