5 ways the St. Louis Cardinals have proven they've learned from past mistakes in 2024

Learning #3 - Building their bullpen with low-cost, high-upside arms

In the past, when the Cardinals have gone about building their bullpen, it feels like they've done so using two profiles of players - prospects from their system and big free-agent contracts.

They never went out and signed big names in free agency like Edwin Diaz or Josh Hader, but they frequently signed expensive relievers like Andrew Miller, Brett Cecil, and Greg Holland, resulting in bad contracts from unproductive relievers.

This offseason, the Cardinals brought in Ryan Fernandez from the Rule 5 draft, Andrew Kittredge, Nick Robertson, and Riley O'Brien, and signed Keynan Middleton in free agency to a cheap deal. Instead of investing most of their resources into one "big name" guy, they invested in five different options, and it has allowed them to strike gold with a few of them.

Fernandez is one of the best relievers in baseball this year, and while Kittredge has come back down to earth a bit lately, he's been highly productive as well. Those two have helped the Cardinals bullpen in high-leverage spots all year alongside another low-cost arm they acquired recently in JoJo Romero.

The nice thing about how the Cardinals invested in relievers is that not only did they strike gold with Fernandez and Kittredge, but their "misses" on Middleton, O'Brien, and Robertson are minor at best. Both O'Brien and Robertson may contribute later this year and will for sure have a chance in future years, while Middleton will just end up being a small dollar investment that did not pan out.

Building bullpens this way won't always result in a great unit, but it does eliminate a lot of the risk and maximize the amount of "shots" you have had acquiring difference makers when you bring in five or so arms rather than just one or two you are truly banking on.