“I don’t know why,” said Siegrist. “It was no big deal.”

Manager Mike Matheny said, “We knew — he knew — that when we took him off that list that it was going to cause a firestorm of questions. We realized that taking a day (of rest) when we had it might buy us a bunch in the future.”

“He’s moving along just fine. I had a feeling it wasn’t going to take very long.”

Siegrist, like Cardinals catcher Tony Cruz a product of nearby Palm Beach Community College, said he felt “great” in his BP session Sunday and Lilliquist said he liked what he saw, especially the development of Siegrist’s slider.

“He made a little adjustment,” said Lilliquist. “We want the slider to be a more consistent pitch. He was basically pre-setting it in his glove and it was creating a lot of mistimed throws based on his arm and grip being locked up.

“I think it’s going to be a good pitch for him.”

One particularly interesting exchange Sunday came when Siegrist threw inside on new shortstop Jhonny Peralta, who then smoked a subsequent inside pitch foul. When Siegrist went outside with offspeed pitches, Peralata took one and then blooped a ball that would have fallen for a hit.