The St. Louis Cardinals are expected to have some activity this offseason, a welcoming change from the dormant winter of last year when they invested a whopping $2 million into the major league roster. However, that activity will likely take the team in the opposite direction of contention as Chaim Bloom puts the foundation on a multi-year rebuild.
With the expected trade of Nolan Arenado, a more than 50/50 shot Sonny Gray is pitching elsewhere, and at least one lefty bat on the move, the 26-man roster will look different than 2025, but in the direction of a sub-.500 team. In a now-annual tradition of looking at the free agent trade market from the perspective of a division-leading club, I like to use the start of the 2026 baseball year by looking at moves I would like to make in a win-now season. The first item on the list would be the same for me: trade Arenado and find a place to put JJ Wetherholt everyday in his absence.
Still trade a lefty bat
Last week, I looked at the four lefty bats and decided that I would lean towards trading Brendan Donovan and Lars Nootbaar for a team that is looking to rebuild rather than compete. In this theoretical offseason of contention, at least one lefty bat would still need to be on the go. Currently, Donovan and Alec Burleson are penciled in for starting spots, likely second base and left field, respectively. Nootbaar is a big question mark after an offseason heel surgery and Nolan Gorman is a bench piece who tends to be a better player when given consistent at-bats.
While settling on Donovan and Noot last week, I would now choose Noot and Gorman as players to go. I personally think Gorman still has the potential to be an above-average player, especially if he can have the positional versatility of second and third while potentially adding first base to his repertoire, but on a team that needs to win now, he would be expendable. The everyday at-bats are not currently there without a trade, and that would come from a deal of Donovan. For a postseason team, the consistency and reliability of Donovan would be needed and when paired with Burleson’s potential as a run producer, those two form a solid lineup base.
The trade of Gorman and Arenado would leave third base open and this is where Spring Training could be used to determine if Donovan or Wetherholt is best there. Donovan spent most of the season at second after an elbow surgery, so I can’t speak to his arm strength from the hot corner, while Wetherholt is a shortstop but one who was always seen as likely to move off the position. In these moves, my infield would consist of Wetherholt at third, Gold Glover Masyn Winn at short, Donnie at second, and Willson Contreras at first. Lineup?
Donovan, Herrera, Burleson, Contreras, DH, Wetherholt, Winn, Walker, Scott. Masyn Winn is my biggest question mark when it comes to the lineup and where he fits. The middle of the order (2-5) could be moved around in mostly any direction, but I love Herrera’s skillset from the two-hole. The DH spot is noticeably filled by John Doe. More later.
Invest heavily in pitching
In the real world, Sonny Gray is a likely Chaim Bloom casualty as he is playing this season on a $40 million price tag and has stated he is welcomed to a trade out of St. Louis. I believe the Cardinals will take the financial hit and pay a team to increase the minimal prospect return Gray will fetch on the trade market. For my championship team, Gray has to remain as a workhorse for the rotation. Note how I did not say “ace” of the staff, as he has been since coming over as a free agent.
In my offseason, Gray will be a middle-of-the-rotation arm for a staff that will include Matthew Liberatore and Michael McGreevy. I was overall uninspired by Andre Pallante’s final few months of 2025, but his inning-eating ability will play well for the realistic 2026 Cardinals. For me, I would make him a long-relief option or as a depth piece in Memphis for when my rotation backfires. Kyle Leahy is still an intriguing option that I would like to see start, but remember, 2026 is ring-chasing in my world. The worst part about free agent predictions, and especially those theoretical moves, is that the player has to want to sign with a team. Said organization can offer $500 million, but the player still has every right to say no if they do not wish to play in that market.
That being said, the Cardinals rotation is in dire need of an ace, as well as some strikeout stuff. If I was able to convince my target arms to sign with St. Louis, I would lean towards high-profile (read: high-priced) arms with a positive track record. In my case, I am usually against offering pitchers long-term deals (to me, five years or more), but am happy to pay a premium for three effective years. Worst case, an injury costs you a season of productivity and only hamstrings your organization for a couple years as opposed to a handfull.
The first pitcher I would overpay would be a fun one in Brandon Woodruff. The former-Brewer (for now), will be 33 next year and is coming off a great prove-it season to show his health and effectiveness. In 12 starts, he went 7-2 with a 3.87 FIP and a career-high 32.3% K-rate that was paired with his excellent command. Woodruff did lose a tick on his fastball, but maybe a healthy offseason will help him jump back into the mid-90s with his velocity. Give me Woodruff on a three-year, $70 million deal with an opt-out each season, above his $17.1 million market value estimate by Spotrac.
Joining the righty would be left-hander Framber Valdez, who is a more expensive option as Spotrac views him as commanding over $30 million annually on the free agent market. Despite his “accidental cross up” from earlier in the season, Valdez has been a quality rotation piece since becoming a full-time part of the staff in Houston in 2021 and has a career 3.36 ERA while receiving Cy Young votes four times and appeared on MVP ballots twice. Even though Valdez had an 8.77 K/9 rate last season, that would rank second on last year’s Cardinal team behind Gray. His fastball still sits in the mid-90s and he got whiffs on his curveball 43.7% of the time, which he paired with a solid 90mph changeup. My theoretical rotation of Woodruff, Valdez, Gray, Liberatore, and McGreevy would be a major step up from 2025, but still may not be enough to compete with the juggernauts of the NL. My hopeful difference makers will come from the power in the lineup… coming up next! But first…
Just because, I decided to add my honorable mentions: Max Scherzer/Justin Verlander (one-year deals with the promise of being flipped to a contender at the deadline if the season imploded), Dustin May/Walker Buehler (prove-it deals with opt outs, prefer two years guaranteed), German Marquez/Michael Soroka (just always liked them and could be cheap, rotation fillers for a couple years).
Overpay for power
And finally, something that has been missing from the Cardinals for most of this decade, POWER! Since 2020, the Cardinals rank 21st in the majors in homers and 16th in slug, while measuring in at a team 101 WRC+. Coming into 2025, my lineup from the first point still lacks pop, but I do believe in 25+ homer potential from Burly, Contreras, Herrera, and the DH spot, with Winn clubbing 15-20 more from short. If those five players hit that mark, that would total 115 homers, just 33 below the team’s total from last season when they had just one player hit 20 long balls.
Since the adoption of the DH, the Cardinals have not really committed to a full-time player at that spot, instead using it as partial days off or a way to get hot bats into the order. As the AL and those NL teams that have adjusted have shown, a potent DH is actually a positive piece, as long as the rest of the lineup allows for it. In the National League specifically, St. Louis ranks 12th in homers from the DH spot since 2020, but is near the top in OBP because of their contact-oriented lineup and constant shuffling of players into the spot. It has not paid off in the production categories, as the team sits 14th in the NL in RBIs and last in doubles. The best DHs in that span? By measure of WRC+ among qualified DHs, the top five consists of Shohei Ohtani, Bryce Harper, Kyle Schwarber, Marcell Ozuna, and Seiya Suzuka. While a few of those players can play other positions, their teams prefer to keep their value untainted by their work in the batters box.
So who would my theoretical DH be for the Cardinals next year? I wrote in another piece that a Nolan Arenado for Nick Castellanos swap could fill that need, and I still don’t think that is necessarily a terrible option. In terms of free agents, there are not a ton of 40-homer options on the market, save for Schwarber who is probably even out of my price range but I would at least offer him something. Marcell Ozuna still hit 21 homers last year, but was an awkward fit, losing his job a couple times throughout the year and had an unsuccessful tenure in St. Louis in 2018 and 2019.
Without anything super intriguing to overpay for on the free agent market, I looked at MLBTR’s top trade targets to settle on a couple/few names I’d call rival GMs about. Brandon Lowe and Wilyer Abreu come to mind first, but are both left-handed for a lineup that struggled massively against lefty pitchers. Taylor Ward was an interesting name for me last year, and I would call the Angels to see what they would want in return for the 31-year-old.
The power point is the last in my offseason as it looks like the available options to pay for homers is pretty sparse. I am typically against putting young guys at DH so early in their career, but maybe that is an option for Jordan Walker (if he can regain life at the plate) or Blaze Jordan, assuming that Contreras and Wetherholt handle the corners.
And this takes us to the end of my theoretical offseason checklist that of course will not happen. To me, it is always fun to look at the offseason like a manager of the team in MLB the Show, but it is important to not let it bug me if these moves do not happen. This is where it is necessary to keep hope and reality separate, because I do believe it is best for the organization to change things up. Obviously, though, if I were in charge, the Cardinals would win the World Series with a 162-0 regular season and undefeated playoff run.
Let the real offseason… BEGIN!
