Looking back at the 7 starters who the Cardinals failed to develop into an ace

The St. Louis Cardinals have a clear problem that they need to address this offseason - finding a starting pitcher who can truly lead their staff. If we are being honest though, this has been a problem for years on end.

The club used to be known for its pitching. Think back to that 2013 range. Their roster seemed to be bursting with both young and veteran pitchers who could give them 6+ innings of quality work and then turn it over to a lockdown bullpen. Sports Illustrated even made their pitching staff the cover of one of their issues that year.

What happened to this club that used to turn out pitching in their sleep? What happened to the club that could identify the best possible mix of undervalued veterans and young studs that could carry a team to a World Series appearance? Can the club get back to those days?

Let me start with the latter. I do think the Cardinals can resemble this to an extent once again. It does not happen overnight though, and requires a lot of things to go right. But if the Cardinals are serious about their desire to add swing-and-miss stuff to their current rotation, continue to identify and either draft or acquire exciting young pitching (Tink Hence, Tekorah Roby, Cooper Hjerpe, etc.), and get back to being at the cutting edge of pitching development, they can regain that status in the league.

While I am sure we will talk more about that topic in the future, I do think it's fascinating to look at all of "the guys" that were supposed to or could have, topped the Cardinals rotation for years but for one reason or another, did not. Some of the names on this list were pure mistakes by the Cardinals' front office, parting with young talent and it blossoming elsewhere. Others though seemed like great bets at the time, but injuries or unforeseen development gaps derailed their career.

For as frustrating as this stretch has been for the Cardinals to not have a dude at the top of their rotation who can shove every fifth day (outside of a few-year resurgence from Adam Wainwright), what is even more frustrating is that they've had so many guys who could have been that. Honestly, after creating this list, it's almost more confusing and shocking that they haven't had multiple guys turn up as stud aces for years on end.

Here are seven starting pitchers the Cardinals had in their system that failed to develop into the ace they could have been for them

Alex Reyes

It was not all that long ago that Alex Reys was the 6th-ranked prospect in all of baseball back in 2017. He rose through the Cardinals system with his devasting stuff (75-grade fastball and 60-grade curveball) and looked incredible in his first take of big league action in 2016, posting a 1.57 ERA in 5 starts and 7 relief appearances. He was weighed down by Tommy John surgery the following year and saw his career unravel from there.

Reyes threw a total of 26.2 innings for St. Louis from 2018-2020 and finally found success and health in 2021 as a closer for the club. He earned an All-Star appearance with his incredible first half but fell apart during the second half of the year. He still finished the year with a 3.24 ERA in 72.1 innings pitched along with an 11.8 K/9.

We all remember the walk-off home run he gave up to Dodgers' Chris Taylor in the Wild Card Game, and that would be Reyes' final appearance as a Cardinal. He missed all of 2022 with a shoulder injury and was non-tendered the following offseason.

Reyes truly missed out on having a special career as a starting pitcher. Injuries and suspensions plagued the early part of his career, and he is still trying to make a comeback with the Los Angeles Dodgers.

I do not blame the Cardinals at all for wanting to bet on the arm talent that Reyes had. It's easy to wonder in hindsight if they should have tried to move off Reyes after Tommy John surgery while he was still a top prospect in baseball, as they could have possibly held onto a few other names on this list had they done so.

Sandy Alcantara

As I said, this list is not just a collection of arms that flammed out as Cardinals' prospects or Major Leaguers, there are names on this list that ended up blossoming elsewhere. Sandy Alcantara is one of the most famous examples of that.

The number six overall prospect in the Cardinals system in 2017 and their third-best pitching prospect, Alcantara was a part of the package that St. Louis sent over to the Miami Marlins for slugger Marcell Ozuna, who had just finished 6th in MVP voting after slashing .312/.376/.548 with 37 HR and 124 RBI the prior season.

While you'll be hard-pressed to find many people who objected to giving up Alcantara for Ozuna at that moment, it clearly ended up being a major mistake for the Cardinal. In 2017, Alcantara got to pitch in 8 games out of the bullpen for St. Louis and wasn't anything special, but he never got the chance to prove what he could be as a starter.

The following year, in six starts for Miami, he posted a 3.44 ERA in 34 innings as a 22-year-old. He followed that up with 197.1 innings in 2019 with a 3.88 ERA. He progressively improved each year following until his Cy Young winning season in 2022 where he led all of baseball with 228.2 innings, posting a 2.28 ERA and spinnings 6 complete games. He's honestly the prototype pitcher the Cardinals would want in their rotation.

Alcantara has struggled most of this year, going 4-10 with a 4.28 ERA, but is still signed to one of the most team-friendly extensions in baseball and is someone I am sure the Marlins are betting on a bounce back from in the near future.

So why did the Cardinals give up on him? While we do not know how the Marlins felt about Luke Weaver, we do know the Cardinals had zero intention of trading Alex Reyes, and it's undeniable the potential that he had shown to that point. Jack Flaherty and Dakota Hudson were similarly rated prospects to Alcantara, so things could have been a lot different had the Cardinals been able to trade one of them instead.

Zac Gallen

The other name that Cardinals fans know all too well from the Marcell Ozuna trade, Gallen was an afterthought to move fans in the deal initially, ranking as the Cardinals' 24th prospect at the time and never appearing in a Major League game for St. Louis.

Gallen was excellent during his rookie campaign, posting a 2.81 ERA for the Marlins and Diamondbacks, as he was traded during the year for Jazz Chisholm Jr. He then finished 9th in Cy Young voting in the shortened 2020 season, had a down year in 2021, but rebounded in a huge way the last two seasons.

While Alcantara finished as the Cy Young winner in 2022, Gallen finished 5th after posting a 2.54 ERA in 184 innings of work and was once again an All-Star with year with a 3.37 ERA in 149.2 innings.

It is fair to wonder though if either starter would have reached their potential with the Cardinals. Gallen specifically has been critical of how the Cardinals handled player development, and we've seen position players like Randy Arozarena and Adolis Garica go on to perform elsewhere as well.

Shelby Miller

When Shelby Miller made his MLB debut during the 2012 season, I was bought in on him being a future ace in the league. Coming into 2013, he was the 25th-ranked prospect in all of baseball, and he backed it up with an incredible rookie campaign, going 15-9 with a 3.06 ERA over 173.1 innings of work. Miller, Carlos Martinez, Michael Wacha, and Lance Lynn all looked like they were going to lead the Cardinals' rotation for years to come.

Miller was not quite as good in 2014, posting a 3.74 ERA in 183 innings of work. That offseason, Miller was dealt to the Atlanta Braves for star outfielder Jason Heyward, as the Cardinals had just lost Oscar Taveras in a fatal car crash and made a panic move to replace him.

Miller was dominant for the Braves that next season. Although he led the league with 17 losses, he had a 3.02 ERA over 205.1 innings of work and was an All-Star that year. He was then flipped that offseason by the Braves for Arizona's top prospect Dansby Swanson.

On his third team in three years, Miller fell apart as a Diamondback. In his third start with the Diamondbacks, Miller injured his middle finger on the follow-through of a pitch where his hand hit the mound. It clearly impacted Miller, and it brought on a string of issues for him over the coming years.

In three seasons with Arizona, Miller had a 5-18 record with a 6.35 ERA and just was never able to regain his ability as a starter. After bouncing around a few organizations as a reliever the last few seasons, he's been a critical part of the Dodgers' bullpen this year, posting a 2.40 ERA in 30 innings of work.

Obviously, the finger injury was a freak accident, so one has to wonder whether or not Miller could have maintained his All-Star level production, or even become a Cy Young contender if he had not had that finger injury happen to him. I doubt the Cardinals would have traded Miller if Taveras had not passed away, and he could have been the next great Cardinal pitcher if he had remained in St. Louis.

Jack Flaherty

The Jack Flaherty era in St. Louis came to an end at this year's trade deadline. After so many failed arms in the Cardinals' pipeline, Flaherty looked like the guy who could finally fill that void for the Cardinals.

In 2018, Flaherty made 28 starts, posting a 3.34 ERA across 151 innings of work with a 10.8 SO/9 for St. Louis. At age 22, Flaherty was already showcasing the kind of swing and miss stuff needed to lead a rotation.

During the second half of 2019, to say it all came together for him would be a massive understatement. His 0.91 ERA, 0.72 WHIP, and .142 OPP BA during that second half was historically good, and although no one expected him to repeat that performance ever, his final season statline of a 2.75 ERA over 196.1 innings seemed like who he was becoming.

The 2020 season was a miss for Flaherty, but he regained his form in 2021, going 9-2 with a 3.22 ERA but suffered from shoulder injuries throughout. During his final season and a half as a Cardinal, Flaherty threw just 151.2 innings and had a 4.27 ERA.

\Once again, it feels like another career robbed by the injury bug and showcases just how important it is to constantly be building pitching depth in your organization.

Michael Wacha

Shelby Miller may have put together the more complete 2013 season for the Cardinals, but it was Michael Wacha who stole the show for them toward the end of that campaign.

In 15 appearances (9 starts), Wacha went 4-1 with a 2.78 ERA in 64.2 innings and pitched his way into the Cardinals' playoff rotation. His final regular-season start saw him take a no-hitter into the 9th inning against the Nationals, and then he followed that up by taking a no-hitter into the 8th inning against Pittsburgh again to force Game 5 of the NLDS.

Wacha was masterful in the NLCS against the Los Angeles Dodgers, throwing 13.2 scoreless innings across two starts and earning NLCS MVP honors. Things unraveled for him in the World Series though as the Cardinals fell to the Boston Red Sox.

Wacha came back strong in 2014 and 2015, posting a 3.31 ERA over 288.1 innings of work, and like the other names on this list, looked like he could be "the guy" for St. Louis for a long time. Unfortunately, shoulder injuries got the best of Wacha, and the final four seasons of his Cardinal career ended with just a 4.39 ERA in 514 innings.

Since leaving St. Louis, Wacha has bounced around a little bit, really getting his career back on track with Boston in 2022 and becoming one of the Padres' best pitchers in 2023.

At the beginning of this story, I talked about how it's crazy that the Cardinals did not end up with multiple front-line starters over the years. Although some had small runs with the club and other's realized that potential fully elsewhere, each name on this list leaves a bit of disappointment in the heads of Cardinal fans, knowing what "could have been".

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