You won't believe this compliment the St. Louis Cardinals' farm system just got

If you haven't noticed yet, the St. Louis Cardinals farm system is getting a ton of praise this offseason.

Chaim Bloom's primary mission since being named the heir to John Mozeliak was revamping their player development and performance departments, reviving an area of the organization that had fallen woefully behind the times, and regaining their reputation and edge as a draft and develop team.

While Bloom himself would say that the Cardinals have a long way to go to reach their goals in that area, progress has indeed been made. The industry has taken notice, and on today's podcast breakdown of the Cardinals' farm system by Baseball America, the Cardinals received an incredible compliment from one of the best prospect gurus out there today.

Geoff Pontes calls Cardinals' farm system going into 2026 is the best he's written about during his time with Baseball America

Geoff Pontes and JJ Cooper of Baseball America published a podcast today breaking down the Cardinals' farm system, and spent much of the podcast highlighting the strides the Cardinals have made this past year. Pontes, who does the write-ups for the Cardinals' farm system for Baseball America, had an especially glowing compliment to give the Cardinals.

Pontes shared on their podcast, breaking down the Cardinals' farm system, that it was probably the best system he's written about for their prospect handbook since joining Baseball America four years ago. Yes, the best he's written about during that period of time.

Now I want to make sure to note that Pontes does not do the write-up for every system in Baseball America's handbook, so he's not necessarily saying it is the absolute best system he's seen during his time with the company, but again, it is still a very strong compliment from Pontes, especially given the context of where the system was even just a year ago.

When Bloom was hired as a special assistant to Mozeliak following the 2023 season, he spent an entire year observing and studying the Cardinals' farm system and player development programs, which ended with him presenting his findings and desired outcomes for the organization, which landed him a job as the next president of baseball operations. During that year, while Bloom was waiting to take the reins, he stayed behind the scenes and began implementing some of those changes, hiring and restructuring their player development staff and department, and essentially doing phase one of the reset they needed.

Remember, back in September of 2024, Katie Woo of The Athletic dropped a bombshell of a report detailing just how bad things had gotten in terms of player development and performance for St. Louis, with one Cardinals staffer saying, “We’re in trouble. This is not easily fixable within the next year, or year after. This is going to take some time." The Cardinals didn't need just a few dials turned; they needed a complete rebuild of their player development.

So, for someone like Pontes to say 15 months later that the Cardinals system is the best he's written about in his four years at Baseball America after where they had been, that's an incredible step in the right direction.

I'm not here to declare the Cardinals as "back" or that they've "caught up" with other organizations now. The proof will be in the pudding over the next few years. Does this farm system actually produce winning ballplayers? Can this new regime continue to scout, acquire, and develop talent at a high level? Can they carry this momentum year after year to churn out exciting young talent and begin to set the tone around the industry as to what the best practices in developing players moving forward are? We'll have to wait and see.

But for now, I'm not sure it is even possible for us to ask any more from Bloom and his team in terms of the strides they've taken so far, and they'll be the first to tell you that they have a long way to go in order to get where they want to be.