6 former St. Louis Cardinals prospects who have fallen from grace

The St. Louis Cardinals have had some top prospects fail to meet expectations or fizzle out in recent years

high-levelWhen you're an organization that prides itself on developing young talent, you're bound to have some high level prospects not pan out. The St. Louis Cardinals have plenty of names that fall into that category.

There are plenty of reasons why a prospect doesn't pan out. Sometimes it's simply just overvaluing or placing too high of expectations on a young player. National outlets can fall in love with and hype up a player, or local pundits can prop up a player as a generational talent when they are nowhere near that kind of player.

Other times, players make it to The Show, and then they face obstacles for playing time or are thrown into situations that set them up for failure. There was real potential there with that player, but it never had the opportunity to be realized because of how the team used them.

And then there are the most heartbreaking circumstances where a player just can't stay healthy. Maybe they had an injury that just knocked them down and they could never play at the same level again. Or other guys just repeatedly have their career setback by a variety of injuries. They have the talent when healthy, they just never are.

Sadly, there are a lot of Cardinals that fit this mold from recent years. Let's take a look at six former prospects who have fallen from the high expectations that we once had for them.