51����

If there’s a managerial equivalent to a team at-bat, it’s what Cardinals skipper Oliver Marmol did Thursday afternoon when he announced that badly struggling will take his turn in the rotation against the Atlanta Braves on Saturday afternoon at Busch Stadium despite dreadful recent results and the club’s quest to continue surpassing expectations and continue chasing a playoff spot.

“We’re going to give him another shot at it,” Marmol said with only slightly more enthusiasm than you’d expect from a hostage video.

Clearly, Marmol’s reticence was not an indictment of Fedde, the person. It reflected the predicament created by Fedde’s lackluster recent performance.

Marmol fought off follow-up questions from behind his desk in the manager’s office at Busch Stadium like a batter fouling off pitches. Instead of a bat, he was armed with a can of sparkling coconut water energy drink.

“Fedde’s going to start on Saturday,” Marmol said. “And my hope is that we can get on the other side of what his last couple outings have looked like.”

In case you forgot how things went in Fedde’s recent outings — and lucky you, if you did — he’d allowed twice as many home runs (four) as he had strikeouts (two) in his previous three starts. He also walked nine batters and posted an ERA of 15.30.

During that span, opposing batters scored 17 earned runs, logged a hard-hit percentage of 58.7% and posted a batting average against Fedde (.417) that would make Ted Williams and Tony Gwynn blush.

To be fair, it hadn’t been that way all season. Fedde has had moments, such as a shutout on the road against his former team the Washington Nationals in May, but even prior to that outing he’d already been battling inconsistency with his pitch shapes and movement that left him extremely vulnerable.

Fedde hits free agency after this season. If he’s able to piece together some representative outings, perhaps he’ll have some appeal as a rental option to teams in need of starting pitching help to get through the summer.

Of course, Fedde must pitch in order to have any chance to establish trade value. That means he gets the ball again, even if that lessens the likelihood of a win and increases the likelihood of putting the bullpen at risk of having to cover six of the nine innings Saturday.

So instead of coming up with a phantom injury for Fedde or pulling whatever shenanigans necessary to skip his turn in the rotation and give it to somebody like , who Marmol has previously admitted belongs in the big leagues, Marmol will send Fedde back out to the mound.

Presumably, this is all about the club giving itself the possibility of recouping any player with a fraction of a chance of contributing to the club in the future in exchange for Fedde.

In recent days as the questions persisted about Fedde, Marmol said there were ongoing discussions to be had before he would announce the plans for Saturday.

The clear implication being that the decision was going to be made by a group of people that included the front office, not just the manager and his coaching staff.

There’s a bigger picture at play, and more than just Marmol’s input has been taken into consideration.

“No doubt about it,” Marmol said to an assembled group of writers Thursday. “That’s why I said there’s more conversation to be had when you guys asked me a couple days ago and then yesterday, because there are other variables that play into this other than just performance.”

That’s where this scenario becomes treacherous for Marmol.

Marmol is the face of this organizational decision, the one answering questions. Common sense and competitive nature tells us he’s hard-wired to give his team the best chance to win every game.

However, Marmol also knows it’s his job to protect his player — not throw him under the bus — and also serve as a shield for the front office from time to time. It’s part of the gig that comes with the office he occupies.

But it does harken back to comments president of baseball operations John Mozeliak made during spring training while seated at a metal table on the patio outside the major league clubhouse at the club’s training complex in Jupiter, Florida.

At that time, Mozeliak described the careful balancing act Marmol would have to perform this season. The manager has been charged with making sure the club provided runway and allowed guys to play through their ups and downs while also being responsible for wins and losses.

The most immediately relevant part of Mozeliak’s March comments are when he said, “The resources that are provided to (Marmol) — the depth that’s provided to him — is not something that he can go out and provide on his own. So he has to play the hand he’s dealt.

“But having the mindset that, yes, he’s going to try to make sure that all these young guys get at-bats. Even if some guys are struggling, they’re still going to get playing time. But he can’t lose his clubhouse either by not trying to win.”

Let that last part sink in, “He can’t lose the clubhouse by not trying to win.”

The front office can let Marmol wear this Fedde decision publicly, but there’s got to be some awareness that they can’t cast Marmol, within the clubhouse, as the sole culprit behind an edict that compromises the team’s ability to win.