From the last checkpoint, how did they fare?
Baseball is full of paradoxes, many of which emulate life itself. To many, the season is interminably long. But then again, it seems just like yesterday I was in Jupiter watching them knock the rust off.
Still, the season marches on inexorably, in its metronome like pace. Thus, we find ourselves with the season two-thirds expired, the sun’s shadows beginning to ominously lengthen and we marvel at how fast it all seems to have passed. Like a good book, we put it down from time to time, blink, and ask, “Where did the time go?”. Will this story have a good ending? I will certainly pick it back up and see it to the end. This is a moment where I put the book down and reflect on the time past.
On May 26, at the 54-game checkpoint, the Cardinals were 30-24, six games over .500. This put them 3 games off the Cubs division-leading pace and 1 game off the wild card race. July 26 represents the second 54 game portion of the season. Let’s see what this slice of the season has revealed.
At the first turn, the pleasant surprises were:
- Liberatore had emerged as an effective starter
- Matz was healthy and effective
- Contreras and first base are a good match
- Jordan Walker can play the outfield
- Victor Scott II can play
- Pitching health was excellent
- The defense is really, really good
At this juncture, most of those observations are still fair. And moving beyond the “surprise” component and becoming sustainable expectation. Not all, though.
Matz has not had a great middle third of the season, with half-a-dozen bullpen meltdowns contributing to some games that got away. His starter stats are noticeably better than his reliever stats, but his role in the bullpen is necessary as Libby’s ascension to starter left a hole in the bullpen just as he filled one in the rotation.
Otherwise, I think you could still say these things, but perhaps now they aren’t surprises anymore.
The pleasant non-surprises were:
- Herrera affirms the bat is real
- Masyn Winn is the real deal
- Nootbaar and Donovan are what they expected with health
- The starting pitching has been solid
Some of this remains mostly true. Winn and Herrera may be two of the more dependable players on the team. Winn may be miscast in the #2 line-up spot, but that is an evaluation of management decisions, not the player. Herrera’s return re-shuffled this a bit.
But not all of it came up as rosy as time marched on.
One exception that stands out … Nootbaar struggled mightily with a K-ridden slump that lasted an alarming length of time and then struggled with health (rib cage). If there is disquiet here, it is that sustained playing time really hasn’t resulted in sustained production. His xwOBA (weighted average) has been below league average for over 2 months now. There may be internal questions if he is a long-term solution.
Donovan also struggled with health. A harsh June (wRC+ of 76) has taken some of the bloom off the rose. His weighted average xwOBA has remained steady all year, so he is still who he is. Perhaps not the .820+ OPS hitter of the first third, but still pretty solid.
The starting pitching has not been nearly as solid. I’d label them as inconsistent in June, and approaching full melt down in July, running a starter ERA well over 7 for an interminable three weeks or more. Libby hit a rough patch but seemed to regain his mojo. Gray has been outstanding overall but had a rough time in AZ and at home against the Padres. Pallante is in and out, with too much out. Fedde and Mikolas have been really struggling with providing quality innings this part of the season and seem like they are leading the league in batting practice fastballs that leave the yard. Unlike the relief corps, management has not been quick to address shortcomings in the rotation. McGreevy endlessly waited in the wings. Somehow protecting against an injury they didn’t have was more important than addressing woeful under-performance that they were experience. I. DO. NOT. UNDERSTAND. Will the spot start earlier this week turn into something more permanent? We can only hope but answer rests on the fickle trade winds.
The unpleasant surprises in the first third were:
- Nolan Arenado is a struggling hitter…but still a really, really good fielder
- It appears that Andre Pallante’s 2nd half 2024 may have been more quirky than break-out
- The bullpen was unsteady
- The march of the young prospect arms has been interrupted by injury
- Jordan Walker continues to regress offensively
- Two general concerns remain (lack of power, poor baserunning)
Arenado’s power (and overall offense) is fleeting. Walker had a little mini-hot streak, but his average is barely over .200 with little power to show. Anecdotally (ie. the eye test), it is really difficult to discern improvement. The IL stints have definitely not helped in this runway season. Back to playing, he is showing glimmers of a bit more power, But…
The bullpen has steadied a bit as the worst Meltdown offenders have been dispatched to Memphis (Fernandez, Roycroft). Graceffo, Granillo and Svanson haven’t been great, but a fair bit steadier. O’Brien has looked particularly good, at times They bring needed octane, too, along with some hope for the future. Romero is doing better. His middle third has been quite strong, in fact, with an ERA below 3. Maton was unscored upon for 2 months, which is hard to find fault with. King? Questionable. He benefits from the Cardinals not having any other lefty in the pipeline.
In that same pipeline, some of the young arms had returned to throwing (Lin, Hence, Mathews) and Roby and Henderson have progressed, so the pitching depth appeared to be rebounding a bit. Lin and Hence are out yet again. Mathews is going through an adjustment period at AAA. His velo and spin rates are down. Something about the different MLB ball. Several pitchers (Robberse, Hjerpe, Rom, others) are out for the year and perhaps well into next, also. The 2025 MLB Draft appears to have provided an infusion of needed power arms.
The expected offensive regression occurred. At first not as harshly as it could have. The team continued to be able to string singles and walks, sometimes together, but the low-wattage power of this line-up has resulted in a string of 20+ inning scoreless streaks. Then after sweeping Cleveland, the offense turned off completely (no walks, no singles, no power) and even had a scoreless streak that reached into the 30+ inning variety. They got shut out in 6 of 17 games in a July stretch, and 2 of those took ninth inning rallies to stave off shutouts. The nadir may (hopefully) have been getting shutout in Coors Field by a Colorado team not strong in the pitching department and not prone to home shutouts.
Health has taken a tumble, hitting the offense hard. At one time or another, Herrera, Donovan, Nootbaar, Arenado, Walker, Gorman and Contreras have been compromised by injury. Most have tried to play through, and that has gone about as well as it usually does.
Some new themes have developed
After tonight represents the 105-game mark, so my numbers are not a perfect 54 game slice. The Cardinals find themselves 54-51, 3 games above .500 as of the close of business on July 25, game 105. So, -3 for the middle third of the season. Not good. This places them on the outer periphery of the last wild card spot, down 1.5 games and three teams to pass. They play all of them upcoming, so they are not without their chances. But the sum of the season so far suggests that those chances, while not zero, and not high either.
Burleson has returned to the outfield. Out of necessity, with injuries and poor performance. As you look at the 26-man roster today, you see all of one natural outfielder (Scott), everyone else is a converted infielder (using converted in the broadest sense). Coinciding with Burleson’s return to the outfield has been a broader trend of more ragged play, a departure from the sharp defense of the first 54 game segment. On a per-inning basis, he would rank as one of the worst OFer in baseball in OAA. He is a -3 OAA as a RFer in 261 innings. The absolute worst OFer (Castellanos) is -10 in 850+ innings. For those that want to point out that 261 innings is super small sample size, we’ll gander at his career -19 OAA across 1378 OF innings and suggest the trend is consistent. He has gotten a bit better out there, I will give him that. But he is a first baseman. Hiding him in LF might be a solution, except for another question that has surfaced…
How to leverage Ivan Herrera? Alongside the confirmation that Ivan’s bat is for real, and likely an essential building block of a credible offense going forward comes the question of where to play him. There is clear discomfort in his defensive contribution behind the plate. A DH role theoretically suits him, but the performance penalty of being exclusive DH reduces the value his bat provides. Is another position in his future? It’s all this team needs is another converted infielder playing outfield.
The offense against LHP has regressed harshly – Opposing teams have taken to stacking left-handed pitchers against this line-up, starters and relievers. The Cardinals lead in PAs against LHP by a lot. That is the other teams’ managers’ statement about how they perceive the Cardinal offense.
Some of it is the platoon-split advantage with so many lefties in the Cardinal line-up, but the RH hitters have been inexplicably defanged by lefties as well, although injury plays a part here. The line-up, as a whole, regresses to a well-below normal 90 wRC+ against LHP, while cruising along above 110 wRC+ against RHP. I had the impression this is what they kept Baker for, but when the need arose, he is nowhere to be found. Strange. This number has improved a bit since Herrera’s return.
This team struggles mightily with executing bunts – Victor Scott II is a leader here (in poor bunt attempts) but is not alone. The bunting game is coming back in vogue around baseball, but the Cardinals lag.
Team depth is a mirage – The Cardinals are pretty open they don’t trust their starting pitching depth. The depth the position player side of this team showed early has turned out to be quite thin. Depth was tantamount to 10 or 11 guys who could rotate around capably in 9 line-up spots, but there is a significant drop off after that. As soon as more than 1 or 2 guys got hurt or struggled, depth failed to provide relief. The “depth” replacements have by and large been total zeroes, with the possible exception of Pozo. Barrero. Hampson. Siani. Baker. Saggese. Fermin. Collectively they have yet to make any impact in any game.
They may be discovering that Herrera is the linchpin of their lineup and his absence magnifies other weaknesses. Health is key for this team.
Gorman got a bit of runway – Injuries provided what managerial decisions would not. Runway for Nolan Gorman. In this middle third of the season with more regular playing time, Gorman has put up a wRC+ of 133 (that would be top quartile of all MLB hitters with 120 PAs or more in that time), with an OPS of .833 and an SLG of .505, which is something the Cardinals desperately need. He shows an increased walk rate and decreased K rate, both harbingers of future success. Yes, small sample size alert. Then he ended up on the IL with that chronic back issue. Ugh.
They are better than a lot of people thought they’d be, but not enough to matter – The Cardinals have pretty well established their level. They are a slightly above .500 team. They were last year, and they didn’t change much, so this should be no surprise. They beat up on the bad teams fairly effectively, with only a blunder in Pittsburg (and now Colorado) as a blemish there. They compete against the good teams but seem to come up short more often than not. Sometimes coming up short is being outright bludgeoned, as their back-end starters are defenseless against the better hitting teams (Cubs, Mets, Blue Jays, Red Sox, Tigers, Diamondbacks). Other times, the games are taut and the bullpen has found a way to lose, as shown in the team being bottom half in both shutdown (SD) and meltdown (MD) statistics.
How does this shape the final third of the season? Understandably, the team will look to sell off soon-to-be-departing assets and re-charge the pipeline (and hopefully re-balance the talent). I would speculate we might see a bit more aggressive “runway” experience as the team tries to gauge their young up-and-coming talent stream. Probably two key questions remain unanswered – are Gorman and Walker going to ascend? It may also be close to time to find out if Wetherholt is all that and a bag of chips. Time will tell.
The only thing I can safely predict about the coming final lap of the season is that new questions will arise, some questions will be answered and the transition to new management will carry on. It will be fun to watch and report on.