3 St. Louis Cardinals trade rumors to shoot down

Last year's MVP will be next year's Cardinals first baseman

The best player in the NL last year was Paul Goldschmidt. He also happens to have been one of the best players in the sport over his 13-year career. And while his numbers certainly are down from last year's hardware-capturing campaign, Goldy remains one of the best players on the team, even at age 35.

So why would anyone talk about trading him? Well, he is 35 years old, and most players see their performance fall off in their late 30s. Also, Goldschmidt will be a free agent at the end of next season, so there's a temptation to use the team's down year to do a hard reset. Trading the reigning MVP certainly would bring back a nice haul of prospects.

But you know what the Cardinals have a boatload of? Prospects! Sure, given how often prospects don't pan out, having more opportunities to find the next Paul Goldschmidt is beneficial. But St. Louis has the actual Paul Goldschmidt right now. Why would they send him elsewhere on the off chance a lottery ticket hits the jackpot?

There could be one more reason to deal away Goldy. He's making $26M this season and next, and if we were to believe Cardinals owner Bill DeWitt, baseball "isn't very profitable, to be honest." Of course, most of us have learned the last person we can trust about a team's profits is that team's owner.

Could St. Louis trade Goldschmidt? Certainly. Should they do so? Certainly not. Will they? No, not even DeWitt is that oblivious to the path to profitability, to be honest.