3 good and 2 bad lessons from the Cardinals' 2023 struggles

Hindsight is always 20/20. It's easy for a fan to look at a season, sit back on the couch, and start picking apart each and every mistake a team or player makes in baseball. Besides, we are all the smartest ones in the business. That's why every Cardinals fan has a job in baseball, right? Fans can play the "what-if" game all day and drive themselves crazy.

The 2023 St. Louis Cardinals season will not and should not be forgotten. Once a season with World Series aspirations, it has now become a season of lost hope. The wins are a struggle, and the losses are a devastation. It seems as though each loss gets worse than the last (insert Simpsons meme here).

A person, group, or company that seeks improvement and growth is one that is able to look back and reflect on its successes, its shortcomings, and its mistakes and makes a plan to fix those failures while capitalizing on the victories. The St. Louis Cardinals must take a hard look at themselves in the mirror after this season and learn from their mistakes.

The errors can be felt on all levels of the organization: ownership, front office, coaches, players, and training staff. The poor play on the field and poor management of the players off the field cannot be pinned on only one person; just like when things go well, it was a team effort.

There are five lessons the Cardinals organization can learn from this past season: depth, its offseason focuses, the youth movement, leaning into the trends, and spending money. Let's break down each lesson, both good and bad, and see how the team can duplicate that effort or amend the effort to prevent the mistake down the road.

The Bad: Offseason Plan

To many people, the team's weakness was quite evident: pitching. The front office, however, doubled down on its starting rotation and bullpen. While having six starters is always a good thing, it really helps to have six STRONG starters. Quality and quantity are essential in a starting rotation.

The other pain from the offseason seems to be its free-agency approach. While the Cardinals have plenty of depth to trade from, the focus during the offseason appeared to be filling in Yadier Molina's absence rather than the rotation. The team could have traded for Sean Murphy and then spent its free agency money on a top-end starter. Instead, management spent its money on Willson Contreras. While I don't necessarily disagree with signing Contreras, I think there were two or three routes that would have been preferable this past offseason.

The plan after signing Contreras was to use the player depth to trade midseason for a starter. That plan clearly didn't work out, as the rotation and bullpen played to their projections, thus being a part of the reason the team is where it is now.

I'm sure signing Contreras alone wasn't Plan A for Mozeliak and Co. However, pushing harder to acquire top-end talent through free agency and trades this past offseason would have helped the team greatly.

The Good: Focus on the Youth

The Cardinals have been great at developing major-league talent in the past ten years. It's been one of the reasons the team has been able to compete each year for a playoff spot despite having their first draft pick in the 20s each year. The minor league system and Randy Flores are excellent at identifying and developing young players.

Due to this fact, the major league roster can be supplanted with ready-to-go young players who can hold their own on the big stage. Brendan Donovan, Nolan Gorman, and Lars Nootbaar are all in the top seven in WAR totals on the team and not one of them is older than 26 years old. Ivan Herrera also saw some time in the majors and played well given his age and track record. This spells a strong future for the team.

The team needs to lean more into this youth movement with other players such as Masyn Winn, Michael McGreavy, Ivan Herrera, and Gordon Graceffo next year. Injecting youth will help keep the clubhouse light and will bring athleticism that the team seems to be missing this year.

Players such as Corbin Carroll, Eury Perez, Gunnar Henderson, Hunter Brown, Anthony Volpe, and Francisco Alvarez were called up this year at a young age. Each player is providing a huge spark for their teams. The Cardinals should mirror that next year with their rising shortstop star and their fine starting pitching prospects.

The Bad: Leaning into the Trends

Many teams this past offseason targeted speed, defense, and strikeout pitching. With the plethora of new rules (bigger bases, limited shifts, limited pitcher disengagements), teams needed pitchers who could limit basemen, infielders who could cover ground, and players who were willing and able to steal bases.

Instead, the Cardinals lessened their typical defensive prowess by playing Jordan Walker in the majors at a position he just started playing, settling for corner outfielders in center field, and signing a catcher with noted defensive shortcomings. While Walker and Contreras have high offensive ceilings, their defensive abilities are not as strong.

Furthermore, the team's baserunning ability has also decreased significantly. Fangraphs has a useful stat called Baserunning Runs (BsR). This stat measures the runs that are created from stolen bases, double plays, and runners taking the extra base when possible. Last year, the team had a 4.7 BsR. This year, they are sitting at -6.5 with only Brendan Donovan, Nolan Gorman, and Paul Goldschmidt sitting above 1.0 BsR. This places them at 25th in the league. In a year where baserunning should be up, the Cardinals are going in the opposite direction.

The Good: Spending

Ironically, the Cardinals spent the most money this past offseason than they ever had. Willson Contreras's five-year, $87.5 million contract was the largest contract given out to a true free agent in team history. This upcoming offseason, the team should match those efforts.

While Contreras may not have been the ideal candidate for a franchise-record contract, his signing shows the team has a desire to sign big free agents, particularly players who fill a need the team has. With the amount of great pitching in this off-season's free-agent class, it is imperative the Cardinals spend money once again. With $35-$40 million coming off the books after the 2023 season, management should use that money to sign a top-end free-agent starter and some bullpen reinforcements.

Building a roster is done in three ways primarily, drafting and developing, trading, and free agent signings. The Cardinals have historically done a good job at drafting and developing; they've practically broken even with trades in recent history; now, they must do more than just dip their toes in the free agent market in the 2024 off-season.