St. Louis Cardinals: Goldschmidt’s impact on the Cardinals depth

Paul Goldschmidt’s addition adds a great deal of pop to the starting lineup, which consequently also shores up the bench with would-be starters. This makes the bench, which was one of the Cardinals strengths in 2019, full of possibly expendable assets.

While the acquisition of Paul Goldschmidt is a landmark move for the St. Louis Cardinals, it shouldn’t be the only one. Just about everyone was under the impression that the Cardinals were more than a single player away from being a contender, and Goldschmidt doesn’t change that. He gets the team exponentially closer, but more holes need to be filled, specifically in the bullpen.

There are bodies at just about every position that the St. Louis Cardinals can choose from to fill their bench in 2019, and many of these names are ones that we saw in the field often last season.  However, many of these names are also guys who are going to be paid like starters and have the value of starters, so trading them to recoup said value is in some cases a better idea then keeping them around with limited plate appearances.

Obviously, this doesn’t apply to everyone. Keeping talent on the bench is important, so keeping a couple of fringe starters around as reinforcements is something the Cardinals will certainly want to do. The team enjoyed having a strong bench, and should want to maintain the high quality of the backups that gave them loads of lineup options in 2018.

But which ones? With a plethora of young names that are coming up through the Cardinals farm system, some people fit because of their talent, while others fit because they wouldn’t serve you any better in a trade Let’s take a look at some of these names and decide whether or not the St. Louis Cardinals should keep them or ship them off.