Cardinals 2025 MLB Season Preview: Staving off the inevitable rebuild

What goes up must come down. All good things must come to an end. Nothing great lasts forever.
Whichever one of those phrases you use to describe a worsening state of affairs can currently be applied to the St. Louis Cardinals.

The Redbirds used to run the NL Central with strong, stern command. They lived in the playoffs. If they somehow didn't make the postseason, they were a whisker away from doing so. But over the last two years, they've started trending downward.

Yes, 2023-24 is admittedly a small sample size. And the Cardinals did rebound from their disastrous 71-91 showing in 2023 to post an 83-79 mark last year. But a quick peek behind the curtain shows that improvement may be a bit of a mirage.

In 2024, the Cardinals scored the ninth-fewest runs per game (4.15) in baseball. They allowed the 18th-most runs per game (4.44). Both figures were below league average. As a result, their Pythagorean W-L record was 76-86. Outperforming this metric by seven wins is more than double the average Pythagorean differential.

The only NL Central squad with a worse Pythagorean record was the Pittsburgh Pirates (73-89). And if that's an indication of what's to come in 2025, the Cardinals are standing on the cusp of their first real rebuild in recent memory.

Position Players to Watch

There's a new dynamic in St. Louis this season. Paul Goldschmidt is already gone. Nolan Arenado hasn't left town yet, but seems destined to at some point. Luckily, the Cardinals have a budding young star ready to handle infield captain duties in 23-year-old shortstop Masyn Winn.

Wynn has already proven himself to be a terrific defender. He won the 2024 Fielding Bible Award for shortstops. His prowess with the glove and arm helped him rack up 4.9 bWAR in 2024.

The hope is that he can be a league-average hitter. He was essentially that by OPS+ (102) and Weighted Runs Created Plus (wRC+; 103) in 2024. But he has been downright putrid with the lumber this spring.

Those numbers have only gotten worse in the past week, as Winn now has a .080/.145/.225 slash line through 50 at-bats. He's projected to bat ninth on Opening Day.

Winn is joined in the back half of the St. Louis lineup by two other young pups in Victor Scott (24 years old, CF) and previously highly-touted prospect Jordan Walker (22, RF). While they develop, the Cardinals have a heavy veteran presence at the top of the order.

Much has been made of Willson Contreras moving to first base. This transition, though, is logical for him and the team. St. Louis already has Ivan Herrera and Pedro Pages on the roster, and three other catchers — most notably Jimmy Crooks —- among their top 10 prospects. Meanwhile, they have no first basemen listed in their top 30 prospects.

Contreras was far and away the Cardinals' best hitter in 2024. His wRC+ (140) and OPS+ (136) was only rivaled by Herrera (wRC+ of 127, OPS+ of 129), who shared his position. Putting Contreras at first base gives St. Louis a way to get another big bat in a lineup that desperately needs it.

The Cardinals' offense isn't going to overpower anyone. Beyond Contreras, it features solid big leaguers (Nootbar, Donovan) who fill a role. But if the bottom-third can't provide any juice, expecting St. Louis to score more runs this year would border on blind optimism.

Pitchers to Watch

The headliners here for the Cardinals are Sonny Gray and Ryan Helsley. When both men are at the top of their game, they're some of the best arms in baseball. Gray finished second in AL Cy Young voting in 2023. Helsley led the majors in saves (49) in 2024.

Gray's 2024 ERA (3.84) was a full run higher than his 2023 figure (2.79). But his Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP) dropped by only .29 (2.83 to 3.12). He had some bad luck in 2024. As long as he dispels this spring's velocity concerns — which may be attributed to illness — he should be his usual self atop the rotation.

After Gray, Pallante — a former reliever — believes he can take another step in 2025. Fedde, following his trade deadline acquisition last year, performed solidly. Liberatore is trying to embark on the path Pallante followed last year. Mikolas' play has slipped, but this group overall feels like it has a higher ceiling than the lineup.

The bullpen, even with Helsley, is projected to rank 22nd in fWAR. If St. Louis is to earn a postseason bid in 2025, the rotation will have to perform near its ceiling. The NL Central is there to be had if it can.

What's best for St. Louis' long-term outlook?

The Cardinals are MLB's version of the Pittsburgh Steelers. No matter how good or bad the roster may appear to be, they're almost always lurking around the playoffs at the end of the season. They very well could do so again in 2025. But is that good enough?

The Cardinals' standard, like the Steelers', isn't merely to attend the dance. It's to leave as Prom King. And lately, they've not come close to doing that. They haven't appeared in the NLCS since 2019. They haven't even won a single League Championship Series game since 2014.

Simply making the playoffs shouldn't suffice as success in St. Louis. And the patchwork attempts to field a true contender in recent years haven't worked. But if they win the watered-down NL Central and make the playoffs, nothing about their operating procedure will change.

Yes, once you make the playoffs, anything can happen. The 2023 Arizona Diamondbacks showed us that. Heck, the 90-win, 2011 Cardinals (to an extent) did as well. But a franchise with St. Louis' track record should be Goliath, not David. The best way for them to get back to their winning roots would be to charge ahead with a rebuild and not look back.

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