St. Louis Cardinals Linked to TWO New Free Agents Including FORMER World Series Champion

St. Louis Cardinals Linked to TWO New Free Agents Including FORMER World Series Champion

Another expert listing of free agents has the Cardinals linked to not one but two new names, including a two-time all-star and former World Series champion. You are Locked On Cardinals, your daily St. Louis Cardinals podcast, part of the Locked On podcast network. Your team every day. Hey there Cardinals fans. I’m JD Haford, a former national radio sports anchor born and raised in St. Louis and a lifetime Cardinals fan. And I’m your host for Lockto Cardinals, part of the Lock Podcast Network covering your team every day. Big thank you to all the everydayers for joining us throughout the season and into the off season. For those of you who are new, welcome aboard. This is a show serving Cardinal Nation and giving you all the info about the birds on the bat. Today’s episode being brought to you by Game Time. Download the Game Time app, create an account, and use the code locks on MLB for $20 off your first purchase. All right, today’s episode we are once again going to be focused on the free agent market. World Series just ended this weekend. Um things are going to start to rev up a little bit as we move towards the winter meetings. You’re already starting to see some announcements on players opting out of their contracts for next season. Some pretty big names, which we knew were going to happen. They’ve already made some decisions. Big one for the Cubs. Shota Imanaga no longer going to be with the Cubs. At least not right now. He’s opted out. Their little mutual agreement thing is Kaput. Alex Bregman has opted out of Boston. Peter Lonzo and Edwin Diaz with the Mets. Cody Bellinger with the Yankees. Uh Robert Suarez from the Padres’s. It’s it’s a decent chunk of people. Um, it doesn’t mean these guys won’t renegotiate things and go back to those teams, but for now they are free agents. Now, Mark Feinand at MLB.com put out a new listing kind of similar to the one that Jim Bowden did for the Athletic. We talked about that last week and he listed his top 30 free agents. And as we’ve established with the Cardinals, they’re likely going to dabble in the free agent market this year. Uh most experts believe that they will be seeking short-term deals with people um as opposed to any of the the bigger multi-year deals that some of the you know bigger name free agents are going to be seeking. You know these guys want um security. They want long-term deals. They want uh if they are going to take shorter ones, they want the ability to opt out and do things. So um you know things can change. But if you remember last week Bowden had the Cardinals linked to four free agents. All of them were pitchers. It was Zack Gallon, Brad Keller, Luke Weaver, and Kyle Finnean. The Zack Gallon one was the one that was like, “Well, you know, he’s probably going to get a bigger contract, so probably doesn’t leave the Cardinals in the mix so much.” Uh, Keller was really, really good with Chicago. As soon as we posted that, I I had Sam from Locked on Cubs saying, “Stay away. Stay away from our guy.” Um, Luke Weaver makes some sense. There’s uh some smoke there. Kyle Finnegan makes some sense. We talked about those guys with Jeff Jones. Now, Feinstein put out his list of free agents and he did not have the Cardinals link to any of those four guys. None of them. He actually had the Cardinals as potential fits for two different names. One of them is a starting pitcher and a big one. And the the other one was an infielder, which was pretty interesting considering that the Cardinals have another log jam right now. Uh among their infielders, there’s a lot of them that they want to see on the field. So once again, similar to Bowden, Feinand does not have them linked with any of the top eight guys on his list, which shouldn’t surprise anybody. Uh at number one, he’s got Kyle Tucker. Then it’s Bregman, Schwarber, Bobette, Cody Bellinger, Alonzo, Mirami from Japan, and then Michael King. Then at number nine, he’s got the Astros, Framber Valdez, and potential suitors. The Cardinals are listed as one of them. He’s got the Astros, he’s got the Blue Jays, and Cardinals as potential fits. Now, here’s what Fein Sand says about the soontobe 32-year-old left-hander. Valdez was on track to be the top starting pitcher in this year’s free agent class, going 11 and4 with a 2.62 RA through his first 21 starts and striking out 141 batters over 134 edics. A lackluster finish to his season. He was 2-7 with a 6.05 05 RA over his final 10 starts and a highly publicized crossup incident in which he intentionally question mark hit his catcher in the chest with a fast ball following a home run have raised some questions but his track record as a workhorse should put him in good position to land a healthy deal. some thoughts courtesy of Keith Law at the Athletic talking about free agents uh and talking about Valdez saying that Valdez was one of only five pitchers who have thrown 900 innings over the last five seasons since baseball returned from the pandemic shortened 2020 season. He’s a classic sinker baller who led MLB and ground ball rate in 2024. He was third in 2025. We know how the Cardinals love their ground ball guys. uh says he’s hovering around 60% working with a plus curveball as his primary offsp speed pitch. The curveball has a big two plane break actually increasing a total break this year over 24 and hitters have whiffed on it more than 40% of the time over his career. He uses the curveball against right-handed batters almost twice as often as he uses his change up. So let’s go back to what Feinstein said. The key words in his grouping there in that dialogue was uh a healthy deal. What exactly does he mean by a healthy deal? Because a healthy deal doesn’t sound like something that the Cardinals are probably going to be around for. Are we talking three years? Are we talking five years? Now, Feinand doesn’t do any of the the contract predictions like Bowden did. Uh but in Bowden’s article, we can go back to this. He had Valdez rated much higher on the free agent list where uh Feinstein had him at number nine. Bowden had him at number four and had him at a six-year $190 million prediction. That’s what he had attached to Forever Valdez. Okay. Now, I don’t want to burst anyone’s bubble because I want fans to be excited about the Cardinals, but come on. Come on. Do we really think that the St. Louis Cardinals in the state of rebuild that they’re in right now are going to fork over anything remotely close to that for a soon to be 32-year-old pitcher? What do you think? uh you know they weren’t willing to do that a couple of years ago when we thought they were in what we considered a winning window and had a chance to make a splash in free agency. Yeah, they signed Sunny Gray, but then they followed that up with two veterans on one-year deals that were at the end of their careers instead of going and getting another top tier RM2 team with Sunny Gray and really make a push for winning something. Instead, they settled for two very lackluster signings, and we saw the results. Lackluster baseball, average baseball at best over the last couple seasons. So, I’m going to side with the uh people I’ve talked to and who are closer to the team and continue to be under the impression that the chances that something of that magnitude happening, a contract of that size would would be slim at best, like very slim. I still believe there are plenty of names and arms that are out there that can upgrade this rotation, which honestly shouldn’t be that hard considering what we just witnessed in 2025 when we had to deal with the trio of Eric Fetty, Miles Michael, and Andre Palante. That was awful. You can’t get much worse than those three. Honestly, you really can’t. And the Cardinals won’t have to commit to something as large as that sort of contract with Valdez to do it. I think he will need to be more creative than just sinking funds into one guy like this. And if he moves Sunny Gray, he’s going to need multiple arms to cover all these innings and uh pick up the slack. So, I can’t see that happening. I I think it’s cute that fights had the Cardinals attached to Framber Valdez, but it doesn’t seem all that realistic to me. What do you guys think? Let me know in the comments section. So, that’s the first one. Now, he’s got us the Cardinals attached to another guy as well. Not a pitcher this time. Instead, it’s an infielder actually that he has the Cardinals connected to. We will talk about him next on Locked on Cardinals. NFL season is back and honestly there’s nothing better than being in the stadium surrounded by fans cheering on your team. But let’s be honest, getting tickets that can be a little bit of a hassle, right? You know, you got to deal with the cues and the login screens and the prices, jumping at checkout and just shocking the hell out of you like you’re in a haunted house. You’re like, “What? What? What is that?” That’s why I use Game Time. As soon as I found Game Time, I’ve never gone anywhere else. It is the app that gives the advantage back to fans. 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We’re also on YouTube, Tik Tok, and Instagram at lockdown Cardinals as well. So, the Cardinals have a lot of infielders at the moment and not enough spots to play them all. This is a similar issue that this team has faced in the outfield for years. For years, it was always, man, we just got so many great outfielders. We don’t know what to do with the ball. It’s crazy. They’re coming out everywhere. And unfortunately, every time they would make that statement and John Mosa would choose a player to trade away to kind of clear up this log jam, this problem that they have, uh, that player would go on to succeed and kick ass somewhere else while the guys he decided to keep would either underperform, would be injured, unhappy, whatever. He always chose wrong, it seemed. Now, Heim Bloom has to adjust things on the infield so that he has the best product on the field moving forward. He’s got decisions to make. Nolan Aronado should be traded this off season. There’s no guarantee that he will get moved as we learned this last off season. They tried, didn’t work, but that should clear up a spot if Aronado decides to move on. There had been plenty of rumblings about trading Brennan Donovan, which has upset some fans, but if it happened, that would also open a spot, but again, no guarantee that that will happen either. If they move both Natto and Donnie, you would still have a nice grouping of young infielders. Like, it’s not like these are a bunch of scrubs. you would have your Gold Glover and Mason win at shortstop who’s feeling great after the the knee surgery, won the gold glove. Awesome stuff. You’ve got Nolan Gorman, which I know a lot of people have already quit on. Uh they’re they’re they’re done with it. They’re like, he’s never going to be what we want him to be. Move on. But he would still be here in this situation. Thomas Jaci, a guy that they clearly like. um did not show the offensive side that we were hoping for last year, but you’ve seen him be very successful in the minor leagues as an offensive player. So, I mean, it was his rookie year. Maybe cut him a little slack. He was playing off the bench most of the time. So, you know, there’s still some some ceiling there. Uh Jose Fine, a very capable uh infielder, backup infielder. So, uh, probably not somebody you’re trying to start, but you know, he’s somebody that that seems like a good utility guy, right? Uh, top prospect JJ Weatherhold. Obviously, somebody’s going to have to move aside so JJ can play every day at the major league level when they decide to bring him up. You could also throw in somebody like Cesar Prito into the mix, part of the Jack Flity deal with the Baltimore Orioles a couple years ago. Um, he’s on the 40man as well. saw him for a cup of coffee at the major league level, too. So, in this situation, perhaps the next free agent makes more sense. If Natto is gone, if Donovan is gone, maybe you look at the infield free agent market and see what you got. With all of those guys still here, it still feels like it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me. But this isn’t my list. At number 27 on fine sands list at MLB.com. He has got Detroit Tigers infielder Glaver Torres listed and potential fits. He has got Cleveland Guardians, the Minnesota Twins and your St. Louis Cardinals. Here’s what he has to say about Torres. Torres had to settle on a one-year $15 million deal in his first 4A into free agency, but he’ll give it another go after making his third career all-star team and first since 2019. He slashed 284, 386, 437 with nine home runs and 43 RBI’s in 72 games through the end of June. But his production fell off in the second half where he posted a slash line of 229, 331, 339 with seven home runs and 31 RBI’s in 73 games from July 1st through the end of the season. He says Torres’s plate discipline was strong, ranked in the 100 percentile in chase rate and 95th percentile in walk rate and placed in the top 20% in both with and strikeout percentage. But his defense was shaky, ranking in the 12th percentile with a minus5 outs above average. So, if we go to what Keith Law had to say about him from the Athletic, he says his main skill at the plate right now is his ball strike recognition as he had the second lowest chase rate among all qualified hitters in 25 behind only the master of the form, Juan Sto. Pitchers changed their method of attack against him in the second half, however, working more in the strike zone to Torres. The result was unsurprising. He ended up in more two strike counts and it dragged down his performance with his strikeout rate jumping from 12.8% in the first half to 20.4% in the second. He’s not a good defender at second with surprisingly poor range from a former shortstop. Now on Bowden’s list, he had Torres at number 22 and said that a hernia injury could be to blame for the struggles that Glaver had in the second half, but he thinks that Torres has done enough to earn a multi-year contract in the neighborhood of four years and 52 million. So the Cardinals are definitely looking for some extra offensive thought, right? They are. They they they they need more offense from the lineup. They could use more offense from the right side in particular. A lot of uh a lot of left-hand hitters, right? In that sense, Torres’s bat does make sense. The plate discipline that they mentioned is obviously a plus, but clearing a spot for JJ Weatherhalt seems to be the top priority, right? Shouldn’t it be? Shouldn’t that be what we’re focused on right now? So, adding another name to the mix of people who are blocking his path doesn’t seem to jive with what the Cardinals should be wanting to do. Uh Torres has only played shorts stop at second base in his career. So, you’ve got a Gold Glover in Mason Win already. Sega base again. You’ve got Donovan, you’ve got Gorman, you’ve got a Saji, you’ve got a Fine. Uh JJ Weatherhold’s got to play somewhere. Now, you could, if we’re moving the pieces around here, you could have JJ playing third base. You could have went at short and then Torres at second base. Now, how does Gorman fit into that situation? Is he even still around to batter anymore? We don’t know that yet. We don’t know. To me, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Unless it’s a one-year deal and you’ve already moved on from a number of people, you’ve still got to move a nado Donnie. Unless Donniey’s playing left field, which I that could be what’s happening. Um, do they feel more comfortable with JJ at third than second base? Does Gorman play at third or like you know what I mean? Like there’s got there’s a lot of questions still surrounding that before you go off and sign an infielder. But I’m definitely not interested if if it’s for what Bowden predicted. Like I’m not signing this dude to four years and $52 million. That’s for sure. Um, that just doesn’t seem to make a whole lot of sense to me. But those are the two guys that uh Feinand says that would be potential fits for the Cardinals for Amber Amber Valdez, Glamber Torres. What do you guys think? Leave your thoughts in the comments section down below. You can hit me up on X as well. Uh John Denton just wrote about how the Cardinals could have how he could see the Cardinals have a Blue Jays like turnaround, which would be incredible obviously. But in doing so, he brings up another familiar name as far as free agents go that just so happened to play for Toronto this year. We’ll discuss it coming up next on Locked on Cardinals. This episode is brought to you by Prize Picks. You and I, we make decisions every day. Some are good, some are bad. But on Prize Picks, when you’re right, that can get you paid, which is what we want. Don’t miss out on the excitement of this sports season. Whether you’re following the NFL, whether it’s the NBA, whether it’s both. Maybe you’re a crazy sports fan like me where it’s in NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB, bring it all. Bring all the sports in. There’s no better time to jump in on the action. If you haven’t tried it yet, Price Picks is the simplest way to play. You just pick more or less on at least two player stats. That’s it. Two player stats. And if you get them right, you win. It’s so quick. It takes less than 60 seconds to make your lineup. And you can play anywhere Price Picks operates, including California, Texas, and Georgia. I’m a big fantasy sports guy. I’ve been using Price Picks during both football season on Sundays. 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For your second listen, find Locked on MLB hosted by Sully who brings you that daily blend of humor and baseball throughout the off season. You can find Locked on MLB on YouTube or wherever you listen to your favorite podcast. Now, we just watched the Toronto Blue Jays go from worst to first in the American League East. 20 games under 500 last year. They win the division the next year. Go all the way to the World Series. two outs away. Two outs away from winning before the Dodgers and superstar infielder Miguel Rojas broke all their hearts in Canada with the game tying home run and then Will Smith stomped on them and crushed them into sawdust uh with his game-winning dinger in extra innings. It was a fantastic World Series and it’s every team and fan base’s dream that you have one bad year where you stink and then the next year you whoop turn it around, bounce back, you become relevant again and go on to do great things like the Toronto Blue Jays just did. and John Den who covers Cardinals for MLB.com uh kind of mapped out a way for the Cardinals to have a a Toronto like turnaround and he mentions a couple of different aspects that you know we can go into in another episode of why and why not it would make sense. um you know cuz I I see his thought process of you know hey if these certain things happen and this lines up you know this is why they could be winners again and I get that you know you’re seeing things through a positive lens. So, uh, maybe we can cover that in another episode. But what he says at the very end coincides with what we’ve been discussing today, which is the free agent market. And the final piece that he mentions in this whole this blueprint, if you will, of turning the Cardinals around is once again free agent pitcher Max Scherzer. Here’s what he says. Finally bring Max Scherzer home. Hey, acquiring Sherzer worked for the Jays. who wrote a couple of strong Mad Max playoff performances this October. Sherzer, a Chesterfield, Missouri native, was a 43rd round draft pick by the Cardinals in 2003 before he opted for Missou. Through the year, St. Louis passed on chances to sign or trade for the likely future Hall of Famer that many fans consider the one who got away. Think Sher wants to keep playing? He told MLB.com’s Keegan Mat, “I may be 41 years old, but I never thought I could love baseball this much. Now, as cool as that story would be, and as much fun as it would be to see Sherzer finally wearing a Cardinals uniform, something that we have kicked around for the better part of the last decade of what it would be to to have somebody of his ability, his energy, all of it, bring him home. As much as that would be great, I continue to believe that he would rather pitch for a contender than play what could possibly be his final season as a Major League Baseball player because you never know. I cannot see him doing it, toiling away with the rebuilding and hopefully competitive St. Louis Cardinals and again hopefully competitive St. Louis Cardinals because we don’t know. The last three seasons have not been that competitive. They’ve been very me unless his desire to play in St. Louis supersedes his um wanting to win. If it supersedes anything else he wants to accomplish in this game anymore, then I don’t see how this will happen. Like it’s the only thing that I can see why he would come to St. Louis just so he could say he finally played for his hometown team and he’s played all over North America. Arizona, Detroit, Washington, LA, New York, Texas, Toronto. He’s won in almost every single place he’s played. He was only on a one-year 15.5 million deal with the Blue Jays. In my opinion, it’s not the money that’s not the problem. It’s not the money that would keep him out of St. Louis, it would be his desire to be on a good team and and winning. That would be the deciding factor to me. And I I’m I’m just not convinced that settling for a job in St. Louis is what he wants. if they aren’t going to be contending for anything. Now, if the Cardinals were in a different spot, if it was the Cardinals from two years ago when they were coming off that god-awful 2023 season and they had a chance to sign Sunny and Max Scherzer, that would have made sense, right? But that didn’t happen. Instead, it was Lance Lynn, Kyle Gibson. But that’s just my opinion. That’s my opinion. And of course, you still got the Sunny Gray thing. Like I would a Sunny Gray Max Scherzer combo be awfully nice to go along with a Liberator, a McGrevy, and whoever else they decide to put in that number five spot. Sure. But is he willing to be around for something like that where, hey, we could be decent. We could also be below 500 again. There’s a real good chance at that if certain people don’t step the game up. We’re also getting rid of guys like Nolan Aronado. Like he’s he’s going to be gone. We got a Willie Contreras over here, but it’s a lot of young guys. I just I just don’t know. I don’t know if that’s where Max Sher would want to be. But what do you think? That’s just my opinion. What do you guys think? Can we tug at Max’s heartstrings enough to make him come home and play for the Cardinals for one year at least? or do you agree with me that he wants to be where he’s got a chance to win? I mean, you saw how excited he was in Toronto, right? So, let me know in the comments section down below. We can discuss it. Big thank you for making lockdown Cardinals to all of you for making lockdown Cardinals your first listen every day. If you haven’t already, give us a follow on X at L_Cardinal and a JD Sports Radio, Tik Tok, and Instagram at Lockdown Cardinals. Like, subscribe on YouTube. By the way, thank you. We did it. 13,000 subscribers on YouTube. You guys rock. You guys are the best. Now, we make the push for 15 before the the regular season starts in 2026. So, that that’s kind of the goal I I’ve set for myself now. So, uh if you haven’t and you like Daily Cardinals content, you haven’t liked or subscribed yet. Hook it up, man. Get it done. It’s real quick. Boom. Boom. You’ll get us in your notifications that every day when we drop something new, keeping you up to date throughout the entire off season. We don’t venture off. This is Cardinals only. we don’t slide into the other sports or whatever. Although, good stuff by the Blues last night and winning. Uh, watch that one. That was awesome. So, um, if you’re not a part of the Cardinal Nation here at Locked On Cardinals, be a part of it. Like, subscribe. You guys are the best fans in baseball for a reason. We will see you next time on Locked on Cardinals.

The St. Louis Cardinals face critical roster decisions as MLB’s free agent market heats up, with surprising names emerging as potential targets. Could a hometown legend return to finish his Hall of Fame career in red?

Host JD Hafron analyzes Mark Feinsand’s latest free agent rankings linking the Cardinals to Astros ace Framber Valdez and Yankees infielder Gleyber Torres. The discussion examines whether these moves align with the Cardinals’ rebuilding timeline, especially given the team’s existing infield logjam featuring Gold Glover Masyn Winn and top prospect JJ Wetherholt. JD also breaks down John Denton’s blueprint for a Toronto Blue Jays-style turnaround, which includes the intriguing possibility of signing Chesterfield native Max Scherzer.

Key topics include the Cardinals’ rotation needs after last season’s struggles, Valdez’s projected six-year contract, Torres’ defensive limitations, and whether Scherzer would choose nostalgia over contention.

Tune in for an honest assessment of which free agent moves make sense for the Cardinals’ future.

0:00 Intro

0:32 Cardinals linked to two new free agents

2:04 Players opting out of contracts

3:35 Framber Valdez as potential Cardinals target

6:40 Would Cardinals pay $190 million for Valdez

9:13 Cardinals linked to infielder Gleyber Torres

14:27 Torres’ stats and defensive concerns

17:33 Does Torres fit Cardinals infield logjam

19:36 Blue Jays turnaround blueprint for Cardinals

22:40 Max Scherzer homecoming possibility discussed

25:45 Would Scherzer choose Cardinals over contender

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