This successful strategy from 2025 is unlikely to help the Cardinals in 2026

While I think it is safe to say most of us lament the weird half-in, half-out strategy the St. Louis Cardinals chose to take in John Mozeliak's final season running the club, manager Oliver Marmol and his staff did find a creative way to keep their rotation afloat throughout the year.

When the Cardinals broke camp in 2025, they had a hybrid six-man rotation that allowed them to keep their arms healthy and fresh in the early stages of the season in order to avoid disaster striking. Sonny Gray, Miles Mikolas, Erick Fedde, Andre Pallante, and Matthew Liberatore headlined the traditional five-man group, while Steven Matz would filter in here or there with spot starts to keep Gray healthy and help Liberatore manage the buildup to a starter's workload. That left Michael McGreevy on standby in Memphis, occasionally making spot starts himself until the Cardinals finally dropped Fedde and inserted McGreevy into the rotation.

This has caused many to wonder if the Cardinals would consider a similar approach early in 2026, especially with six interesting young arms currently vying for a spot in their rotation. When Marmol was asked about this in a Zoom call with various Cardinals bloggers and podcasters on Friday, he gave some insight into why a different strategy will likely be needed this year.

The Cardinals are unlikely to utilize a six-man rotation in early 2026

Marmol addressed a question about having a six-man rotation during the Zoom call I took part in, and while he agreed that their strategy last year worked well, there were reasons why it did not make as much sense to start 2026, with the first of those being the number of off days the club has in late March and all of April.

After the Cardinals' home opener on Thursday, March 26th, the club has an off day on Friday, and then the four consecutive Thursdays following that are off-days as well. Marmol pointed out that if the Cardinals went to a six-man group to start the year, their starters would be working on a seven-day schedule between starts, and that could actually pose a greater risk of injury due to the amount of time between throwing high-intensity pitches. Now, the Cardinals do play 17 straight days from April 24th to May 10th, so they could decide to mix in some starts for guys outside the rotation during that stretch.

Marmol also stated that another reason for their desire to be careful with their five-man group was the lack of pitching depth they had down at Triple-A last year. Outside of McGreevy, the Cardinals did not feel confident in their other options. Early in the year, guys like Quinn Mathews, Tekoah Roby, Tink Hence, and Cooper Hjerpe all went down with injuries, and so they really didn't have many names they could turn to if anyone missed time.

This year, the Cardinals have a deeper group of names to turn to if an arm or two go down. Dustin May, Matthew Liberatore, Micahel McGreevy, Kyle Leahy, Andre Pallante, and Richard Fitts are the six names they are expected to lean on early, but guys like Hunter Dobbins and Quinn Mathews could factor in early as well if needed. Even beyond those eight guys, there are more potential options in Ixan Henderson, Brycen Mautz, Pete Hansen, Zack Thompson, Bruce Zimmerman, Tink Hence, Cooper Hjerpe, Gordon Graceffo, or even Liam Doyle could factor in at some point.

I fully expect the Cardinals to use a lot of young arms in 2026, but a six-man group to start the year seems unlikely for multiple reasons.