5 important things we've learned about the Cardinals at the season's 30% mark

The offense is better than they showed during the first six weeks, but their ceiling may not be as high as we thought

The Cardinals' offense ranked among the bottom three teams in baseball for the first six weeks of the season. Going into the year, many of us believed they'd have a top-10 offense. How on earth can there be such a stark difference between expectations and performance?

That's been the million-dollar question this season, and it looked like it may cost people their jobs within the organization before their recent run of form. It wasn't just regression from Goldschmidt and Arenado, pretty much everyone not named Willson Contreras was in a slump over the first six weeks of the season. It made no sense with the amount of talent they had, and yet, it was happening, and for far too long.

Now guys like Masyn Winn, Alec Burleson, and Ivan Herrera are leading the charge, Lars Nootbaar and Nolan Gorman are heating up, and it just goes to show the depth this lineup was supposed to have this year. As of late, they've been producing like a top-10 offense, but what is their ceiling now? If Goldschmidt and Arenado are who they are now, can this offense live up to expectations? Can their young bats pick up the slack for the remainder of the season? Will Willson Contreras continue his run of form when he returns from injury?

We won't know the answers to those questions for a while. But here's what we do know - this offense is better than it showed at the beginning of the year.

The Cardinals do not have one of the worst offenses in baseball, and you can still see a path to being a top offense if some more rebounds happen or the young guys continue to progress, but we at least know what they did for all of April and the beginning of May is not their DNA.

If the Cardinals end up being more of a middle-of-the-pack offense though, what is this team's ceiling? They have the formula to make the playoffs if their offense is producing at a high level, but if it cannot do this all season long, it is going to be a really tough road to clawing their back and grabbing a postseason spot.

Luckily for St. Louis, a recent rule change makes that chase a lot easier.