Matthew Liberatore's shift to starting has given Cardinals pitcher a full bag of tricks

Nearly a year ago, St. Louis Cardinals fans heard that solid reliever Matthew Liberatore was being inserted into the competition for a starting rotation spot. At the time, it looked to be a last-second idea, with Liberatore not actually getting a real shot in the starting five thanks to his success out of the bullpen. Now, though, the southpaw looks poised to lead a completely revamped pitching staff.

Matthew Liberatore's PitchCom system ran out of buttons for all of his pitches.

When PitchCom was established, it was created to keep the pace of games moving while also making sure there was not any funny business going on with sign stealing. This new technology has made its way down the ladder, as now even teams in my high school softball team's conference have implemented similar systems. Keeping pitchers and catchers on the same page not only helps pace of play, it prevents the need for changing signs with runners on base, which could become confusing for all parties involved as these secret systems got more complex. "Back in my day," our go-to was runner on second, "chase two," meaning that the first sign AFTER the catcher put down a two in his stance was the pitch to throw. As teams caught on to that, we then had to get sneaky with counts and equipment taps, all things that are out the window thanks to PitchCom.

Matthew Liberatore has bounced between featuring a five- and six-pitch mix since becoming a starter, but each of the pitches has been average or slightly above rather than having one go-to offering. Coming into a 2026 season where Libby is transforming into the leader of the rotation, though, the southpaw is adding to his repertoire and has run out of buttons on the new pitch-calling technology.

Whatever tinkering Liberatore has been doing with his pitch mix has been working thus far in Spring Training. With the caveat that he is doing this in games that "don't matter," no matter how you slice it, Liberatore has been amazingly effective during the exhibition season. Through a team-high 10 innings pitched in Florida, Libby has allowed a total of three runs with just one walk against 14 strikeouts. His fastball has been around his typical 94-95mph range, whatever that means in spring, but Nate Schwartz of Pitcher List was more impressed with the usage rates of his other pitches. I had Nate on along with Thomas Gauvain to break down the pitching rotation, but we spent most of the time talking about Liberatore and what his future ceiling could be when looking at where he fits for a contender. We discussed the entire rotation, so feel free to jump in there and drop your starting five predictions for when the Cardinals head north to play Tampa Bay in the season opener.

We still have a couple weeks for the rotation to sort itself out, but even with Dustin May touching 99mph with electric stuff, all signs point towards Matthew Liberatore getting the ball on Opening Day. After a successful season in his first full year as a starter, Liberatore looks to take his stuff to new levels and lead a ragtag staff of arms.