Grading the Cardinals' draft picks from the 2023 MLB Draft

St Louis Cardinals Draft Picks: Position Players

The start of the draft went swimmingly for the Cardinals when Chase Davis, one of the best power hitters in the draft period, was sitting there for them at the 21st overall pick. St. Louis would dip into the college outfielder pool again when they grabbed Travis Honeyman ouf of Boston College who should be able to hit for average as well as some power. Zach Levenson out of Miami was a notable day two bat while shortstop Dakota Harris, outfielder Brayden Jobert, and first baseman Will Sullivan all got picked early on day three.

Getting Davis was a strong pick to be sure and the Cardinals did load up on college bats. St. Louis seemed to be focused on college performers with their position players, but we ideally would have liked for them to bring some more athleticism and upside with this group. This isn't necessarily a Cardinals-specific problem as the industry as a whole is moving away from grabbing prep and/or raw bats in the draft, but getting a long-term project that has some more raw tools to work with would have been icing on the cake.

Grade: B+

St Louis Cardinals Draft Picks: Pitchers

We all know that the Cardinals are in need of some more pitching in their organization. Tink Hence has been doing great work down in the minor leagues and they spent a first round pick on Cooper Hjerpe last year, but there is some reliever risk with Hence and Hjerpe is on the injured list. The Cardinals did add some college arms on day two in LHP Quinn Matthews out of Stanford, RHP Jason Savacool out of Maryland, and LHP Ixan Henderon out of Fresno State before pivoting back to position players for the early portion of day three.

This is a little disappointing to be sure. The three college arms of note that St. Louis picked on day two of the draft are fine, but none really offer much in the way of upside. None of them throw all that hard and all three of them are more pitchability types that can throw strikes but that don't have any standout pitches. It feels like the Cardinals valued higher floors with these guys, but they may struggle to get one big league rotation arm out of this draft even if all three of these guys make it to Double-A pretty quickly.

Grade: B-