The Cardinals are in a very familiar place as of late, a place the Cardinals were in all of last offseason, which is a holding pattern of sorts. The holding pattern being caused by potential trades that will probably happen but haven\u2019t yet. The Cardinals are in a more advantageous position now though, basically waiting for a team to capitulate to the demand for Brendan Donovan as opposed to getting zero calls from teams interested in Nolan Arenado. The latter admittedly is still happening, but at least Arenado will be more receptive to waiving the no trade clause this time.<\/p>\n
Even if the Cardinals do not trade Donovan, I imagine they would still want another outfielder. Donovan is likely targeted for nearly a full-time outfielder role if he stays on the team. The outfield situation is such, however, that even if that were the case, I still think they need another outfielder. That says more about my desire to see Jordan Walker dominate in AAA before getting another MLB opportunity – you have the MLB option, now is the time to use it. But all reports are that Donovan will be traded eventually, and then the Cardinals REALLY need another outfielder.<\/p>\n
There has been a decent amount of movement in the outfield market, but there are also many players the Cardinals could still sign. You may be wondering who is left. That\u2019s what this post is for. A general overview of moderately desirable outfielders. It is a requirement that you are an outfielder though. Apologies to the dozens of fans clamoring for Eloy Jimenez, but he played a single game in the outfield in 2024 and just 14 in 2023. He was a horrendous fielder before that.<\/p>\n
First, earlier this offseason, I wrote a post <\/a>about former Cardinal players, who weirdly fit a niche of being guys that actually made sense for the Cardinals. At least in theory. Of those players, Adolis Garcia signed a 1 year, $10 million deal with the Phillies and Lane Thomas signed a 1 year, $5.25 million deal with the Royals. Tommy Pham, Randal Grichuk, and Harrison Bader are all still free agents. Bader will cost the most money, the other two probably not much.<\/p>\n It remains to be seen whether Bader will fall under this category and also what my threshold is for big money. I don\u2019t honestly know. These guys have clearly separated themselves from the rest of the pack and actually even lumping Bader in with this group is a very big favor to Bader. Bader, as I expressed in the earlier post, had a very high BABIP and a not particularly high xwOBA, so his offensive season looks very fluky. His defense is also not as good as it once was. But every MLB team knows this, and I doubt he\u2019s looking at this great deal.<\/p>\n Both Kyle Tucker and Cody Bellinger are likely out of the Cardinals\u2019 self-imposed budget. In Tucker\u2019s case, that\u2019s because the reported ask is $400 million, and it\u2019s a little doubtful he\u2019ll get that, but unless it\u2019s as low as $200 million, and even then, I\u2019m not sure the Cardinals are even calling him up. In Bellinger\u2019s case, it\u2019s because he\u2019s frankly a very untrustworthy player to give an eight-figure contract to considered he collapsed as a hitter when he was 25. Doesn\u2019t mean it\u2019ll happen again, but I\u2019m not betting $100+ million that it won\u2019t.<\/p>\n The Cardinals are unlikely to tap into these waters<\/p>\n You may be wondering why the Cardinals would sign a left-handed bat that can only hit right-handed pitching. A good question. This player would probably only sign here with a trade of Donovan, thus swapping a left-handed bat for a left-handed bat. If you were to keep Donovan, this certainly means Walker is heading to AAA, but also you have a left-handed bat at all three outfield spots, two of which do not have a platoon partner. Who platoons with this guy? Honestly, Jose Fermin. I don\u2019t hate that arrangement. Between JJ Wetherholt, Thomas Saggese, and Nolan Gorman, starts at the infield position will be hard to come by – this is a way to get him starts.<\/p>\n Stats: 385 PAs, .263\/.356\/.400, 11.7 BB%, 22.3 K%, .137 ISO, .328 BABIP, 115 wRC+<\/p>\n Small caveat but not necessarily a negative: Tauchman has shown zero platoon splits in his career. Honestly, Tauchman makes a ton of sense. His one notable offensive talent is that he takes a lot of walks. He\u2019s otherwise okay at the other parts with below average power. He is a decent defender. He will almost certainly sign a one-year deal. He is almost a player specifically designed to be a stopgap, giving you competent at-bats, decent defense and sorry Mike, very easy to push aside if you\u2019re ready for a change.<\/p>\n Stats: 474 PAs, .216\/.300\/.391, 10.1 BB%, 19.6 K%, .175 ISO, .232 BABIP, 90 wRC+<\/p>\n Kepler is basically Lars Nootbaar at 33. Usually has nagging injuries that prevent him from playing the full season, has underlying statistics that suggest he should be better than he is, a reasonably good defender. Kepler is much worse against lefties though and is a true strong side of the platoon. If you sign him, you should have a specific plan of playing a right-handed batter when the Cardinals face a lefty in his place or you shouldn\u2019t bother.<\/p>\n Stats: 866 PAs, .267\/.307\/.373, 4.4 BB%, 12.7 K%, .106 ISO, .294 BABIP, 90 wRC+<\/p>\n Those are Brennan\u2019s career stats, because he only played in 6 games – 13 total plate appearances – last season. He had a 103 wRC+ in AAA – it was only in 35 games – so I think he was hurt most of the season. This is the kind of player a true rebuilding team signs. Let me take this longshot chance of a player who probably isn\u2019t good, but isn\u2019t that old and you never know. Brennan also has been an above average hitter against right-handed pitchers in his career (102 wRC+).<\/p>\n And hey maybe developmentally speaking, you can do something with this kind of hitter. Great at making contact, doesn\u2019t make good enough contact to probably be this aggressive. Basically Alec Burleson with worse contact quality and no power. His career swing% is only lower than the most free swinging hitters you can think of (PCA, Salvador Perez, Michael Harris) and would have ranked 6th in baseball last year. Perhaps a \u201cyou don\u2019t need to swing at everything\u201d approach could slightly improve his results.<\/p>\n