6 encouraging statistics from the Cardinals so far this year

The Cardinals are playing better baseball of late, and these six statistics are really working in their favor

What a rollercoaster the St. Louis Cardinals' season has been so far. For a few week stretch, even the most optimistic fans and pundits had to wonder if this team could ever turn things around. The pitching has been about as bad as it could possibly have been so far, and the offense was extremely inconsistent for the first five or so weeks of the season.

Lately, the team has really turned things around, specifically from a run-scoring side of things. While the pitching has been virtually the same since the beginning of the season, the offense is now reaching its potential as one of the best units in the game, and arguably even has another level it could hit as the season goes on. While it does not totally mask the starting pitching, it does help out a ton and is the main reason why the Cardinals are winning a lot of games as of late.

These are all anecdotal observations though, based on the eye test when you look at this club. But there are some really informative statistics that should encourage fans as they follow this club for the rest of the season. When you play 162 games of baseball, there can be small stretches where the results may be there for a team, but the underlying statistics say that regression is coming. Other times, a team can be losing games left and right, but the numbers indicate that they should be playing a lot better.

While there are some very worrisome statistics surrounding the Cardinals that we should look at in the near future, these six statistics should be very encouraging for Cardinals fans.

Stat #1 - 114 wRC+

Even with the rocky start to the season, the Cardinals offense has posted a 114 wRC+ on the season, good for third best in all of baseball behind the Tampa Bay Rays and Texas Rangers.

wRC+ (weight runs created plus) measures the stat runs created and adjusts for the ballparks that teams are playing in. The league average is wRC+ is 100, so 114 wRC+ means that as a team, the Cardinals are 14% above the league average offensively. The offensive depth that the Cardinals have gives them an edge in almost every matchup that they go into.

If you look at the Cardinals' offense since they began their winning baseball on May 7th, they lead the league with a 129 wRC+. For context, players like Max Muncy, Adolis Garcia, Anthony Santander, Brandon Nimmo, and Adley Rutschman all have between a 130 and 128 wRC+ on the season. The Cardinals' offense is playing like a borderline All-Star level hitter as an entire lineup since May 7th.

Having three All-Star pedigree bats like Paul Goldschmidt, Nolan Arenado, and Willson Contreras helps lead the way for a club to have a lineup like this, but you need a depth of options to truly be this dangerous of a lineup. On any given night, the likes of Paul DeJong, Lars Nootbaar, Alec Burleson, Tommy Edman, Brendan Donovan, Oscar Mercado, and Juan Yepez can all have a major impact on the game. But there is another name that has really risen to the top this year that has truly taken this lineup to the next level (see the next slide).

Stat #2 - .981 OPS

As the season got closer and closer, there was buzz that Nolan Gorman could be a breakout bat for the Cardinals, but nobody could have expected the season he is having so far.

Gorman has a .981 OPS in 47 games this year, good for fourth in all of baseball. He is hitting the ball often, and when he does, it goes very far. When he is not getting good pitches to hit, he's grinding out at-bats and getting on base via free passes. Gorman has now put himself into the middle of the Cardinals' order, giving them a trio of hitters with Goldschmidt and Arenado that are almost impossible to stop.

The way that Gorman has transformed the Cardinals lineup this year feels a lot like what it did for the 2021 Cardinals when Tyler O'Neill put everything together that season. For stretches, they had three MVP level bats in their order, which propelled them to win often despite their terrible pitching. The Cardinals now have a trio like that once again, and their newly developed lineup depth means that the damage goes beyond just those three.

But there is more to this conversation as well. The Cardinals have lacked a left-handed bat that could do damage like that since the years that Matt Carpenter was in MVP conversations. Adding Gorman's bat with the right-handed slugging of Goldschmidt and Arenado gives this lineup more ways to beat different kinds of pitchers. There are few things more valuable than left-handed power bats, if any.

Second, Gorman is doing this in clutch moments for the Cardinals as well. He is currently fifth in all of baseball in RBI this year, and he is having his best moments in the late innings of games when the Cardinals need to tie the game or drive in the go-ahead run.

Gorman is legit, and it's transforming this lineup into something special.

Stat #3 - Five games back

For as dire as things seemed for a while in early May, the Cardinals have already clawed their way back to within striking distance of the Milwaukee Brewers in the first place, and they still have 109 games left to do so.

Just a few days ago, Ken Rosenthal echoed this optimism as well, saying he expects the Cardinals to still win the National League Central by 10 or more games this season. The Pirates, Brewers, and to a lesser extent, the Cubs, all got off to good starts to the 2023 season, but have all begun to regress back to what we all expected them to be this year.

The Cardinals, on the other hand, had a historically terrible start to the season, at one point had the worst record in the National League as recently as a few weeks ago, but are now already back in contention for the division lead.

For those who began to have doubts about the Cardinals even being a playoff team, I would guess they are first in the division by the end of June at the latest. Building a bit of a lead going into the All-Star Break could help the front office turn their attention toward being legit buyers, and my next few slides will show some more reasons why they may choose to be aggressive at this year's deadline.

Stat #4 - 31-20, 27-25, 24-27, 31-21, 24-27

Kind of a weird set of numbers right? Well, let's look at who each of these records belongs to this year.

1. 31-20: Atlanta Braves
2. 27-25: New York Mets
3. 24-27: Philadelphia Phillies
4. 31-21: Los Angeles Dodgers
5. 24-27: San Diego Padres

These are the five teams that many thought the Cardinals were lagging behind in the National League coming into the year. Obviously, the Braves and Dodgers are doing very well this year, but the Mets, Phillies, and Padres have all been more vulnerable than people thought they would be this year. The Cardinals are just two games back of the Phillies and Padres at the moment, and 4.5 games back of the Mets in the Wild Card standings.

Even for how good the Braves have looked this year, the Cardinals are only eight games off their current pace, which seems like a miracle considering how bad the Cardinals started. I'm not trying to argue that the Cardinals can finish with the best record in the National League, but what I do think this is showing is that the National League is pretty wide open outside of the Braves and the Dodgers.

And even with those two teams, but have experienced significant injuries with their pitching, especially the Dodgers. Not only did the Cardinals just take three out of four against Los Angeles this past weekend, but the Dodgers are now down Walker Buehler, Dustin May, Michael Grove, Julio Urias, and other arms that were supposed to make a major impact for them this year. If you compare the Dodgers and Cardinals lineups, the Cardinals are the clear winner in the battle.

There is still a long way to go this season, but if the Cardinals are truly turning things around, they look like a team that can at least compete with the top clubs in the National League. And according to front office executives around baseball, they have the assets to improve their roster.

Stat #5 - 3rd ranked farm system

Going into the 2023 season, outlets, like MLB.com had the Cardinals, ranked as the 9th best farm system in all of baseball. If you look at other media outlets, St. Louis tends to rank anywhere from around 9th to about 14th in the game today.

But when it comes to making trades, it doesn't really matter what scouting outlets think of your farm system, it matters what other teams value. And apparently, other front offices view the Cardinals' farm system in an even higher light.

When executives were asked over the offseason which team had the best farm system in baseball, the Cardinals came in third, only behind the Baltimore Orioles and the Los Angeles Dodgers. What this tells me is that not only do the Cardinals believe they are sitting on a bunch of young talent, but the rest of baseball believes that as well.

Obviously, those players could come up and make major impacts on the club this year, like Jordan Walker, Masyn Winn, and Gordon Graceffo, but this also means the Cardinals are holding a lot of very valuable capital come July if they choose to pursue a major upgrade to their rotation.

With the club being right back in the fight for the NL Central crown and the rest of the National League looking weaker than we originally thought, it makes a ton of sense for the Cardinals to make a strong play at this deadline and go for it this season, as they'd have a legit shot to make a run if they upgraded their pitching.

We know the Cardinals will not sell out for a rental, but why are we so quick to forget that the club was willing to talk to the Nationals about Juan Soto this past deadline? The Cardinals knew they'd have to take on significant salary if they acquired him (John Mozeliak has already confirmed they have money to increase this year's budget), and Soto wasn't even as big of a "need" as an ace is. Sure, it would be very expensive in terms of prospect capital, but I'm not sure there's an ace that would bring back the kind of return that Soto did last year.

All of this to say, the Cardinals have turned things around, and are within striking distance of other NL contenders, but there is one more stat that I think will help even the most pessimistic fans begin to feel a bit better about this club.