As the offseason takes shape for the St. Louis Cardinals, starting pitcher Sonny Gray will be perhaps the biggest domino to fall.
It’s no guarantee that the Cardinals will trade Gray, but it also makes complete sense that they would, seeing as he just turned 36 and has admitted freely that his time in St. Louis hasn’t gone as he expected so far through two seasons.
It’s still early in the offseason, but the more we monitor what the market is whispering about Gray, the more we may have a realistic sense of whether he’s actually moved.
Aug 10, 2025; St. Louis, Missouri, USA; St. Louis Cardinals starting pitcher Sonny Gray (54) pitches against the Chicago Cubs during the first inning at Busch Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jeff Curry-Imagn Images / Jeff Curry-Imagn Images
On Monday, insider Bob Nightengale of USA Today named Gray among his top trade candidates of the winter, but with a catch: He doesn’t believe there’s any way the Cardinals will move him without having to eat some of his $35 million salary.
“Gray is one of the finest starters on the trade block, but he’s also earning $35 million this year and has a full no-trade clause,” Nightengale wrote. He has a $30 million club option in 2027. The Cardinals will have to eat some of the contract if they want to move him.
The Cardinals unwittingly put themselves in a tough position when they gave Gray his backloaded three-year, $75 million contract. It was a deal designed to help them spend more on payroll in 2024 and 2025, and both of those wound up becoming lost seasons.
Gray’s trade value is tough to predict, too. Beyond the contract, he’s aging, and didn’t have his strongest couple of seasons in terms of ERA (3.81 last year, 4.28 this year). However, the fact that he punched out 200 hitters in each of those seasons after only doing it once in his first 11 years as a big-leaguer signifies that he’s still got a lot left in the tank.
Now that a rebuild of some scale is beginning to take shape, the Cardinals must judge whether the trade market for Gray is strong enough to decimate the top of their rotation in the short term. Based on Nightengale’s anecdote, that doesn’t seem guaranteed.
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