Shelby Miller Promoted to Class-AA Springfield

JUPITER, Fla. - Right-handed pitcher Shelby Miller has been promoted from Class-A Advanced Palm Beach to Class-AA Springfield effective Wednesday, June 1. He is expected to make his first start in Double-A Friday night.

Miller led all of Minor League Baseball with 81 strikeouts in just 53.0 innings-pitched through last Friday, a strikeout-per-nine innings ratio of 13.75. He went 2-3 with a 2.89 ERA in nine starts as the Cardinals' ace, allowing 40 hits and 20 walks while holding opposing batters to a .204 average. He recorded a regular season career-high 12 strikeouts while allowing just three hits and one earned run in his last outing with Palm Beach Friday night.

Miller was drafted by the Cardinals with the 19th overall pick in the 2009 First-Year Player Draft out of Brownwood (TX) High School and made his professional debut that same year with Class-A Quad Cities. The 6-foot-3, 195-pound right hander went 7-5 with a 3.62 ERA during his first full season with the River Bandits in 2010, ranking fourth in the Midwest League with 140 strikeouts and first among Cardinals minor leaguers with 12.1 strikeouts/9.0 IP.

He was honored as the Cardinals Minor League Pitcher of the Year in '10, completing his first full professional season one month before his 20th birthday. Coming into the 2011 season Miller was rated as the No. 1 overall prospect in the Cardinals organization (13th overall in the nation) by Baseball America.

Miller becomes the 10th player to join the Springfield club from Palm Beach this season and the second first-round pick in the last week. Third baseman Zack Cox, who was selected with the 25th overall pick last year, was leading Palm Beach with a .335 average through 42 games before being promoted May 24.

The Palm Beach starting rotation still features two right-handers rated in the top-10 on Baseball America's top prospects list and four pitchers selected in the first 10 rounds of their respective drafts. Righty Jordan Swagerty, selected in the 2nd round of last year's draft out of Arizona State University, and right-hander Joe Kelly, a 3rd round pick in 2009 out of the University of California at Riverside, are rated as the ninth and tenth best prospects in the system, respectively.

For more information on the Palm Beach Cardinals, Class-A Advanced affiliate of the St. Louis Cardinals, please call (561) 775-1818 or visit www.palmbeachcardinals.com. For tickets and more information regarding Roger Dean Stadium, please visit www.rogerdeanstadium.com.