Cardinals might be testing driving a new lineup with surprising two-hole hitter

The St. Louis Cardinals' offense has been one of the best in all of baseball to begin the 2025 season, but not all cogs in that machine are firing on all cylinders.

Masyn Winn began the season in quite the rut after a rough spring training but found a way to turn that performance around in the last week. Only Winn and two other regulars in the lineup have an OPS south of .700 to begin the year, and Alec Burleson, who mustered a .660 OPS to this point, is still carrying a nice .270 average to begin the year.

The only hitter in the lineup who really can't figure things out right now is first baseman Willson Contreras, who in 49 at-bats is slashing .102/.170/.143 with 22 strikeouts. Coming into the 2025 season, Contreras was far and away the best hitter on the Cardinals roster, and while that is likely still true, he's really lost at the plate right now.

The Cardinals decided to give Contreras an off day on Friday as the Philadelphia Phillies come to town, and that means the Cardinals are slotting in a new face into the number two spot of the lineup as they face Aaron Nola this evening.

Jordan Walker is batting second in what could end up being a new-look top of the lineup for the Cardinals

Batting in the two hole tonight will be right fielder Jordan Walker, who has been off to a pretty good start to his 2025 season. After what was an extremely disappointing year last season, Walker has come out of the gates hitting .282/.378/.359. While he hasn't been one of the best hitters on the roster, he's certainly done his part, and he'll have the opportunity tonight to produce while hitting between Lars Nootbaar and Brendan Donovan at the top of the order.

There has been a lot of talk as of late about moving Contreras down in the batting order, and while we don't know how the Cardinals will handle the lineup when Contreras comes back tomorrow, this is the route they'd likely go if they did move Contreras down in the order.

I have my doubts that they will actually move Contreras down on Saturday, but perhaps a big game from Walker would change that. If Ivan Herrera were healthy right now, I would have no doubt that he would be batting second for them right now, but with his recent injured list stint, the Cardinals' lineup is pretty thin on right-handed bats.

Outside of Contreras and Walker, the other right-handed bats on the roster are Nolan Arenado, Masyn Winn, Pedro Pages, Thomas Saggese, Luken Baker, and Yohel Pozo. Arenado is the cleanup hitter and that won't be changing anytime soon, and while Winn's bat has been hotter lately, I doubt they'd move up from the bottom of the lineup in the near future. Pages, Saggese, and Pozo just don't fit the bill right now in that number two spot, and Baker does get those opportunities in the middle of the lineup when a lefty is on the mound.

The Cardinals do have lefties like Burleson and Victor Scott II, and they will soon have Nolan Gorman back as well, but stacking the lineup with three lefties in a row at the top will present them issues in the later innings.

We all know that Paul Goldschmidt's early-season struggles that many of us cautioned would turn around never did, so no one can say for certain that Willson Contreras will figure things out. But with that being said, Contreras' struggles do not seem like a guy who is declining physically or in ability; he simply looks lost mentally, and his confidence is shot. I believe in a guy like Contreras to get out of that funk, but I do not blame the Cardinals for moving him out of the two hole for now if they so choose in order to get him right.

I'm not convinced Walker is ready for this shift, though. While his .282 average and .378 on-base percentage are nice to see, his .359 SLG is the lowest of his career so far, and his .077 ISO is less than half of his career ISO. His strikeout percentage has dropped by a little over a point, and his walk percentage has more than doubled (11.1%), but if he is not able to take his walk as often as he is right now, then the lack of power is going to come back to bite him here soon. Walker's ground ball percentage is 59.3% so far, the 10th highest in all of baseball, and his line-drive percentage (11.1%) is 149th out of 179 hitters who have qualified so far.

On the flip side, Walker's chase percentage has improved noticeably so far, and anecdotally, he looks far more comfortable at the plate this year than he did last year. Only time will tell if he is able to produce at a high level like the Cardinals are hoping he can.