shared a lot of high praise for Cardinals<\/a> catching prospect Leonardo Bernal. Akbani suggested the Cardinals could use Bernal in the big leagues at some point this season.<\/p>\nLeonardo Bernal has star potential written all over him![\"St.](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/01kgfksqt2nv6a2ds64b.jpg\" "\\"St.")
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Feb 20, 2025; Jupiter, FL, USA; St. Louis Cardinals catcher Leonardo Bernal (96) poses for a photo during media day at Clover Park. Mandatory Credit: Jim Rassol-Imagn Images | Jim Rassol-Imagn Images<\/p>\n
“The signature trait of the Cardinals\u2019 player development team is their ability to produce countless top-tier catching prospects,” Akbani wrote. “Leonardo Bernal is no exception, with the Panamanian product slowly but surely ascending through the minor leagues while flashing average to above-average tools across the board. <\/p>\n
“The 2025 season was a tale of two halves for Leo. He registered an impressive 135 wRC+ through 6\/30, but a putrid 68 wRC+ from July 1st to the end of the season. He\u2019s always been a solid hitter at the plate, registering a 79.4 contact% this past season at Springfield, suggesting a Z-Contact% somewhere in the low-mid 80s.”<\/p>\n
The Cardinals have a lot of talented catchers in their system. Bernal has the potential to be a star, which means he might be the next catching prospect to make his way to the big leagues.<\/p>\n
With Iv\u00e1n Herrera likely slotting in at the designated hitter spot more than anything, the Cardinals could look to carry three catchers. If Bernal can get off to a hot start at the Triple-A level, he could be an early call up for the Cardinals. Bernal is a good defensive catcher, but he’s going to have to battle other top catching prospects to get to the big leagues.<\/p>\n
More MLB: Predicting Blockbuster Brendan Donovan Trade After Eugenio Su\u00e1rez Deal<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The St. Louis Cardinals are in the middle of a huge rebuild which has already seen six big…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":554130,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2403],"tags":[5,160,4,673,67,4311,4310],"class_list":{"0":"post-554129","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-st-louis-cardinals","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-cardinals","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-st-louis","12":"tag-st-louis-cardinals","13":"tag-stlouis","14":"tag-stlouiscardinals"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116012307138961585","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/554129","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=554129"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/554129\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/554130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=554129"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=554129"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=554129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}