Riley O'Brien's struggles should not lead Cardinals to rash offseason move

Get ready for an unpopular take: The St. Louis Cardinals do not need to solve their "Riley O'Brien" problem. They simply need to have a stronger bullpen unit around him in the future.

Should O'Brien be the best reliever on the next Cardinals contender? Probably not. But as the blown saves have increased once again, there is angst among various fans who want to see O'Brien go away, but that would be a terrible idea as things currently stand.

On the season, O'Brien's 4.20 ERA is far from ideal, especially considering how strong things started. Through May 15th, O'Brien had 13 saves, striking out 25 batters in 22 innings with a 2.45 ERA. He was consistently locking games down for St. Louis, and his arsenal looked the sharpest it had in his entire career.

Following that, O'Brien's performance fell off the tracks, and despite a late-summer surge where he looked like himself again, his performance on the mound has wavered once again. His 5.73 ERA in August was the beginning of the second regression, and through 5.1 innings in September, he's given up four runs.

Don't get me wrong, O'Brien's falloff is concerning and super disappointing. He's not locked into some high-leverage role going into 2027, but it also seems foolish to believe the best thing to do is to just release him now. Sure, if a nice trade offer comes the Cardinals' way, they should entertain it, but if they want to compete in 2027, they need to add arms, not subtract ones who have shown the upside that O'Brien has.

The Cardinals need to reinforce their bullpen, not remove Riley O'Brien from it

The Cardinals do have other interesting arms to look at heading into next season for their bullpen group. Gordon Graceffo, Luis Gastelum, Justin Bruihl, and Cade Winquest all seem like locks to be in the Cardinals' Opening Day bullpen and could even be relied on for significant roles.

George Soriano, like O'Brien, had a much stronger start to his year than he has finished, and while I think he'll be back as well, I wouldn't be shocked if he wasn't. But let's assume he's in the mix, as well as O'Brien, those are six options off the bat they have to look at.

Ryne Stanek could be someone they bring back on a cheap deal. Brycen Mautz will be back in the mix. Cooper Hjerpe will be an excellent option if he is not starting, but he should be a rotation option instead. Matthew Liberatore, if he's still with the team, could be looked at for a bullpen role.

The Cardinals have essentially no payroll commitments for next season, including $33 million of the $96 million current 2026 payroll coming off the books from the Sonny Gray and Nolan Arenado trades. If Chaim Bloom wants to add more relievers to this mix, he'll have the ammo to do so. They didn't really do so this past offseason, but they won't have any excuses not to this winter.

I would much rather see the Cardinals add more competition to this bullpen mix and force O'Brien out because arms outplayed him, than to just go ahead and pull the plug now. O'Brien was an All-Star this year (yes, it feels like a long time ago) and is tied for second in all of Major League Baseball in saves this year with 36. Yes, it's been bad too often, but it's not been as bad as some would like to believe.

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