St. Louis Cardinals: FanSided MLB sites mock winter meetings

The REAL St. Louis Cardinals will be gearing up for winter meetings that will occur in December. In fact, the game plan probably exists as we speak. In preparation of this, we will participate in FanSided’s own mock winter meeting.

Fans of the St. Louis Cardinals should rejoice as winter approaches. Why? Historically, a great deal of MLB activity occurs around the winter meetings. This could well spell the landing of a big trade (e.g. Giancarlo Stanton) or the signing of a big free agent (e.g. Jason Heyward, Dexter Fowler).

FanSided’s MLB sites are so excited about the pending winter meetings that we have created our own mock meetings. Each site is being represented by the respected FanSided site in some way. Many of the editors of these sites are participating as mock GMs.

Redbird Rants’ own Dr. Michael D. Miles and Tito Rivera will be serving in this mock meeting as the St. Louis Cardinals’ GMs. In preparation, let us look at a few potential names and numbers that might loom largely in decisions.

Potential bait

Stephen Piscotty

• Team control and under contract through 2022 (6yr/$33.5M began in 2017).
• .235/.342/.367 in 2017
• Career-WAR: 4.4 (0.6 in 2017)
• Career-oWAR: 3.8 (-0.2 in 2017), career-dWAR: -0.9 (0.4 in 2017)

Randal Grichuk

• Team control through 2021, 2018 is first year arbitration-eligible
• .238/.285/.473 in 2017
• Career-WAR: 7.0 (1.0 in 2017)
• Career-oWAR: 4.4 (0.4 in 2017), career-dWAR: 1.9 (0.1 in 2017)

Jack Flaherty

• Team control through 2022
• 2.18 ERA in AA, AAA in 2017; 6.33 ERA in MLB in 2017
• 148 pitched innings in AA, AAA in 2017; 21.1 IP in MLB in 2017

And those are just a few of the potential names the St. Louis Cardinals could offer for trades. Now let’s take a quick look at a few of the potential “gets.”

Potential gets

Giancarlo Stanton (might as well get this one out of the way)

• Team control and under contract through 2027 (13yr/$325M began in 2015)
• .281/.376/.631 in 2017
• Career-WAR: 35.1 (7.6 in 2017)
• Career-oWAR: 29.8 (6.5 in 2017), career-dWAR: 0.6 (0.4 in 2017)

Jay Bruce

• Free agent
• .254/.324/.508 in 2017
• Career-WAR: 18.9 (1.5 in 2017)
• Career-oWAR: 15.9 (1.2 in 2017), career-dWAR: -3.6 (0 in 2017)

J.D. Martinez

• Free agent
• .303/.376/.690 in 2017
• Career-WAR: 13.7 (2.1 in 2017)
• Career-oWAR: 17.0 (2.5 in 2017), career-dWAR: -6.7 (-0.5 in 2017)

More from Redbird Rants

• Cardinals Rumors: 3 pros and cons of signing Carlos Rodon
• What’s next for the St. Louis Cardinals after Contreras signing?
• Report: Cardinals Emerge As Mystery Team for Carlos Rodon
• Cardinals: Trade targets after signing Willson Contreras
• Reflecting on the 2013 Cardinals’ top 30 prospects

And those are just a few of the names that could be had. The questions remain then, Who goes? Who should the St. Louis Cardinals target? Who should the St. Louis Cardinals avoid?

It is our goal in the mock winter meetings to play through all the potential trades to see if we- not the actual GMs mind you- will be lucky enough to make the moves that (1) could actually happen, and (2) make creative moves that our respective teams SHOULD consider.

To kick things off before our official mock meetings coming up at the end of the month, we have been tasked with identifying the following as available or seeking:

GREEN=AVAILABLE; RED=SEEKING

C

1B

2B

SS

3B

LF

CF

RF

DH

SP

RP

At first glance, we are thinking that 1B (Matt Carpenter), 3B (Jedd Gyorko), SS (Aledmys Diaz), LF (Grichuk), RF (Piscotty), and SP (Flaherty) as green. Additionally, we are thinking of coloring LF, RF, SP, and RP as red.

But here’s how you can help US. We are asking you to send us names from the St. Louis Cardinals who we should shop and to whom we should shop them. Additionally, if you have trade ideas, please Tweet those to us.

Please tweet at our Redbird Rants account.

Next: 2018 bullpen options

Stay tuned as we will update you when the meeting occur and the outcomes. We will also update should we secure a trade before the actual meeting dates happen. But please help us by tweeting to us!