3 reasons why the Cardinals should wait to address rotation until 2024

The Cardinals would be better off waiting to upgrade their rotation until next offseason

Going into this off-season, one of the biggest needs identified for the St. Louis Cardinals was the lack of a true ace. But after re-signing Adam Wainwright, the club would be better off waiting to address that need until next off-season.

The Cardinals lack a true ace on their roster right now, and although they do have some high-quality starters, you don’t expect any of them to truly matchup with other club’s aces in the postseason. While it would be great to find that ace before the 2023 season, it does not appear like that will be an option that St. Louis can realistically go after.

This is assuming that the Cardinals are out of the Jacob deGrom and Justin Verlander sweepstakes, and that a guy like Shane Bieber or Tyler Glasnow won’t be available on the trade market. If the opportunity to grab an ace is there, they should take it, but it seems unlikely that St. Louis will be in that position before the 2023 season.

John Mozeliak seems to have his eyes set on catcher, a left-handed bat, and bullpen help. Shortstop could end up being a target, but the market would have to play into the Cardinals favor for that to happen. Xander Bogaerts and Dansby Swanson still remain in play for the club.

Let’s look at a few reasons why the Cardinals would be better off waiting until next off-season to revamp their rotation.

The rotation will have major turnover after 2023

One of the underrated storylines entering the 2023 season is the fact that four of the five projected starters for St. Louis will be free agents after the season, with just Steven Matz being under contract long-term.

Adam Wainwright will be retiring at the end of the season, and not only has he become a club legend, but he has continued to provide the Cardinals with important innings over his final few seasons. Miles Mikolas bounced back big time in 2022, going 12-13 with a 3.29 ERA in 202.1 innings of work. Jordan Montgomery was a critical second-half addition, going 6-3 with a 3.11 ERA on the stretch for St. Louis. Jack Flaherty missed most of the 2022 season but will be looking to prove he still has ace-like stuff in his contract year.

The Cardinals may look to bring back one or two of these guys next off-season, but the likelihood is that they will need to fill three or four rotation spots come 2024. Matz is a quality middle of the rotation starter, but the club will need to find innings at both the top and backend of their rotation.

While the Cardinals could go ahead and add an option to their roster that will be there after 2023, the smarter play would be to ride out their options for this season, evaluate who to bring back, and which young arms could join the rotation. Ideally though, the Cardinals would revamp their rotation with one of the many top-end starters who will be free agents after 2023.

The 2023-2024 free agent class is loaded with top-end starters

Between Wainwright, Mikolas, Flaherty, and Montgomery, the Cardinals will have $49.7 million coming off of the books after 2023. Add in other expiring salaries, and that numbers jumps up to close to $70 million.

While some of that money will need to be used toward other roster spots, it’s safe to say John Mozeliak will have an opportunity to go after an ace if he so chooses. Here are just some of the names available next off-season: Aaron Nola, Shohei Ohtani, Max Scherzer, Julio Urias, Yu Darvish, Lucas Giolito, Clayton Kershaw, Blake Snell, Frankie Montas, Lance Lynn, Sonny Gray, and Luis Severino, on top of the Cardinals own starters and others.

While some may look at that list and say there is no way the Cardinals are spending that kind of money, the advantage that St. Louis has here is that with so many high-end starters available, the bidding wars on individual pitchers will not be as drastic as when there are only a few top-end guys available. Even if the Cardinals have to shell out $30 million to an ace, that still leaves them with $40 million to round out other roster spots.

Outside of their rotation guys hitting free agency, the Cardinals do not have any other impact free agents hitting the market. This frees up St. Louis to go after some of that high end talent, knowing that they have plenty of internal options to fill out their roster.

Let’s look at some of those internal options who could fill out the rotation.