Chaim Bloom can restart the Cardinals by trading for this superstar

The St. Louis Cardinals are in uncharted territory. The franchise is at its lowest point during the DeWitt ownership era. As fans' interest is dwindling with the current product on the field, ownership is ensuing a "reset" to put the organization back on track to its winning ways. But with TV deal reconstructing losing guaranteed money; a new streaming package on the horizon, which is still vague; and fan attendance dropping, ownership is weathering the storm that is the 2025 season. With the front office in its own reset, John Mozeliak is buying his time before he moves on from the role of President of Baseball Operations, which he has held since 2007.

The heir to Mozeliak being Chaim Bloom has many fans very excited for the future ahead. While the current front office shows a repetitive history of failing to develop players, Bloom has displayed tremendous success in his short stint being a GM. The Cardinals admitted defeat in this regard in 2023 and sold off many key players to their team in order to add back to their minor league system. The talent is slowly rising back up, and so are the Cardinals in prospect rankings. While this is due in part to Bloom's influence in his advisory role, Bloom's work of art has been the Red Sox heralding one of the top farm systems in all of baseball. Fans across the sport recognize this and believe he can recreate the same magic in St. Louis.

But the short stint with the Red Sox started off with one of the more controversial decisions to be made within a franchise. His first task as the Red Sox GM was to trade franchise icon Mookie Betts. Ownership cried being cash strapped, the farm system was depleted after the Dave Dombrowski 2018 title push, and the future was looking bleak for future sustainability to win. This is essentially the same position Bloom finds himself in taking over the Cardinals in 2026. The bright side here is that Mozeliak is making the tough and unpopular decisions that ownership has bestowed upon the front office before he resigns.

Clean slate

Bloom gets a fresh start with control being in his hands. The "reset" has allowed him to not deal with unwanted pressures based on prior front-office decisions. The expected next core is in place, and Bloom can direct this franchise in full confidence that aligns with his expertise. With his most notable move being trading the franchise superstar in Betts, he can enjoy the opposite in St. Louis by acquiring one. Even with the Cardinals failing over and over by trading prospects who shine with other organizations, they do not shy away from acquiring MLB superstars to take them to the next level.

Within the DeWitt era, the team has shown this by acquiring names like Mark McGwire, Jim Edmonds, Scott Rolen, Larry Walker, Matt Holliday, Paul Goldschmidt, and Nolan Arenado. While many teams wait for free agency to add big-name players to stabilize their core rosters, the Cardinals look to pounce on other teams ready to move on from theirs. All the names above are star acquisitions from teams who reside in mid to smaller markets who do not get to enjoy long-term success. These teams have to cycle through windows of winning and windows of rebuilding. The Cardinals jump early and often when they see an opportunity with teams starting the rebuilding phase.

Chaim Bloom will have this opportunity starting right out of the gate in 2026. The San Diego Padres are in a transitional period after the passing of their prior owner, Peter Seidler. The team went bonkers during the 2021-2023 seasons by trading much of their farm system for many stars within the game. The team also signed their stars to very long-term deals to ensure Padres fans that the team was ready to compete at a high level for a very long time. This seemed like a perfect dream come true for Padres fans and seemed way too good to be true. After Seidler passed away, this was too good to be true. The Padres are now slowly entertaining trade ideas for players on their roster and have publicly stated they want to shed payroll. The current ownership does not have the same drive that Seidler did, and they are looking to return the Padres back to their market size to avoid losing revenue in the long run.

The next star in St. Louis

With the Padres looking to begin a reset of their own, it seems that they might be open to moving on from one or several of their longer-term commitments. Manny Machado, Xander Bogaerts, and Fernando Tatis Jr. are all locked up for the next decade, and these are key reasons why the team sees issues with their financing. After many tough postseason battles over the years and going head to head with the rival Los Angeles Dodgers, these star players will not be ready to wind down the competitive desire. If they become unhappy with the reset, then maybe they will look toward trying to win with another organization. This scenario has played out well for the Cardinals many times in the past.

The player that has the best value to be moved is Fernando Tatis Jr. He is still very young, his long-term contract guarantees his roster control, and with AAVs on the rise, his will be comfortable to pay in the long run. What makes this more logical is that the Padres have had off-the-field issues with Tatis that have not favored the Padres from a public image perspective. On top of clubhouse culture issues, it might be wise to entertain shopping Tatis to recoup the prospects lost over the past four seasons.

The Cardinals have much history with the Tatis name and even tried adding Tatis as an amateur signing early on in his career. This will not be an uncertain move, and fans know the organization likes working within comfort. Having a superstar locked up for over a decade, who is still very young, who has history with the organization, and who is still very productive makes for the right ingredients for a Bloom recipe. Fans might think this is a stretch with how much-mixed signaling is taking place from ownership, but Mozeliak did not rule out for fans to expect increased payrolls in the future. This does not mean the Cardinals will be aggressive in trying to be level with the Los Angeles Dodgers. But this does mean that they will be reactive to the market of the game and will capitalize in areas where they see fit. With two franchises working to reestablish themselves for long-term success, maybe Chaim Bloom will repeat Cardinals history to start off his tenure as the new President of Baseball Operations.