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5 ways the St Louis Cardinals could be losers at the trade deadline
The most important thing the Cardinals need to do at the trade deadline is to not screw it up.
We are now officially in the month of July and that means that trade season is officially underway and the St. Louis Cardinals have some really tough decisions to make. The offense has been very good and their run differential seems to indicate that they are a better team than their record is showing, but it is hard to polish the turd that is being in dead last in the National League Central by a considerable margin.
At 14 games below .500, one cannot really make a case for the Cardinals having much of a chance at all at making the playoffs this season. They are 9.5 games back in the worst division in the National League and the news is even worse if you turn your attention to the wild card race.
That places a lot of importance on this particular trade deadline for the Cardinals' short-term and long-term outlook. There has been no shortage of pieces on this very site alone that have discussed at length which prospects need to stay and go, who the Cardinals need to target at the deadline, and what exactly the roster's needs are.
However, the most important thing the Cardinals have to do is not screw this trade deadline up. There are a few ways they could handle things that are defensible, but mishandling the trade deadline could hamstring the franchise for years to come.
Here are ways the St Louis Cardinals could screw up the trade deadline
There are several landmines the Cardinals need to avoid at the deadline. Some of them revolve around decisions regarding specific players while others are more general strategic things that they should avoid doing like the plague.
Lets take a look at what the Cardinals need to do to avoid screwing up the 2023 trade deadline.
The Cardinals not selling at the trade deadline would be a bad idea
While adding some players that could help the team next year and beyond is a perfectly reasonable course of action, the Cardinals still need to treat the 2023 deadline as primarily sellers. Here is just the reality: the rotation is not going to be fixable with one deadline's worth of moves. The quality on the market just isn't there and even if they do spend all of the resources needed to grab multiple quality rotation arms, it is still highly unlikely they would be enough to make up this much ground.
If the Cardinals were a bit closer in the standings and there were some really marquee rotation arms available, the decision calculus would be different. However, Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander are the guys that are potentially available with the best track records, but both have been pretty rough this season and are owed a TON of money. Shane Bieber is another guy that has been awesome in the past, but he is trending in the wrong direction. Eduardo Rodriguez is probably the guy that is going to be in demand the most, but we don't even know if he is going to be healthy at the deadline or if the Tigers will trade him at all.
It is simple cost/benefit analysis here. Being true buyers at the deadline just isn't likely to do much for their playoff chances. However, selling players like Giovanny Gallegos, Jack Flaherty (more on him in a second), Jordan Montgomery, Tyler O'Neill, and/or Dylan Carlson could stock the Cardinals up with young talent in a sellers' market and provide clarity to their plans for next year.
The Cardinals need to trade Jack Flaherty at the deadline
We mentioned Jack Flaherty as a guy the Cardinals need to consider trading at the trade deadline, but the reality is that the Cardinals need to trade him. We'll gloss over the fact that he has dealt with injuries in recent years and has been bad this season. The biggest reason that they need to trade him now is because if they don't, it is very likely they will get literally nothing out of his exit from the organization.
There is a case at least to be made for keeping Jordan Montgomery because placing a qualifying offer on Montgomery when he hits free agency is likely to net the Cardinals a draft pick. However, Flaherty has struggled enough that giving him a qualifying offer seems very likely to result in him signing the offer, committing the Cardinals to a significant amount of 2024 money to a guy that isn't producing enough, and then him walking after next season and St. Lous gets nothing. Trading Flaherty now is the only sensible path forward and if he is still on the roster after the deadline, it will be purely a loss of value.
The Cardinals overpaying for a starting pitcher at the deadline is ill-advised
This harkens back to the first section, but warrants specific examination due to the state of the starting pitching trade market. We know that the Cardinals need starting pitching. However, a lot of actual contenders also need starting pitching this season and there are just not a lot of rotation arms to go around this year...or at least not a lot of arms anyone should want if winning more baseball games is the goal.
A bidding war for starting pitchers this year is inevitable as a result and the Cardinals don't have the depth in their farm system to be doing that especially given how the season has gone. It is already strategically dicey to make a move as a buyer in a seller's market. It is even worse to pay that sort of premium when the Cardinals are basically already out of it. Mortgaging your future for a shot at a .500 record by betting on questionable starting pitchers is just not the play.
Trading away Masyn Winn or Michael McGreevy would be nightmare fuel for the Cardinals
Speaking of the Cardinals farm system, we need to talk about a couple of guys that the Cardinals need to avoid trading at the deadline this year. Masyn Winn has a tantalizing toolset at shortstop and Michael McGreevy appears to be on the fast track to the big leagues. Both are guys who have a ton of value and upside, but that is precisely why trading them now would be a mistake.
There is a strong argument that trading either of those guys period is ill-advised, but that isn't the argument here. At the end of the day, they are still just prospects and all prospects should be able to be had for the right price. However, using two guys who are at Triple-A and close to being ready for the big leagues for trades to upgrade during a lost season wastes their value. If you retool the roster next year and find yourself in actual contention, sure...it may be worth dealing them next year if need be. For now, though, if you really want to make a move for a guy that helps you in 2024 and beyond, try to use the guys further away from the majors to do that.
Doing nothing at the trade deadline would be the worst possible outcome for the Cardinals
When asked recently about the Cardinals trade deadline plans, St. Louis' president of baseball operations very bluntly said that a complete tear down of the Cardinals roster was not an option. We can understand that point of view, but it brings us to what could be the most important thing that the Cardinals need to avoid doing and that is standing pat at the trade deadline.
There are some teams where a wait-and-see approach makes some level of sense, but the Cardinals have real short-term and long-term problems with their roster. As it stands, they are not well suited to turn things around and compete in the present nor are they in a spot as an organization where they are oozing with minor league talent that points to a bright future. Maybe a complete rebuild doesn't make sense for the Cardinals, but they are going to have to make some moves and hard choices one way or the other. If they don't, they could be in rough shape for a long time.
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