Myth-busting 5 narratives surrounding the St. Louis Cardinals

Myth - Payroll did not go up in 2023.

Reality - Payroll did go up in 2023 - but how it went up is where Cardinals fans should be upset

Ask many Cardinals fans, and they'll say the front office lied about payroll increasing in 2023, or that if it did go up, it was only a very small increase. Those statements just are not true, and they bring the focus away from the true problem, which was how payroll went up.

Derrick Goold detailed this well in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The Cardinals' Opening Day payroll in 2022 was $154 million and went up to $174 million in 2023. That is about a 12% increase in payroll, which is a significant boost on the surface. The problem with these numbers, and the thing that the organization needs to be held accountable for, is they represented mostly pay raises for internal options, rather than going out and improving the club like they needed to. Yes, they signed Willson Contreras last offseason, but most of that payroll jump came from arbitration raises, Arenado's increased salary, and re-signing Adam Wainwright.

The Cardinals did look at other moves last offseason, but could not convince veteran bats to come to St. Louis to compete for a starting job and balked at the price of the top-end starting pitchers. Based on internal conversations at the end of this season, it sounds like both ownership and the front office are ready to meet the price of pitching.

Why does this matter? Well when people continue to throw out false numbers or narratives at the Cardinals' organization as "proof" that they lied, it does not help the argument. What the Cardinals need to acknowledge, and actually seem to be at this point, is that the way they have spent in recent years is just not going to cut it in today's game.

Myth - The Cardinals say they'll make big moves but don't follow through.

Reality - The Cardinals never promised to go after big-name free agents in recent years, their problem was the fact they didn't even want to engage with them.

In some ways, this is a continuation of the first myth, but there is a reason I feel a need to dig deeper into this one.

In recent years, people have gotten upset at the Cardinals for "saying" they'll go after big-name talent on the market like one of the top-end shortstops, ace-level pitchers, or whoever else fans wanted them to sign. Here's the problem, they've never actually said they'll do any of that. If anything, they mostly temper the expectations of fans. When Mozeliak said payroll would go up, we read into that as them spending big, and although that was at the very least a poor choice of words by Mozeliak, it was not a promise to go after the big names that people wanted.

So when people say "Oh well we've heard the front office and ownership say this before" about spending, it's just not true. The types of reporting we are getting about the Cardinals' willingness to spend, and the public comments that Bill DeWitt III has made above climbing the payroll rankings, are not typical comments or reports you hear from this organization.

Actions will speak louder than words for sure, but typically when the Cardinals front office says they'll do something, they usually follow through. Just look at last season. While they threw out a couple of moves they'd look to explore, their number one target was clearly catcher, and they went out and spent on the top guy on the market. Right now, they are preaching the need for pitching, pitching, and more pitching, so I'll be shocked if they do not make significant moves in this area. If they do fail to deliver, and they do not climb the payroll rankings, then they deserve all of the criticism coming their way.

Myth - Adolis Garcia is another example of the Cardinals misevaluating talent

Reality - Adolis Garcia was passed on by all 30 clubs after being traded to Texas, and has worked his way to becoming a great player since then.

During Adolis Garcia's brief tenure with the Cardinals organization, he wasn't all that productive of a player. The Cardinals had a variety of outfield prospects, and at age 25, Garcia was not showing enough promise to remain in the plans for St. Louis.

They traded him following the 2018 season to the Texas Rangers for cash considerations, and he was eventually designated for an assignment by the Rangers as well. He went unclaimed by all other teams in baseball and returned to the Rangers on a Spring Training invite.

Years later, he's now mashing throughout the postseason, passing David Freese for most RBIs in a single postseason. He's turned into a really good player and comes up big when the lights are the brightest. Another huge miss by the Cardinals, right?

Sure, they'd love to have a mulligan on him if they could, but this is an example of a player proving all of Major League Baseball wrong with his hard work and determination, not as much a talent evaluation issue by the Cardinals. If it was that, then there's no way all 30 teams would have passed on Garcia when he was DFA'd.

Randy Arozarena, Zac Gallen, and Sandy Alcantara are for sure examples of the Cardinals betting on the wrong talent. All three of them quickly proved with their new organizations that they had a ton of talent, and somehow the Cardinals did not see what their new teams did. Make fun of the Cardinals all you want for those trades, but the Garcia one says much more about Garcia's ability to overcome adversity than it does about the Cardinals' ability to evaluate talent.

Myth - The Marcell Ozuna trade was a terrible idea back in 2017

Reality - The Cardinals needed to make an aggressive move and Ozuna fit the bill. What they gave up for him ended up being a disaster in retrospect.

We can all agree the Marcell Ozuna trade was a disaster for the Cardinals. When people look back at John Mozeliak's tenure in charge of the front office, it will likely be viewed as the biggest mistake he made, and he deserves that criticism.

But the thought process behind the trade is actually something the Cardinals need more of.

The Cardinals offense was in desperate need of an upgrade after the 2017 season. Matt Carpenter, Paul DeJong, Tommy Pham, Jose Martinez, and Dexter Fowler were their best hitters, and that led to a mediocre 83-79 season despite having a pretty solid pitching staff. Marcell Ozuna was coming off an All-Star and Silver Slugger-winning season with Miami and profiled as a true middle-of-the-order bat after mashing 37 home runs.

In this deal, the Cardinals gave up their 6th-best prospect in Sandy Alcantara, 7th-best in outfielder Magneuris Sierra, and 24th-best prospect in their own system in Zac Gallen along with Daniel Castano. It was viewed as a great deal at the time but ended up aging poorly due to Alcantara and Gallen rising to become two of the best pitchers in baseball.

What if the Cardinals had given up Alex Reyes, Jack Flaherty, Luke Weaver, Dakota Hudson, Austin Gomber, or Jake Woodford instead? Reyes was one of the top prospects in all of baseball and Flaherty and Weaver were similarly rater prospects to Alcantara. It probably would have been viewed as an overpay at the time, but would have aged better in all of our eyes.

What's odd about this trade is that although it was the biggest mistake they made over the last decade, it also happens to be one of the few times they went out and made an aggressive move that could launch them into true contention. The front office deserves all of its flowers for the Paul Goldschmidt and Nolan Arenado trades, but those are unique situations that do not come up very often. Typically, if you want to make significant improvements, it takes aggressive trades like this, and it seems like the Ozuna deal has scared them off from that same level of aggression in recent years.

Myth - The Cardinals are hypocritical for firing Mike Matheny during a bad season but not Oli Marmol.

Reality - Bill DeWitt Jr. did say that the Cardinals' fired Mike Matheny because he was not winning, but they blamed the manager for that. In 2023, they blamed the roster and front office, not Marmol.

During the mess that was the 2023 Cardinals' season, Bernie Miklasz called back to a quote that Bill DeWitt Jr. had about the firing of Mike Matheny back in 2018.

It's easy to look at that quote and think "Well, how on earth does Oli Marmol have a job still?", but context is key for situations like this, something that makes it clear why the Cardinals see a difference in Matheny's performance and Marmol's.

Yes, the Cardinals were 47-46 when Matheny was fired in 2018, but they had just missed the playoffs in both 2016 and 2017 and were on their way to missing the playoffs for a third straight year. Yes, things were great from 2012-2015, but I'm guessing most fans would agree they should have accomplished more than they did during that stretch as well.

Oli Marmol made the playoffs with the Cardinals in 2022, and John Mozeliak has been quick to take the blame for how the 2023 season unfolded. In the front office and ownership's eyes, this season was a roster construction issue more than it was a manager issue, which is why they feel confident with Marmol again in 2024. I don't think anyone would absolve Marmol of all the blame this year, but it really is hard to believe a different manager makes this situation much different.

Does this mean Marmol is a good manager and 2024 will be an excellent rebound for him? No, but I don't blame the Cardinals front office for rolling with him again, and it's not "contradictory" to their statements back in 2018. If you believe someone needs to lose their job here, you would need to direct the attention to the front office, but with the sustained success they have had over the last decade, I also don't blame them for getting a chance to prove themselves in 2024. If the DeWitt family is serious about spending this offseason, then both the front office and Marmol will have zero excuses if things do not go well next season.