The St. Louis Cardinals ended May with a 33-25 record, second best in the National League’s Central Division, only three games behind the No. 1 seed Chicago Cubs. Fast forward to the end of July, and the Cardinals were 10 games behind the No. 1 seed Milwaukee Brewers, with a 55-55 record. By the end of the season, they were 19 games back from the No. 1 seed, with the fourth best record in the NL Central at 78-84. This marks the third year in a row that the Cardinals won’t be playing in the postseason.
President of Baseball Operations John Mozeliak’s last year with St. Louis has been full of criticism for the team’s lack of success. This could be attributed to the lack of pitching depth and impactful hitters, as well as the surrounding awkwardness that coincided with the season. With trade talks of both third baseman Nolan Arenado and starting pitcher Sonny Gray, or the transition phase from Mozeliak to Chaim Bloom, this will likely be a year Cardinals fans try to forget as they push towards the direction of a full blown rebuild.
However, the season wasn’t a total disaster. Shortstop Masyn Winn finished the season as a contender for the Golden Glove award. He ended the season with a WAR of 3.5, the second best mark on the team behind Gray, and led all qualifying shortstops in fielding percentage at 99.4%. Second baseman Brendan Donovan provided valuable hitting for the team as he ended the year with a batting average of .287, putting him 19th in the entire league. Donovan was also the only Cardinal selected as an all-star.
The Cardinals have real cornerstone players that they can plan to build around in the Bloom era, and the remarkable seasons these players just had shouldn’t be taken for granted. Unfortunately, this cannot be said about the rest of the roster.
The rest of the team’s shortcomings continued to make themselves apparent throughout the season. The pitching situation continued to be a disaster, with St. Louis having the second worst pitching team in the league, one spot above the 43-win Colorado Rockies. Out of the Cardinals’ five pitchers who played over 100 innings, only Gray had an above average strikeouts per nine innings. Not only that, but the earned runs average among those five was 4.776, which would put them 28th in the league. With talks of Gray waiving his no trade clause this season too, the future of pitching in St. Louis doesn’t look bright without some massive developments coming from their young players.
The hitting this year continued to be an issue as well. They ranked 19th on the year in total runs, but this statistic is a bit skewed due to early season success. Since June 30, the Cardinals ranked 24th in runs. They were also second-to-last on the season in total home runs with 148. Some of the lack of hitting success can be attributed to the 363 at-bats from Jordan Walker, 351 at-bats from Nolan Gorman and the 361 at-bats from Pedro Pagés. Among all players who had 350 plate appearances, Gorman ranks third worst in strikeout percentage, with Walker ranked 8th and Pagés ranked 24th. When those three players are making up for 20% of the team’s total at-bats, it’s not hard to see how the struggles formed.
Cardinals fans will likely look back on this year with a sour taste in their mouth. The pitching was a disaster, the hitting left a lot to be desired and the locker room drama left fans to wonder about the team’s future. However, with a cornerstone of the organization leaving in Mozeliak, the likely departures from Gray and Cardinals former Golden Glove winner and All-Star Arenado, St. Louis looks to push toward a rebuild, led by their new President of Baseball Operations Chaim Bloom.
While many Cardinals fans will attempt to forget about this season and look into the future, incredible seasons by Winn and Donovan, along with the hot streak in May should not be forgotten.
