The Cardinals need to tread water with Jordan Walker and then reset this offseason

No matter which way you slice it, 2025 has been a massive disappointment for Jordan Walker, and the St. Louis Cardinals have a massive question mark on their hands as they finish out the season and prepare for 2026.

Slashing .233/.288/.323 with just four home runs and a .611 OPS in 84 games, Walker has not rebounded from his putrid 2024 campaign at the plate, and many fans are beginning to wonder if Walker can ever get back to the potential he showed as a top prospect in baseball and during a very encouraging rookie year in 2023.

Even for all of the defensive strides he seemingly made to begin this year, even that facet of his game has regressed again, as his -2 OAA ranks in the 21st percentile. I'll say that he does look far more comfortable out there than he did the last two years, but he's still a below-average outfield defender. Even his top-end arm strength continues to be muted by inaccurate throws or delayed decisions, also resulting in a -2 arm value, which is in the seventh percentile.

2025 has seen Walker post career-worst metrics in strikeout percentage, ISO, and slugging percentage while continuing to see a massive dip in his average, on-base percentage, wRC+, and frankly, almost every category possible offensively. Perhaps the scariest part of that profile, other than the high whiff rate and continuing to drive baseballs into the ground, is that Walker actually has a career high .335 BABIP, which would be tied for 18th in all of baseball among qualified hitters.

So, not only has Walker's production been terrible this year, but there's a good argument that even that has been lucky, and things are even worse beneath the hood than some fans want to believe.

Look, I still believe that Walker has the tools to be a very impactful player. Frankly, the Cardinals' future is so much brighter if Walker can figure things out. There is no real incentive to cut bait on him right now, but the Cardinals are staring down the barrel of a tough decision in the near future, so the end of the 2025 season should be more about waiting things out than trying to make a massive change at this point.

The Cardinals have to tread water with Jordan Walker for the remainder of the 2025 season and then hope major changes occur in the offseason.

While there were flaws in Walker's profile even during his rookie year, things have just regressed tremendously since then. I'm not telling you anything you don't know already, but Walker is in need of another major reset this offseason.

Walker is the worst hitter in baseball in squared up percentage among qualified hitters, ranks in the bottom ten percentiles in xwOBA, xBA, launch angle sweet-spot percentage, whiff percentage, and strikeout percentage, and carries a really bad chase rate, walk rate, and xSLG as well. Yes, Walker hits the ball extremely hard and very often, but that doesn't mean anything at this level if he's not optimizing that swing.

There was a brief stretch following the All-Star break and his injured list stint where Walker was at least putting together better numbers on the surface, which I do think was an important boost to his confidence. For 18 games from July 18th through August 8th, Walker slashed .318/.366/.455 with a .821 OPS and 132 wRC+. During that stretch, though, Walker's BABIP was sky high at .417, and his xwOBA sat at a measly .286. While some got frustrated when people pointed that out because they believed Walker was turning a corner, he has now fallen back down to earth once again.

Since that hot stretch, Walker has been in one of his worst stretches of the year (albeit a small sample size of 10 games, but not much smaller than the 18 games that got many over their skis about Walker turning things around), slashing .152/.222/.182 with a .404 OPS and 18 wRC+ prior to Sunday night's two-hit game. Again, I'd love nothing more than for Walker to get red-hot for the rest of the year and look like a shining star again, but I think most people can agree that things look bad right now.

Sure, the Cardinals could send him down to Memphis right now, but this late in the year, that would be a major mistake. The path for the Cardinals to finish out 2025 is clear, and the plan heading into 2026 seems to be taking shape as well.

First, Walker has to stay on the roster for the remainder of the season. I think he should play most days, but if the coaching staff and player development group believe he needs work with them behind the scenes, I get that. Optioning Walker to Memphis at this point would burn his final option year, meaning they'd have to keep Walker on the roster for all of 2026 or pass him through waivers, and with so little time remaining in the season, I do not see how that makes any sense.

Second, going into the offseason, the Cardinals need all hands on deck to put together the best possible "action plan" they can give Walker and pour as many resources and manpower into helping him train and learn this offseason. Manager Oliver Marmol said during Walker's recent hot streak that he believed the 23-year-old was putting into action the changes they were trying to make with him, so perhaps another extended offseason of work could be the turning point for Walker.

But, much like what happened with Nolan Gorman during spring training, if Walker makes it to camp without being traded by Chaim Bloom, he should be playing and training to earn not only a spot in the lineup, but a spot on their 26-man roster.

In 2026, Walker needs to be treated like a prospect, not someone who's guaranteed any kind of runway, until further notice. If he finishes 2025 looking like the guy many of us thought he was two years ago, sure, it could be different. But assuming things haven't gotten a ton better before the year is over, Walker needs to be put to the test this offseason and down in Jupiter.

If things go well, sure, have him on the roster and in the lineup. But again, I'm not sure a long leash is necessary. But if things go poorly, that's when his final option year should be exercised, and Walker can spend as much time as he needs, even if it means all of 2026, in the minor leagues fixing his swing and approach at the plate.

Yes, Walker is going to have to face big league pitching to get over his frustrating chases at low and away sliders, or to get out of his own head with the frequent takes of fastballs down the middle in hitters' counts (or even in two-strike situations!). But it's hard to ignore how broken his swing looks right now, and until he figures out how to stop pounding the ball into the ground, his future is mediocre at best.

I know the Cardinals' coaching staff and player development group are hard at work trying to get Walker to hit again, but this really does feel like a lost cause for this season. They need to find a way to tread water for now with Walker amid the changes they are making and hope this coming offseason helps to bear better fruit next year.