The Angels' Shohei Ohtani blunder that may have cost the Cardinals a championship run

After Dylan Carlson signed a minor league contract with the Chicago Cubs this past week, the St. Louis Cardinals' failure to acquire Juan Soto at the 2022 trade deadline is being brought up again, unfairly. After all, it was not Dylan Carlson, but rather the Cardinals' lack of an arm similar to Mackenzie Gore, that swung the trade package in favor of the San Diego Padres. However, it's worth revisiting another domino at that deadline that could've turned the Soto trade in the Cardinals' favor: Shohei Ohtani.

The Angels' insistence on holding onto Shohei Ohtani when his exodus from Anaheim was all but inevitable is perhaps one of the greatest front office failures in recent memory. Though their roster was immensely flawed, the Angels chose to try for contention in both 2022 and 2023, despite having a golden opportunity to cash in on a prospect package for the ages. According to Ken Rosenthal, the San Diego Padres offered a monster package for Ohtani at the 2022 trade deadline, including budding star Jackson Merrill and a comparable package (if not better) than the one they ultimately gave up for Juan Soto.

If the Angels had put Shohei Ohtani on the trade block in 2022, Juan Soto may have ended up with the Cardinals after all

Washington received a package including Mackenzie Gore, CJ Abrams, and James Wood for Soto, a clear win for them, and it's likely Anaheim could've jump-started a rebuild with a haul of top prospects rather than a compensation pick and nothing else for the now 4-time MVP.

It's clear that the Padres' preference would've been landing Ohtani, so if the Angels had agreed to send the two-way star to San Diego, the Juan Soto sweepstakes could've been wide open for the Cardinals. While other teams might've swooped in and taken Soto at the 2022 trade deadline, the Cardinals were in a prime position to be aggressive and go all-in with a core of MVP Paul Goldschmidt, MVP-candidate Nolan Arenado, a resurgent Albert Pujols and Yadier Molina in their final year's as Cardinals.

With the Cardinals' recent fall-off, the what-if of acquiring Juan Soto looms in the background as perhaps the last missing piece in sending Pujols and Molina off as champions rather than an unceremonious exit at the hands of the Phillies. Even if the Cardinals were willing to part with Jordan Walker, Masyn Winn, Dylan Carlson, Nolan Gorman, Matthew Liberatore, and others, a package that now looks underwhelming in hindsight, was no beating the Padres' monster offer. However, the Ohtani trade that never happened still looms large as a pathway for the Cardinals to win the sweepstakes and potentially rewrite the ending for two franchise icons.