Evaluating St. Louis Cardinals MVP, Cy Young, and Rookie of the Year cases

The St. Louis Cardinals are off to a strong start as a team. But do any Cardinals have a shot at the end-of-season individual awards?

The St. Louis Cardinals are in first place in the NL Central. They’re grinding out tough wins. They’re getting healthy. And they’re showing signs they might be a real contender. As a team, a whole lot is going right.

But how do the Cardinals stack up on an individual level? As it gets closer, we’ll take a look at the all-star positional races (personally, I think Arenado, Goldschmidt, Edman and Helsley are locks, with cases to be made for Waino, Yadi, Albert, and Mikolas). But do any of the St. Louis Cardinals have a chance at the coveted year-end awards?

The only current Cardinals to win an MVP, Cy Young or Rookie of the Year is Albert Pujols. In fact, Albert is the last Cardinal to win Rookie of the Year (2001) or MVP (2009), while the last Cardinal to win the Cy Young was Chris Carpenter in 2005.

The current MVP drought of 12 seasons is the longest in franchise history since the 20 year gap between Willie McGee (1985) and Pujols. In fact, the 2010s were only the third decade since 1920 where a St. Louis Cardinal did not win an MVP award (1950s and 1990s).

It’s shocking to me, but Chris Carpenter and Bob Gibson are the only Cardinals to win a Cy Young. Wainwright had his stolen by Tim Lincecum in 2009, but surely a team that values pitching as much as the Cardinals should have the best starter on their roster, right?

And while Pujols is one, can you name the other five Cardinals to win rookie of the year? (answer revealed at the end!) The MVP drought might be long, but since the rookie of the year award was introduced in 1947, the Cardinals have never gone this long (20 seasons) without a winner.

So while we (rightfully) focus on if the Cardinals have what it takes to make a deep postseason run, let’s take a moment to examine the award races. We’ll start with MVP, move to Cy Young, and finish with ROY. Do any Cardinals have a shot?

Cy Young

There might not be tougher competition for any award in baseball than NL Cy Young. Even without Jacob DeGrom and Max Scherzer at full-strength, the list of competitors is incredible.

Last-year’s winner Corbin Burnes and runner-up Zack Wheeler are dominating once again. Sandy Alcantara and Pablo Lopez have been almost unhittable for the Marlins. Joe Musgrove is leading the Padres pitching staff. Max Fried has continued to develop as an ace for the Atlanta Braves. And I haven’t even mentioned any of the Dodgers superstars. The Cy Young shortlist is a tough one to crack.

All that being said, the Cardinals boast two legitimate dark-horse candidates. Once again, Adam Wainwright is one of the best pitchers in baseball. He’s top ten in ERA, innings pitched, and home runs per nine innings. And Waino is just outside the top ten in WAR, hits per nine, and WHIP.

It’s a long season, and part of what wins a Cy Young is being dominant throughout the entire 162 games. If the season ended today, Wainwright would not be in the discussion for the top pitcher in the league. If he continues to be consistent, however, and mixes in a few dominating outings, he will only rise up the leaderboard.

The surprising feature to this section is Wainwright ranks second in most pitching categories among Cardinals starters. The leader is none other than Miles Mikolas. Mikolas is also top ten in the NL in ERA and innings pitched. In addition, Mikolas is top ten in WHIP, adjusted ERA+, and 11th in WAR. Not to mention that he’s one of only five NL starters with a complete game– and that doesn’t include the almost no-hitter from Tuesday night.

Like Wainwright, Mikolas has a long road ahead to be included in the Cy Young conversation. The voters and the metrics both favor high strikeout guys, which disadvantages the Cardinals pitch-to-contact method. However, it’s fun to track how these two aces stack up against the rest of the league. And who knows? A few more months of domination, and both Wainwright and Mikolas could see their names on a piece of hardware.

Rookie of the Year

By this point, I think everyone in baseball has heard of Cardinals Devil Magic. A relatively unknown rookie shows up midseason in St. Louis and becomes a household name. To the chagrin of the rest of the league, it feels like this phenomenon happens every year.

What people might not know is that excluding the shortened 2020 season, at least one Cardinals player has received rookie of the year votes every season since Matt Carpenter in 2012.  Unsurprisingly, they are the only team in baseball with this streak.

2021- Dylan Carlson (3rd)

2020- no one (60-game season)

2019- Dakota Hudson (5th)

2018- Jack Flaherty (5th), Harrison Bader (6th)

2017- Paul DeJong (2nd)

2016- Aledmys Diaz (5th), Seung-Hwan Oh (6th)

2015- Stephen Piscotty (6th)

2014- Kolten Wong (3rd)

2013- Shelby Miller (3rd)

2012- Matt Carpenter (6th)

This season, there are three candidates to continue the trend, and potentially break through to finish first. Let’s look at each one, before evaluating their competition from around the league. A quick shoutout to Andre Pallante and Matthew Liberatore, who have been solid on the mound but probably won’t get enough innings to compete for the award.

Juan Yepez

Yepez has slowed down a bit since his torrid start, but he’s still slashing .272/.332/.440 with five home runs. Simply put, Juan Yepez knows how to hit. If Yepez can continue to get at-bats, there is no doubt that he can build a strong rookie of the year case.

Nolan Gorman

Now that the top prospect has shown he can field his position at second, there’s no reason to send Nolan Gorman down to the minors. Not to mention the heads-up baserunning. I wouldn’t be shocked if Gorman went on a tear sometime over the next month, vaulting up the rookie rankings and establishing himself as a core part of the St. Louis Cardinals future.

Brendan Donovan

Is there anything this guy can’t do? Brendan Donovan has batted in each spot in the lineup and played six different positions in the field this season. More importantly, Donovan walked more than he’s struck out, leads qualified NL rookies in OPS, and leads all NL rookie hitters in WAR. It’s not only that Donnie can do everything– it’s that he can do everything really, really well.

So Yepez has an outside shot, Gorman has the prospect recognition, and Donovan is the surprising early leader. Despite their strong start, however, the young Cardinals trio has staunch competition from around the league.

Two Cubs outfielders, Christopher Morel and Seiya Suzuki, are right on Donovan’s tail on the OPS leaderboard. Hunter Greene in Cincinnati and Mackenzie Gore in San Diego are both top draft picks pitching like aces of the future. Spencer Strider and Michael Harris are each performing well for the Atlanta Braves. And we haven’t yet seen the debut of Pirates prospect O’Neil Cruz.

Young players can be wildly inconsistent, and a lot can change in the rookie of the year race. But I’d put my money on Gorman and Donovan keeping pace with the rest of the league for the whole season. It’s due time for the St. Louis Cardinals to have another Rookie of the Year.

Conclusion

So, can the Cardinals win a major award this season? Goldschmidt is the front-runner for MVP, but he has to hold off Manny Machado, Mookie Betts, Bryce Harper, and two of his teammates. Cy Young looks like it might be out of reach, but there are three young Cardinals building strong rookie of the year resumes.

There are other spaces for recognition, as well. Maybe Ryan Helsley gets more save opportunities and wins reliever of the year? Oli Marmol has done a commendable job managing a roster full of moving pieces. Is he worthy of manager of the year recognition?

Of course, the Cardinals have brought back most of the Gold Glove roster from last season, too. It wouldn’t be shocking for the Cardinals to defend their title as the best defense in baseball in 2022, as well.

Ultimately, there’s a reason these awards aren’t given out in June. Less than half the season has been played, and no one knows what the rest of the summer might bring. The good news is the St. Louis Cardinals boast worthy candidates for each spot. And in a quest for a deep playoff run, you need to have superstars to rely on.

The Cardinals have a long history of individual and team accomplishments. We’ll keep tracking these players as they work to add to both tallys. In the meantime, we can celebrate their individual success as the team steadily wins ballgames and builds towards the postseason.

Trivia question– The six St. Louis Cardinal Rookie of the Year winners are:

Wally Moon (1954)

Bill Virdon (1955)

Bake McBride (1974)

Vince Coleman (1985)

Todd Worrell (1986)

Albert Pujols (2001)