St. Louis Cardinals: Five players who could make the Birds a playoff team

The St. Louis Cardinals are 36-28 and in third place in the NL Central. Right now, we would be missing the playoffs for the third straight year. Who can we trade for to turn the team into a playoff contender?

The St. Louis Cardinals are 20th in baseball in team batting average. 22nd in OPS. The starters have the third best ERA in baseball. The relievers have the fifth worst ERA. The team is tied for the second worst fielding percentage in baseball.

Starting pitching = great. Everything else = bad.

As we look forward and start to consider what this team needs to make the playoffs, it would seem the St. Louis Cardinals need more offense. Getting a guy that also plays great defense would help. In my opinion, some of these problems can be solved by playing guys we already have with more regularity.

Harrison Bader is better offensively and defensively than Dexter Fowler.

Jedd Gyorko should be playing third base pretty much everyday. Not only was he the second-best defensive third baseman in all of baseball last year, but he has also hit 50 home runs for the St. Louis Cardinals over the past two seasons.

Getting Paul DeJong back will improve the offense and defense.

Some of these solutions won’t happen because Mike Matheny won’t make it happen.

Even with some in-house options, the team still needs some drastic improvement from position players who needs to come from the outside. So, let’s take a look at some position players who would upgrade the St. Louis Cardinals and potentially turn them into a playoff team capable of making a deep run.

Let me preface this by stating that these players have not necessarily been rumored to be trade candidates (yet, at least), but are simply players who I think might make sense for both teams.