4 moves the St. Louis Cardinals can make to improve their pitching immediately

The Cardinals need to improve their pitching staff immediately, and here are four ways they can do so

We all know the St. Louis Cardinals need to bring in help from outside the organization to improve their pitching staff between now and the trade deadline. But if we are being honest, they need improvements far sooner than trades will become a possibility.

As of May 29th, the Cardinals rank 18th in all of baseball with a 4.37 ERA as a team. While the offense has sputtered as of late, the team has had to rely on its slugging to win games all year, and while they have the offense to do that, it's very difficult to ask them to put up five, six, or even more runs every single game.

I would love it if the Cardinals were able to go ahead and make a trade pitching help today, but the likelihood of any deal going down until at least the All-Star break is very low. Trades of any significance just rarely happen around the league until then, and with how much pitching is needed around the league, teams will want to start bidding wars on their talent.

We could spend all day ranting about mistakes that the front office has made when it comes to building their pitching staff (and we've done that before), but I do think there are some immediate changes the Cardinals can make to improve their pitching staff for the time being.

Here are four changes I could make to the Cardinals' pitching right now to hold them over until July.

Change #2 - Stick with a five-man rotation

I'll get to some more roster moves in a moment, but there's more reason than just the struggles of Steven Matz to go back to a five-man rotation for the Cardinals.

First, the Cardinals seem to find themselves having a shortage of arms once or twice a week now with their six-man rotation, asking Liberatore and now Matz to be available just days after starting to come out of the bullpen and being sure when their next start is. The club needs to get that extra arm back in their bullpen and stop messing around with the routines of their starters.

Second, the Cardinals actually need to get more starts out of their better starters, specifically Miles Mikolas. When you're using a six-man rotation, your starters pitch less often, which is a problem where there are significant talent gaps between starters.

Mikolas has sneakily rebounded to be one of the most productive starters in all of baseball over his last seven starts, posting a 2.38 ERA in 41.2 innings of work. The Cardinals need this kind of production, and these innings, from their rotation, and pitching Mikolas more often will give them that.

I also believe that one or both of Jordan Montgomery and Jack Flaherty give the Cardinals better chances to win each night than Adam Wainwright, Matthew Liberatore, and Steven Matz. Both starters have been pretty streaky to start the year, but present a higher upside in their starts than those other starters. Again, the Cardinals higher quality starts, so why not pitch the guys who have the upside to do that?

Speaking of Flaherty and Montgomery, their importance between now and the trade deadline goes beyond their immediate production.

Change #3 - Evaluate Jack Flaherty and Jordan Montgomery, prepare to shop one of them at the deadline

Before you freak out, if the Cardinals are going to acquire a front-line starter, they need a rotation spot to clear up, right?

They aren't taking Adam Wainwright out of the rotation. We all know that. Miles Mikolas certainly shouldn't be removed with his recent play and his freshly signed extension. Matthew Liberatore presents a cost-controlled rotation for the present and the future. That's three of the four spots taken, and that's not even including the new ace we'd all like them to acquire.

With Flaherty and Montgomery set to be free agents at the end of the year, the likelihood is that one or both of those guys are gone after this season. The Cardinals can do the following things if they shopped one of them at this year's deadline.

1. Clear up a rotation spot for a front-line starter
2. Recuperate assets after having to dip into them for the ace trade
3. Give more chances to young arms

Again, this is assuming the Cardinals want to go after an ace. If they do, their playoff rotation would likely look something like their newly acquired ace, Mikolas, one of Flaherty or Montgomery, and then either Liberatore of Wainwright. That's a pretty good-looking group, especially with the offense they have.

While neither arm would get the team a fortune in a trade, they both would surely be hot commodities unless they completely fall apart in the next month or so. Look around the league at almost every contending team. They all need pitching. Not every team can go out and trade for an ace though, so many contenders will be looking to acquire arms with high upside that they can at least slot into the back of their rotation. Montgomery and Flaherty would qualify as those.

Get some assets back in return to help replenish the farm system after trading for an ace, and if injuries happen down the stretch, you still have arms like Matz, Gordon Graceffo, Zack Thompson, and Michael McGreevy on deck to fill in.

Change #4 - Reshuffle the high-leverage relievers

This happens every single year to every single team, but the Cardinals' bullpen is in need of a reshuffle for the time begin.

The first change I would make is bringing Jordan Hicks into the late-inning closing group with Ryan Helsley and Giovanny Gallegos. It wasn't that long ago that myself and many others were calling for Hicks to be DFA'd, but he has not only turned things around but he's also become lights out as of late.

Over his last 15 games, Hicks has a 2.60 ERA in 17.1 innings while striking out 30 batters. Yes, 30. He's found that strikeout stuff in a big way and is quickly becoming a top-end reliever again. Over his last 7 outings, Hicks has only allowed 1 hit and 3 walks while giving up 0 runs.

Helsley, on the other hand, has been a bit shaky this season with his 3.52 ERA, which has been even higher in his last 7 appearances with a 4.15 ERA. There's no need to "demote" him yet, but I do think Hicks has earned the chance to close out games or come in in crucial spots at the same rate as Helsley and Gallegos.

The second change I would make is putting Genesis Cabrera on Memphis watch, and being prepared to call up Zack Thompson if needed. I wasn't a big fan of them demoting Thompson to prepare to be a starter for next year with how valuable he's been for them out of the bullpen the last few years, and I really think they need to undo that if Cabrera continues to struggle. He now has a 4.95 ERA on the season and his WHIP has raised to 1.55. Cabrera has some of the best stuff in the Cardinals' bullpen, but they need him to produce better than he has.

I'm all for Thompson getting a chance in the rotation next season but for now, they need him to be ready to get back to his high-leverage self in St. Louis.

I would also be unafraid to move off of Drew VerHagen or Chris Stratton if either cannot get their footing back soon. I think both guys deserve more time to figure things out, especially Stratton, as they have had a big impact out of the bullpen at different times this year. But with guys like Thompson and Guillermo Zuniga waiting in the wings, they can have short leashes.