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3 unexpected moves the Cardinals could make this offseason

Three players that the Cardinals could go after that aren’t on the top of everyone’s list.

By Cliff Williams |
San Diego Padres v Los Angeles Dodgers
San Diego Padres v Los Angeles Dodgers / Harry How/GettyImages
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The playoffs haven’t finished yet and for the first time in several years, we are already talking about what the Cardinals will look like next year.

There are several holes that need to be filled. John Mozeliak has said there will be three pitchers signed. The President Bill DeWitt has said there will be a payroll increase. Based on this everyone is expecting something like Aaron Nola, Sonny Gray, and some other pitcher that will make us all just giddy.

I tend to be a bit more skeptical. If you look at recent free agency signing periods the Cardinals have been linked to several top-level, game-changing free agents over the years and have come up short. John Mozeliak always seems to hit his ‘puke point’ and backs off.

Granted this year it seems the Cardinals will raise the point before Mo feels the need to puke but I’m afraid other teams will be raising theirs also.

Looking at just one team, the Dodgers, they will need to jump into the free-agent market in a big way. Kershaw thought about retiring this year and it wouldn’t surprise me to see him gone. They brought in Lance Lynn to fill some holes but he has an option that may not be renewed. A really big piece of their rotation, Julio Urias is a huge question mark. Dustin May, Tony Gonsolin, and Buehler will all be coming back from surgeries. Does anyone think that if the Dodgers decide they want Nola the Cardinals will outbid them? And even if they do offer more money would Nola (or any pitcher) choose the Cardinals over the Dodgers? By the way, I think Nola would be a great fit for the Dodgers.

The Cardinals have dug themselves a deep hole. Even stocking our minor leagues at the trade deadline, most of the scouts that have a good feel for prospects predict that it is more likely that they won’t be a major piece of the puzzle until 2025. And even if they reach ahead of schedule they slide into the middle level, not aces. If that is the case then would it even make sense for the Cardinals to bring in a Nola to St. Louis and waste his first year with them?

Would it make more sense to zig while others are zagging? It might be if they decide to skip the Nolas and Gays this year and look to 2025 and go after Gerritt Cole, Chris Sale, Zack Wheeler, or Tyler Glasnow, all of whom will be free agents. What if the Cardinals improve this year just enough to have a shot at the playoffs and then go all in next year?

Here are three players that the Cardinals could go after that aren’t on the top of everyone’s list.

Josh Hader - Age 29 - Closer.

Hader has had over thirty saves in each of the last three years. He will be coming off a season in which he appeared in 61 games and saved 33 of them. In 56 innings he had 85 strikeouts and an ERA of 1.28. He has appeared in five all-star games.

The Cardinals bullpen ranked 28th in all of MLB this year. Part of that was the way they were used. Part of that was the players they had. Not knowing what the starting five will look like it makes sense to add another big arm to the pen. I would much rather see Hader as part of the relief corp than someone like Pallante. Or even another number four or five starter.

As an added bonus the Cardinal batters would not have to face him. The team batting average against him was .179 over the years. In 37 inning he struck out 63 Cardinals.

Spotrac Market value: 5 years/87Mil, 17Mil average.

Cardinals Comp: Miles Mikolas, 17 Mil.

Hyun Jin Ryu - Age 36 - SP

This has Cardinals move written all over it. Someone fairly inexpensive. Someone who would probably sign a shorter contract, and at the end of it, the Cardinals should have some of our prospects turning into players.

Ryu is coming off of Tommy John surgery. He made it back in time to start eleven games. In those eleven games, his ERA was .346. His ERA was actually less than Nola’s this year. His hard-hit rate was less than it was in 2021 and 2022, as well as his strike-out percentage.

Ryu came in second in Cy Young voting in 2019 and third in 2020. Those two years he also got votes for MVP.

While he may not be the pitcher he was in 2019 and 2020, this might be a gamble the Cardinals would take if the contract was short enough.

Spotrac Market Value: 2 years, $16 million ($8 million AAV)

Cardinals Comp: They are paying Steven Matz $12.5 million per season.

Frankie Montas - Age 30 - SP

Would this be ironic? The Cardinals were reported to be in the Frankie Montas sweepstakes. They fortunately lost out to the Yankees who had to give up JP Sears, Ken Waldichuk, Luis Medina, and Cooper Bowman. Josh Jacobs wrote that that would have been the equivalent of the Cardinals trading away Gordon Graceffo, Michael McGreevy, Jake Walsh, and Jonathan Mejia.

In 2021 he pitched in 32 games and had an ERA of 3.37. That year he came in 6th in voting for the Cy Young Award. Something I am sure the Cardinals were looking at was the 207 strikeouts he had that year. In 2022 he pitched 144 innings and had an ERA of .249. After that, the wheels fell off. Or more to the point his arm. After surgeries and missing almost the whole time he was with the Yankees, he is now a free agent.

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This time around all it would take is money. I doubt his salary would be very much and the length should be reasonable with a very high upside. I wouldn’t think the Cardinals would gamble enough to sign both Montas and Ryu but they should get one.

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