6 Cardinals front office missteps that put the team in this terrible position

We are approaching the halfway point of the 2023 season and it is fair to say that the St. Louis Cardinals are not having a great time. In a National League Central division that looks like the second worst division in baseball (wow does the AL Central look bad), the Cardinals haven’t come close to contending so far and even a .500 record this season seems like a lofty goal at the moment.

Look, the Cardinals aren’t going to win the division every year and it is important to note that other teams in the division have a say in where the Cardinals place. The Pirates have somehow become an actual force to be contended with at times although their recent losing streak took some wind out of their sails. The Brewers and Cubs have turned inconsistency into an art form as they have averaged out to be decent if unexciting. As for the Reds, they are showing real signs of life especially since they called up Elly De La Cruz and they have rode a massive win streak all the way to first place.

However, that doesn’t explain why the Cardinals are off to one of their worst starts in decades this season and like with most things, the answer is complicated. Some of it can be explained by waving one’s hands around and saying “baseball is weird sometimes”, but there were clearly missteps small and large that have combined and cascaded into what has become a glorious dumpster fire of a first half for St. Louis.

Some of these mistakes looked like mistakes at the time and we wonder what the team was thinking. Others seemed like fine decisions at the time, but have turned out poorly because baseball is hard and guys (especially prospects) that seem like they SHOULD perform ended up flaming out. In the end, though, all moves have to be judged on their results and, well, the results haven’t been great in 2023.

Without further delay, here are six mistakes that the Cardinals' front office has made in recent years that have helped to put the team in the terrible position they are in right now.

Not being proactive last offseason

This one has been beaten to death by just about everyone, but can’t be ignored here. The Cardinals were a pretty good team in 2022, but certainly not good enough to tread water for this season and expect the wins to come like candy. The rotation’s viability and injury concerns were known going into the offseason and the only real move they made for pitching was to bring back the 41 year old version of Adam Wainwright.

It hasn’t helped that the one big move the Cardinals did make last offseason, the Willson Contreras signing, hasn’t panned out so far and has also caused a bunch of organizational drama. Replacing what Yadier Molina meant to the team was always going to be a tall order, but Contreras has still fallen well short of what St. Louis was hoping for when they signed him. 

It seems like the Cardinals were at least semi-interested in signing other big names like Carlos Rodon and Dansby Swanson last offseason, but they got neither of them nor did they make any other moves to improve the roster beyond the bare minimum. That's a problem. 

The Adolis Garcia trade, but the Cardinals were not alone

This one goes firmly in the “baseball is dumb sometimes” category. No one denied that Adolis Garcia had some prodigious power in his bat at the time, but his initial call-up to the big leagues did not go well (in an admittedly very small sample of plate appearances) and the Cardinals ended up trading him to the Rangers for cash considerations after the 2019 season.

The 2020 season came and went without Garcia contributing in the big leagues at all for Texas and the Cardinals were looking quite smart in getting anything for him at all after he cleared waivers for the Rangers and was outrighted to Triple-A. Unfortunately, Garcia got called back up in 2021 and he has been one of the consistent sources of power for Texas’ lineup ever since. We don’t necessarily blame the Cardinals for moving on from Garcia because he certainly had his warts at the time, but having a bat like his in the organization would have made some other roster considerations a lot easier.

The Randy Arozarena/Matthew Liberatore trade

It is clear that during the offseason after the 2019 season, the Cardinals recognized that they might need some pitching help before too long and they deserve kudos for at least trying to remedy the problem. St. Louis again turned to the Rays for their needs (they may want to stop trading with Tampa) and traded for former 1st round pick LHP Matthew Liberatore along with Edgardo Rodriguez and a supplemental 2nd round pick in the 2020 draft for OF/1B Jose Martinez, a supplemental first round pick in 2020, and an outfield prospect by the name of Randy Arozarena.

In fairness, the jury is still out on Liberatore and he could easily still turn into a useful big league starter, but he hasn’t exactly been awesome so far. Jose Martinez didn’t do much for the Rays at all, but Arozarena has turned out to be a stud. Is he as good as he was when he was basically Babe Ruth during the 2020 playoffs? Absolutely not because, well, no one can sustain that. However, he is quickly turning into one of the better young players in MLB right now and is a big reason why the Rays have been on a warpath this year.

One final note, trading away their supplemental first round pick in 2020 didn’t help their previous draft woes even though they got a second rounder back. 2020 was a five round draft and while the Cards did well with the picks they had in that draft, the extra bonus pool and higher pick could have potentially made the class even better.

The Marcell Ozuna Trade Disaster

Yeah…you probably knew this one was coming and at the time, it looked more like a very aggressive move for a high upside bat and not a trade that could haunt St. Louis forever. For all of his faults in recent years, Ozuna was a very, very highly prized bat back during the offseason after the 2017 offseason. So, the Cardinals struck a trade with the Marlins to nab him with St. Louis giving up Sandy Alcantara, Zac Gallen, Daniel Castano, and Magneuris Sierra.

It is not hyperbole to suggest that this trade has a strong argument as one of the worst trades in franchise history. Ignoring Sierra and Castano because they don’t really matter in this, losing Alcantara and Gallen for two mediocre years from Ozuna feels really, really bad right now especially given the state of the Cardinals’ rotation.

In the interest of fairness, the organization’s relationship with Gallen wasn’t great at the time and neither pitcher was considered to be an All-World talent per se. In fact, Gallen would be moved AGAIN in the trade that brought Jazz Chisholm to Miami. We’ll never know for sure how Alcantara and Gallen would have developed in the St. Louis farm system, but having both the 2022 Cy Young winner and one of the prohibitive favorites to win it in 2023 in the organization would be really nice. 

Look, no front office is going to get every move right and the Cardinals are no exception. Hindsight analysis can often be pretty unfair, but it is the front office's job to make moves for the benefit of the organization. Sure, there have been good moves along the way and those should be lauded. However, it is impossible to ignore that these missteps have heavily contributed to St. Louis occupying the cellar of the NL Central this year.

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