St. Louis Cardinals: Three predictions for spring training

The Cards leave with three definitive starters in the outfield

The St. Louis Cardinals’ outfield is young and inexperienced. The player with the most service time is Harrison Bader with only 348 games under his belt. Per Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post Dispatch, the Cardinals have only named Harrison Bader as the outfielder written in pen for a starting job.

Beyond Bader in center field, Tyler O’Neill, Dylan Carlson, Lane Thomas, and Justin Williams, will all be fighting for a job at one of the corners or on the bench. When the Cardinals leave Jupiter, it is likely that only three of these four head North to Cincinnati for Opening Day.

The easy choice for left field is Tyler O’Neill after his Gold Glove campaign in 2020. For right field, the team will likely want to give Dylan Carlson as many at-bats as possible to continue his growth. Predicting these three as the starting outfield isn’t going out on a limb, but the team rarely leaves spring without naming a starter at each position in the field.

All of the outfielders on the 40-man will get plenty of playing time this spring, but I believe the cream will rise to the top, and that’ll end up being O’Neill/Bader/Carlson. At the end of the day, the Cardinals shouldn’t leave spring training without knowing which three outfielders will take the field on Opening Day.

There are plenty of other options for predictions to be made, but these three are the things I’ll be watching closest this spring. Even if all of these are wrong, the Cardinals are greatly improved and I’ll be wrong every day of the week if it means it can be baseball season.