Báez, 23, this season leads all minor leaguers in home runs, with 34 in 103 games for Triple-A Memphis. Overall, he’ll arrive in the majors after having batted .256/.328/.573 this season with 21 stolen bases in 24 attempts.

Born in Boston but raised in the Dominican Republic until his family returned when he was a child, Báez first drew the attention of scouts at Dexter Southfield School in Massachusetts, not just for his plus-plus game power, but also for his two-way athleticism — he touched 97 mph on the mound. The Cardinals were sufficiently moved to tab him with the 54th overall pick in the 2021 MLB Draft and then go well above slot to sign him to a $2.25 million bonus. To state the obvious, an organization doesn’t do that unless they’re quite high on the player in question.

Báez saw very limited action in the Florida Complex League, and in 2022 he played just 32 games. That’s because he suffered a wrist injury after his first plate appearance of the season. The injury eventually required surgery, and he missed more than two-and-a-half months. Still, he showed promise late in the year, as he managed a slash line of .286/.418/.540 in 20 games as a 19-year-old in the Florida State League. In 2023 and 2024, Baez’s strikeout problems exacted a price against more advanced competition, as he batted .231/.338/.395, struck out in 34.8% of his PAs, and had a swinging strike rate of 18.1%. In 2024 specifically, a hot 15 games at Palm Beach earned him a promotion to the Midwest League, at which point he proceeded to strike out in 37.3% of his plate appearances with a swinging-strike rate of 20.8%. The shine was coming off, and even at age 21 Baez seemed at risk of becoming one of the countless raw-power specialists who just can’t get the bat on the ball often enough.

But then in 2025 Báez broke out at Peoria and Springfield with 46 extra-base hits in 117 games across the two rungs and 54 steals. Even more encouraging is that Báez reduced his strikeout rate from 35.5% in 2024 to 20.6% in 2025. That, suffice it to say, is a massive improvement, and it came despite playing most of the season at a higher rung than he did in 2024. As well, Báez’s swinging-strike rate tumbled from 19.2% to 12.3%.

While he made major strides this season with his power and production on contact, his swing and miss and chase crept back up. Báez’s gaudy home run numbers had many fans clamoring for his promotion much earlier in the season, but internally the Cardinals were worried that his renewed contact concerns would be exploited at the highest level, which in turn would mean he wouldn’t be able to put bat to ball often enough to take advantage of his capacity to do damage. In recent weeks, though, he’s shown progress on this front.

Let’s consider some key plate discipline indicators and how they’ve improved from the first half of the current season to the second half:

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Anyhow, Part 1 was semi-recently, and now here’s the breathlessly awaited Part 2 …

Bob writes:

We have watched this team all season and seen them go from being nine games over five hundred and in the playoffs to being two games under and out of the playoff picture. Can you explain what happened? Do you believe this roster is capable, given the trades, of turning this around again and making a run at the playoffs? And if not, can this roster compete next year? What needs to improve?

These are just the tides normal to a marathon-length season such as baseball’s. Part of it, also, was probably some regression that was in order after the Cardinals outplayed their run differential for much of the early weeks and months of the season. In other words, they gradually found what was likely their truer level of performance all along.

That said, yes, a playoff run this season is entirely possible, although that says quite a bit about the low bar set by the third NL wild card spot. Right now, the Cardinals are three games out of playoff position. While things can still change – the Nationals, Reds, and Pirates could easily re-enter the fray – right now the Cards are one of five teams jostling for the final two spots in the NL bracket. Here it is in state-of-the-art screenshot form:

Looking ahead, the Phillies and Marlins have tougher schedules the rest of the way than do the Cardinals, Pads, and D-backs, who are all bunched together in remaining opponents’ average winning percentage. There’s also the matter of tiebreakers. Thanks to the bloated playoff schedule, MLB no longer makes room for tiebreaker games. Instead, head-to-head record, or the outcome of the regular season series between the two teams of note, is the first tiebreaker when it comes to solving ties for division titles, wild card spots, and seeding. On that front …

• The Diamondbacks hold the tiebreaker over the Cardinals.

• The Cardinals hold the tiebreaker over the Padres.

• The Cardinals lead the season series against the Phillies 2-1 with three more to play.

• The Marlins hold the tiebreaker over the Cardinals.

And should it become relevant:

• The Cardinals lead the season series against the Nationals 2-1 with three more to play.

• The Cardinals lead the season series against the Reds 5-3 with five more to play.

• The Cardinals lead the season series against the Pirates 5-2 with six more to play.

Effectively, the Cardinals are 3 ½ games behind Arizona because they’d lose the tiebreaker in the event of a tie in the standings.

Elsewhere, some possible roster developments give reason for additional hope. Nathan Church and Everson Pereira, recently claimed off waivers from the White Sox, have the makings of a solid center field platoon, at least for the near-term. Power-hitting prospect Joshua Báez has made progress in improving his contact and chase rates in recent weeks and may be days away from a call-up. That’s because in just another day he’ll be able to retain his rookie status going into 2026 and thus make the Cardinals eligible for a prospect promotion incentive draft pick (which JJ Wetherholt will net them this season, provided he wins NL Rookie of the Year honors). Báez is probably ticketed for left field. Cardinals left fielders this season have combined to hit .237/.298/.380, so it’s entirely possible that Báez will improve upon that slash line.

As for 2027, yes, I again think it’s quite possible they’ll contend for a postseason spot. Again, it’s typically not going to be that hard given that six teams in each league make the playoffs, and this next CBA, which theoretically will be in effect for the 2027 season, may unfortunately swell the playoffs again.

Broadly, ahead of 2027 the Cardinals need to decide what their rotation will look like (will Matthew Liberatore be part of it?), what the bullpen will look like, and what center field and third base will look like. Those seem like the leading roster issues looking (far) ahead to next season. My personal expectation is wild card contention in 2027 and division title contention in 2028. We’ll see if I’m getting over my skis a bit with those expectations.

Bill writes:

If everyone currently in the organization hits their ceiling, is the ideal 2029 rotation Cijtnje, Matthews, Doyle, Roby and Clarke? Not necessarily in that order. Or is that underselling Tanner Franklin and others?

If everyone in the organization hits their ceiling, man, the 100-win seasons will flow like intrepid rivers. They won’t all hit their ceiling, of course, but I appreciate the rosy thought experiment. This is subject to change, but my one through five based on ceiling – or my estimations of ceiling, to be exact – would probably run like this …

1. Brandon Clarke, LHP

2. Jurrangelo Cijntje, RHP

3. Liam Doyle, LHP

4. Tegan Kuhns, RHP

5. Tanner Franklin, RHP

The decisions get tough after the top three, which speaks to how much depth and upside the Cardinals have right now on the young pitching front. I can see cases for Quinn Mathews, Tekoah Roby, Cooper Hjerpe, Yhoiker Fajardo, Mason Molina, Daniel Eagen, and even Ixan Henderson. No doubt, others besides Kuhns from this most recent draft class will emerge. This is to say nothing of the current rotation members who might be long-term fixtures like Michael McGreevy, Kyle Leahy, and Hunter Dobbins, and don’t forget about Richard Fitts. It’s going to be fascinating to see how Chaim Bloom and company sort out any logjams, whether via trades or shifts to relief roles. Speaking of the latter, all that depth has the cascading effect of making an effective, largely homegrown bullpen all the more likely.

Good “problem” to have, as the saying goes.

Bret writes:

I’m a bit concerned about Masyn Winn’s offense. His production has regressed every season. From the naked eye I have no idea what his approach is. His back foot is all over the place. He doesn’t appear to have a plan. Do you have concern or insight into his offense?

This is definitely a fair concern. Winn as a big leaguer has seen his full-season OPS+ decline from 104 in 2024 to 91 last season to 84 thus far in 2026. At the same time, his full-season xwOBA has meandered from .296 to .286 last year to .303 this year. He’s actually gotten a bit unlucky at the plate this season, as his wOBA has undershot his xwOBA. For context, the average MLB shortstop this season has an xwOBA of .308, so Winn at an underlying level has been average-ish at the plate by positional standards. Throw in the fact that he’s one of the very best defensive shortstops in baseball and you have a player who’s worthwhile even when he’s not hitting. Winn’s fielding, as long as it stays at its current level, is going to provide him with a 2.0–ish WAR base, and that has a lot of value.

All that said, it’s reasonable to wonder whether Winn has a higher gear at the plate. He’s been much more assured and productive with the bat over the last week or so, but we of course don’t want to read much into such a microscopic sample. On the other hand, there’s this recent bit of reporting from Benjamin Hochman at the Post-Dispatch (subscription required and highly recommended):

“Winn said he was in the batting cages along with close friend Jordan Walker and Casey Chenoweth, one of the Cards’ assistant hitting coaches.

“‘Casey was actually looking at some stuff J-Walk needed to work on, and it actually kind of inadvertently helped me. So that’s been, that’s been huge working on that. Just kind of driving the back elbow. Me and Walk have kind of been getting around the ball with our back elbow, so just trying to be more direct, I think, has been helping me a lot. …

“‘Everybody wants to pull the baseball, but you know, there’s a certain way to do it, and you know, the way I’ve been trying to do it this year hasn’t worked. And really just you know dropping that elbow in a slot and going directly to the ball has been good for me recently. It’s helped me go backside, but at the same time, I’m starting to pull some balls the right way. I think it’s a more direct path, quicker swing.’”

Nothing’s going to change the nature of the sample size, but at least there’s a mechanical change that coincided with the increased production. That increases the chances of it being more than just baseball noise.

That “quicker swing” part is important, as focusing on that back elbow slot may be helping Winn’s timing and sequencing at the plate. Here’s Winn at the moment of front heel strike (i.e., when his heel touches the ground after his leg lift) an instant before singling off a sinker from Gavin Hollowell back on June 27:

Now here’s Winn, after making the tweaks detailed above, at the instant of front-heel strike and about to single off an Alex McFarlane sinker on Tuesday:

He’s timed up much better in the more recent image with hip rotation already underway and the front knee locking out and forming a block and in a much-better position to do batted-ball damage. McFarlane’s sinker, by the way, came in at 100.2 mph versus a 94.6 mph velo on Hollowell’s sinker. So the differences you see above aren’t the result of a more hitter/timing-friendly pitch velocity.

No, I’m not declaring Winn to be “fixed” or suddenly on a higher plane as a hitter forevermore, but the uptick and the swing adjustments should at least have our attention for a while. Maybe there’s something to it.

That’ll do it for this time. Back soon with more.

You, gentle readers, responded to the recent call for mailbag questions with zeal and abundance, so I’ll be breaking up my replies into two posts. The first one is just below. Forthwith!

Aaron writes:

I have two somewhat related questions for you.

1. As we move past the third Cardinals sell-off in the last four years, I am wondering if this offseason might finally be the transition from selling to building/adding-on. I realize that the offseason might still include trading away a catcher (or two), but might we also see some competitive, longer-term additions, or do you think that waits until after the 2027 season concludes?

2. I believe one of either Goold, Miklasz, or Leitch (part of my proverbial Cards’ Coverage Mt. Rushmore) said that the Cardinals are only committed to $15 million dollars in payroll obligations next year and beyond. If it’s anywhere in that range, don’t you think the Cardinals could get creative in the next year or two and offer some very, very high AAV at a very short term -- something like what Tucker recently took to go to LAD? I mean, when you have that much payroll to work with...if you feel like you’re close to competing....

Thanks for the contribution, Aaron. My guess is, no, there won’t be any bold near-term-oriented moves this coming offseason. Some of it may depend on what the next CBA looks like and whether small-market teams like the Cardinals get a higher cut of local revenues (or whether those local revenues are slated to be nationalized and shared equally). Absent such a change, the Cardinals are going to have revenue concerns given the hit their local-broadcast revenues have taken and the drop in attendance. I don’t think you’re going to see any big spending by the DeWitts. It’s also not an especially strong class once you get past Tarik Skubal. Given the successful reclamation and trade of Dustin May, it wouldn’t be surprising to see Chaim Bloom take on another such project, but that’s not the kind of addition you’re wondering about.

On another level, I’m not sure the Cardinals are going to project as strong contenders next season, which means they probably won’t make major external additions to that end. Even with the basement level payroll – as you hint, they’ll owe JJ Wetherholt $2.75 million next season, and the only other guarantee is a total of $13 million to pay down the contracts of Nolan Arenado and Willson Contreras, per the terms of those trades – I don’t see much spending or assumption of multi-year obligations on the immediate horizon. The potential exceptions would be a long-term extension for someone like Jordan Walker or a trade for a notable young talent with multiple years of team control remaining (the recent deadline trade of José Soriano to the Blue Jays, for example).

Going into the 2028 season, things will probably be different, but that’s really too far out to guess who’s developed successfully within the organization and what the league’s labor structure looks like.

Ron writes:

Love the work on our favorite team.

It seems that there is a lot of duplication now with the recent additions. By that I mean multiple guys for the same position at the same level (Peete-Ragsdale-Cho) for CF in Springfield. Many many Starting pitching options at that level as well.

My question: is this talent going to sort itself out soon OR do you see a BIG trade consolidating some of this on the horizon?

Thanks

Thank you, Ron. I’m inclined to answer “both” to your question. This, as the saying goes, would be a good problem to have.

The organizational depth at catcher is much discussed, and as you note there’s a potential abundance of young outfielders on the way. I wouldn’t necessarily classify Josiah Ragsdale and Won-Bin Cho as future center fielders (although they could be), but I’d instead bucket all these names under the more general phylum of “future outfielders.” Further behind them, there’s also Franklin Arias, acquired from the Brewers in the Dustin May trade, Emanuel Luna, Ryan Mitchell, and recent top pick Trevor Condon, and ahead of them is of course Joshua Báez. Báez will make his way to St. Louis probably by mid-August, at which point he’ll be able to maintain rookie eligibility for 2027. It says much about the current depth of the Cardinals’ system that Cho, who’s slashing .303/.420/.633 as a 22-year-old since his promotion to Springfield, isn’t even on MLB.com’s updated, postdeadline list of our top 30 prospects. There’s potentially a similar situation on the pitching front, which I’ll get more into below.

As for the meat of your question, yes, some of this will be sorted out by the usual attrition rates, but the leveled-up player-development program and these impressive raw materials mean that the Cardinals will probably wind up with bottlenecks in some of these roles. I expect when the time comes, Bloom will indeed trade from depth in order to make targeted strikes upon the active roster.

Jay writes:

Is Marmol just completely bulletproof until the 2028 season or beyond? No matter how the team performs, we’re just chalking it up to roster construction?

If so, what does the roster need to look like before we can start evaluating his results?

I wouldn’t say completely bulletproof, no. A true bottoming out in 2027, say more than 100 losses, might well imperil him. That said, Bloom and Oli Marmol are clearly simpatico, and I have little doubt that if Bloom deemed him to not be the guy to lead this transition phase, then he would’ve made that change – Bloom was quite empowered by the DeWitts to make such changes.

Thus far, this year’s Cardinals model has exceeded expectations – they’re close to .500 despite having played the second-toughest schedule to date in all of MLB. Assuming that generally persists, it’s going to buy Marmol additional latitude moving forward. There just seems to be a lot of coordination with the front office on player usage and deployment, and whatever the team’s current faults, it’s hard to pin much of it on Marmol. I do of course have occasional tactical quibbles with him, but he’s pretty reliable at explaining in-game decisions that strike some of us as curious at the time. Often, there are unseen reasons for those decisions.

Looking forward, I think Marmol probably needs a postseason berth in 2028 or at least a near miss should the bar for the playoffs be higher than expected. If that happens, then I’m guessing he’s not going anywhere.

Keith writes:

What really sucks is that it’s quite likely that after Dec 1, MLB will shut down and the Hot Stove league will only exist on the labor bargaining table. But for now….looking forward…. 1) Is Jordan Walker going to be a 30/100 hitter? 2) Is Nolan Gorman no longer a prospect (or Cardinals)? 3) Who’s going to play CF? 4) Who’s going to play 3B? 5) What/where is the future for Ivan Herrera? It’s not behind the plate. 6) Cardinals have been very fortunate this year regarding the healthy of the rotation. Where is depth and Ace coming from? 7) Will “Tarps Off” live after 2026??

Taking these in order …

1. Yes, I think he will be. I think he’s always going to need occasional resets and pauses for cage work and time with the coaches. He just has the kind of finely tuned mechanics that can go awry at various points. The foundation, though, is finally there, and I think Walker will be that homegrown middle-of-the-order thumper that the Cardinals have long sought. There might be some streakiness to his overall production, but I believe he’ll be that moving forward. There’s a basis of plate discipline and ball-elevation that hasn’t been there in the past.

2. Probably not, but I’m not prepared to fully dismiss him yet. He’s found a higher gear in Memphis lately, and he has 10 home runs in 34 games there. The swing-and-miss is still excessive, though, which makes me suspect he’s not going to pass muster at the highest level. I’d guess we’ll see Gorman again in St. Louis at some point down the stretch, and he’s a non-tender candidate going into the offseason. Until further notice, I’ll predict that’s his fate.

3. I’m going to guess status quo for now, which means Nathan Church against right-handers and various/assorted against left-handers. I am interested in seeing what kind of role, if any, recent waiver claim Everson Pereira carves out. He’s got real power potential, and he’s just 25 years of age with barely a year of MLB service time. He needs to tame his swing and miss, but he’s a really interesting post-deadline addition thanks to some promising quality-of-contact indicators and strong power outputs in the minors. He’s a plus at the outfield corners and is adequate in center. Maybe he’s a platoon possibility in the role, or, heck, maybe he’s more than that. It may be a bit before some of the young outfielders named above are in the mix, and I think Joshua Báez is bound for a corner. Josiah Ragsdale could be in Memphis before the current season is up, so maybe he’s one to watch for the 2026 center field situation. Meantime, Victor Scott II just hasn’t shown enough in Memphis as of yet to insert himself back in the mix.

4. As noted above, I’m pretty bear-ish on Gorman. I’m still in wait-and-see mode on Blaze Jordan, as his quality of contact has been improving in recent games. He also continues to look surprisingly strong with the glove. For now, I think it’s Jordan, provided he continues making strides with the bat and shows some capacity to handle same-side pitching. Looking further ahead, I still have my eye on shortstop Jesús Báez, who’s putting up big power numbers this season as a 21-year-old (29 homers across stints at High-A and Double-A). He may be too good defensively to move off shortstop, though.

5. See just below on Herrera.

6. There’s no doubt been some good fortune, but after this very long, multi-season run of rotation health, it’s getting safer to assume there’s an actionable and repeatable plan behind it all. The plan is to develop their next ace internally, and there are some legitimate long-term options for that. I will say that I don’t think it’s anyone presently in the rotation. I’ll have more to come on the future rotation in Part 2 of this mailbag. .

7. Yes. I expect the club to encourage it, and there’s plainly a block of paying customers who get a kick out of it. It’s fun, and it says here it shall continue.

Tony writes:

With this season more than two-thirds over, how do the Cardinals think the Ivan Herrera at Catcher trial is working? Who do you think will be our most frequent catcher in the 2027 season?

I suspect Herrera will be moved off the position after this season. He hasn’t shown much growth in controlling the running game, and with a crowded situation at the position on the horizon I think his time there is limited. I suspect he’ll be moved to DH this coming winter and perhaps also see some time at first base and left field. There’s an alternate reality in which Herrera shows a surprising capacity for third base – a catcher-to-third transition isn’t unprecedented – but I have no reason to think that’s feasible.

As for 2027, I think Leo Bernal will be the primary catcher for the bulk of next season. He’s a skilled defender, and his bat seems to be in the midst of a growth spurt at Memphis. I still want to see what Jimmy Crooks can do at the plate with more consistent reps, but my feeling is that Bernal is poised to pass him in the queue, pending Rainiel Rodriguez’s eventual arrival in St. Louis (and depending upon how much Rodriguez catches). I think there’s a good chance that an offseason trade happens within this space.

OK, that’ll do it for this round. Back soon with the rest of your questions and contributions.

As for our mailbag, you know how this goes. To contribute, you may reply to this email if you’re reading via those means, leave a comment below, or just hit me up at daynperry@gmail.com. Give me your questions and or thundering declarations about the deadline, the Cardinals in general, or anything else that’s on your mind — video games, books, movies, other sports, the human condition — and I’ll respond to your mailbag contributions in an upcoming episode.

Until then remain healthy, defiant.

dp

Tuesday’s blowout defeat to the Cubs dropped the Cardinals to below .500 for the first time this season and positioned them to trade away perhaps multiple veteran contributors in advance of Monday’s deadline. This is what the Cardinals will do, and it’s also what they should do.

To be sure, this was probably always going to be the case, and Bloom hasn’t wavered from his long-term vision, while also respecting that such trades are difficult on the human beings that populate a roster, especially in the face of on-field success. In the second half, though, that on-field success has been erased. The Cardinals are 3-9 since the break, and they’re 9-16 since the calendar flipped to July. Going back to the three-game skid that began on June 17 – tidy end-point, I’m aware – they’re 13-23. Only the A’s have a worse record over that span.

If there’s any upside to these untimely struggles, it’s that the clubhouse can’t really claim Bloom’s forthcoming moves are undercutting a team on the rise. (No, that’s not really much of an upside.) The sell-off to come has been “earned” in recent days and weeks. The Cards are still within spitting distance of playoff position, but that says more about the low bar set by the third wild card spot than it does anything about the team’s present merits. It’s also a crowded queue, and every team ahead of them, save for the Padres, projects better than the Cardinals moving forward. So, yes, a sell it is.

That brings us to this week’s temperature check:

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Jay writes:

Even as a playoff-starved fan, I know that making the playoffs can’t be the primary focus this year. Having said that, I think we all believe this reto…

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You, gentle readers, responded to the recent call for mailbag questions with zeal and abundance, so I’ll be breaking up my…

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You know how this goes. To contribute, you may reply to this email if you’re …

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Sure, it’s the Home Run Derby. It doesn’t count in the standings. None of those 31 home runs that Jordan Walker hit at Citizens Bank Park on Monday night are going to show up on his baseball card or his Baseball-Reference page. It doesn’t really, truly change anything about the Cardinals’ 2026 season. But it was pure, u…

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Since Wetherholt is lined up to earn a …

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The other part of this picture is found in Miami. The increasingly pesky Marlins at this writing have won five in a row and are a sparkling 25-8 since the calendar flipped to June with a plus-56 run differential over that span. The Marlins do have a slightly more challenging remaining schedule than the Cardinals have, but on the downside the Cards have no more head-to-head games against Miami, who have a two-game edge in the chase for the third and final wild card spot in the NL. That’s not what you want when you’re in chase position.

That general sense of things presents a good spot for this week’s temperature check:

• Record: 48-43, third place in NL Central, two games out of third NL wild card spot

• Lottery position: 18th, 0.23% chance of getting top overall pick

• Run differential: plus-7

• Third-order record: 45.7-45.3

• FanGraphs playoff odds: 33.3%

• Strength of schedule: .511 opponents’ average winning percentage, second in MLB

• Remaining strength of schedule: .503 opponents’ average winning percentage, 10th in MLB

• Average home attendance per game: 27,554; 18th in MLB

Now let’s dive in.

Jordan Walker, All-Star and Home Run Derby combatant

Walker, the Cardinals’ 24-year-old lineup fulcrum, recently earned his first career All-Star selection thanks to his impressive and frankly unexpected power breakout in 2026. Walker was overlooked by fans and his player peers in the voting process, but he wound up being one of six NL selections made by the league. I don’t particularly care about how he made it to Philly. I do care that he made it after such a prolonged period of strife, struggle, and doubt. Plainly, the All-Star laurel wreath meant a great deal to Walker, manager Oli Marmol, and the rest of the team:

Walker since becoming the 21st overall pick in 2020 and then arriving (prematurely) in the majors in 2023 as a 20-year-old to lots of ballyhoo has dealt with the unexampled challenges of being a “COVID era” prospect, shown immense promise, cratered, been returned to the minors, struggled more, gone back to the minors, reached new depths, tinkered, rebuilt, seen it come to nothing, worked more, confronted doubts, and – finally – thrived. That’s a rare arc for anyone, let alone a player who’s still so young. I can say I had a difficult time still believing in him coming into this season, especially after a punchless spring in which he was pulled from games and sent to the cage and lab for what struck me as desperate remedial work.

Well, the work worked. Walker’s gone through droughts this season, but each time the man has punched his way out of them and turned back to the true north foundation of his swing to get him back to being what he’s been across 380 plate appearances this season – one of the best hitters in baseball. That Walker has also achieved this while making a parallel journey from a Todd Hundley-grade defensive outfielder to a playable one makes it all even more remarkable. In this era of All-Star roster bloat and increasingly at a time when some All-Stars would quite understandably just prefer to have the days off, it’s damn cool to see the honor be just that, an honor, for a player who was so recently lost in the boggy mire of unmet expectations. Here’s to Jordan Walker, is what I’m saying.

To put Walker’s journey in numerical terms, consider:

• Walker from 2024-25: .263 wOBA, .273 xwOBA, -2.5 WAR;

• Walker in 2026: .379 wOBA, .363 xwOBA, 3.5 WAR.

He’s reconstructed himself as a hitter as much as those numbers would lead you to believe. He swings faster and hits the ball harder than ever, and at the same time he’s finally hitting the ball in the air, often to the pull side, while also reducing his strikeout and whiff rates. Walker’s a different hitter now, and all signs point to this being a sustainable level for him.

As for Walker’s participation in the Home Run Derby, let’s just enjoy it, shall we? Given Walker’s bat speed, thunderous power, and newfound propensity for elevating the ball and finding the ideal attack angle on incoming pitches, he’s the kind of hitter who can thrive. And, no, there’s still no evidence that participating in the Derby is bad for a hitter’s swing or future production. If anything, the Derby with its simple and raw mandate to “hit the ball hard and in the air as far as you can” could align well with Walker’s ongoing mission to stay out of his own head at the plate. Let’s just enjoy Walker enjoying being in the Derby and at the All-Star Game and, one hopes, watch him put on a show and claim some hardware. He’s earned all of it.

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There’s a haze around this. As you know, lead decision-maker Chaim Bloom remains committed to the long-term goal of amassing and developing young talent, but the Cardinals’ status as surprise contenders in 2026 is the most obvious complicating factor. There’s a tension between honoring that relevance -- even with many quality opponents and not many off days in the offing -- and proceeding as planned with trade discussions regarding Dustin May, Nootbaar, and select others.

This, then, is a good spot for this week’s temperature check (going into Friday’s matinee at Wrigley):

• Record: 45-39, third place in NL Central, in third wild card spot

• Run differential: minus-4

• Third-order record: 40.9-43.1

• FanGraphs playoff odds: 36.5%

• Strength of schedule: .504 opponents’ average winning percentage, ninth in MLB

• Remaining strength of schedule: .513 opponents’ average winning percentage, fifth in MLB

• Average home attendance per game: 28,801; 16th in MLB

That current playoff position isn’t the only headwind working against a deep deadline sell. There’s also May’s recent struggles and present status. This past winter, the Cardinals signed May to a one-year, $12 million pact with a mutual option for 2027 -- one that, like most mutual options, probably means nothing -- as a reclamation project and possible deadline trade chit. Because of an unfortunate run of injuries on and off the field, May came into this season having been compromised in one way or another for roughly the last half decade. In 2026, though, he’s enjoyed a velocity rebound, and some mechanical tweaks have allowed him to deepen and alter his repertoire. All that plus his very modest salary should add up to a strong deadline market. Things recently, though, may have changed, at least until further notice.

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Let’s begin with a trio of deadline-related questions.

Anthony writes:

Which Cardinals are likely to be traded at the deadline? Before the season, the list of likely trade candidates looked (to me) like May, Stanek, Romero, O’Brien, …

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The Cardinals remain in top wild card position in the National League, and the leading subplot is the remaking of the bottom of the lineup. Consider what Oli Marm…

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On the upside, the offense may be poised to improve. Catcher Jimmy Crooks was recently recalled from Memphis, and he’ll be the primary catcher moving forward, at least once the Cardinals get clear of this recent glut of lefty starting pitchers they’ve faced. That’s welcome news, as Pedro Pagés, for all his defensive and leadership merits (and the fact that he seems like a very swell guy and teammate), just can’t hit, and the top-heavy Cardinals lineup badly needs some length to it. Crooks is coming off a scorching performance at Triple-A this season, one rich with home runs and walks. His strikeout issues improved in May, and as I recently pointed out those strikeout issues were in large measure confined to platoon-disadvantaged spots. Crooks projects as a substantial offensive upgrade over Pagés, and he’s made excellent strides behind the plate. As a former major-college draftee who’s 24 years old and has more than 600 plate appearances at the Triple-A level, he should be as ready as he’ll ever be.

What also figures to help the lineup is the return of Lars Nootbaar. Coming off bilateral heel surgery in the off-season, he’ll be activated from the 60-day injured list on Friday and, presumably, be in the lineup that night against the Reds. Nootbaar and the Cardinals both believe that heel malady cost him at the plate and at the field in 2025, and for what it’s worth he slashed .257/.409/.543 across 44 plate appearances on his just-completed minor league rehab assignment. Nootbaar plus the recent roster addition of Nelson Velázquez should greatly improve the left field situation and give the Cardinals the option of making Nathan Church the primary center fielder once he returns from his shoulder strain. (For the moment, we’ll table any discussion of the magma-hot Joshua Báez as the center fielder of the present and future.)

With the pitching gradually appearing to level up, a lengthening of the lineup would be the ideal complement. Crooks and Nootbaar -- and to a more limited extent, Velázquez -- should help that happen.

That brings us to this week’s temperature check ...

• Record: 32-28, second place in NL Central, tied for first/second wild card spot

• Run differential: minus-12

• Third-order record: 29.5-30.5

• FanGraphs playoff odds: 26.4%

• Strength of schedule: .510 opponents’ average winning percentage, fifth in MLB

• Remaining strength of schedule: .509 opponents’ average winning percentage, seventh in MLB

• Average home attendance per game: 28,176; 16th in MLB

And now let’s do what must be done and talk about the leading off-the-field matter of the moment.

As you’re probably aware, the current collective bargaining agreement (CBA) -- the accord that governs the working relationship between players as represented by the MLBPA and club owners -- expires on Dec. 1 of this year. At that point, owners are expected to lock out the players if there’s not a new CBA in place or close to the finish line.

While negotiations have been running in the background for some time, they began in a formal sense in early May. Late May brought us the opening proposals from each side. If the spirit moves you, you can read about the union’s opening offer here, and the league’s first “almost comically light on specifics” proposal here. As expected, owners are proposing a salary cap with a salary floor and a 50-50 revenue split with players that, thanks to carve-outs, isn’t actually a 50-50 split and may even amount to a decline in total player salary. The players, meantime, want a tax floor to go with the luxury tax ceiling that’s been in place for years, and they’re also asking to roughly double the minimum salary (which would necessarily make getting to a salary floor less of a leap for teams in violation). As is the nature of opening offers, they’re a mix of starting points and posturing and nothing that either side actually expects to get in those earliest forms. The real negotiating starts now, as we see the two sides in subsequent proposals and counter-proposals soften or even vacate many of those initial asks.

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First, this week’s temperature check ...

• Record: 29-23, second place in NL Central, in second wild card spot

• Run differential: minus-3

• Third-order record: 25-27

• FanGraphs playoff odds: 27.5%

• Strength of schedule: .511 opponents’ average winning percentage, eighth in MLB

• Remaining strength of schedule: .512 opponents’ average winning percentage, seventh in MLB

• Average home attendance per game: 27,736; 16th in MLB

Now let’s talk it out.

Jordan Walker thoughts

He just keeps doing it, doesn’t he? He’s coming off an 0 for 3 against Misiorowki and the Brewers, but his only strikeout probably should’ve been a walk. However, plate ump Marvin Hudson declined to ask for help on his checked-swing strike three call in the fourth inning. Just prior to that, Walker homered twice in as many days in Cincinnati. At this writing, he’s second in the National League with a 3.1 WAR and tied for the NL lead in OPS+ with a mark of 172. In very much related matters, Walker this season is flashing elite batted-ball quality, and he’s whittled his K% down from 31.8 in 2025 to 25.7 this season. His groundball percentage is a career low by a wide margin, and his rate of pulled balls in the air is a career high by a wide margin. Eyeball his xwOBAs against all the various pitch types, and they’re all at least respectable versus the offerings he’s faced in any meaningful number. He’s simply a different hitter, and the sample at this writing is up to 218 plate appearances.

Now let’s approach this from an angle that’s very uncharitable toward Walker. Let’s throw out that season-opening heater he was on when he homered eight times in his first 16 games. Here’s what he’s done since that power streak ended (including the slump that immediately followed his eighth homer of the season on April 13):

• Walker is batting .281/.355/.504 since April 14 with seven home runs and nine doubles in 35 games and 152 plate appearances since April 14. That’s good for a wOBA of .370.

• While his xwOBA of .334 is a bit lower than his wOBA, Walker over this span has a higher barrel rate than he does overall in 2026 (18.4% versus 16.4% -- both elite figures), and his average exit velocity since April 14 is 93.5 mph.

• His K% is 25.0 over this same span, slightly lower than his overall figure.

• His groundball rate since April 14 of 41.8% is slightly higher than his overall mark of 39.3%, but it would still be a career low. It’s also lower than the league-average mark of 42.9%.

Know what we’d be saying if the above were his overall 2026 numbers instead of the MVP-caliber outputs he has in reality? We’d still be saying Walker has finally leveled up and that all his assiduous work in the cages on grooving his latest suite of mechanical changes has allowed him to be what we hoped he’d be. There is, of course, absolutely no reason to throw out those first 16 games of his 2026 season, but doing so makes the point that Walker is far more than “just” that thunderous start to his age-24 campaign.

This leads me to a couple of questions about Walker, one near-term and one a more longer-term consideration. First, should he be the No. 2 hitter in Oli Marmol’s lineup? I pose this question not as any kind of indictment of the current No. 2 hitter Iván Herrera, who himself an excellent batsman. Rather, this is an acknowledgement that Walker is probably the team’s best hitter on what I believe is a sustainable basis. Putting your best hitter in the two hole is the sweet spot between maximizing plate appearances and RBI opportunities behind what is ideally an on-base threat in the leadoff spot (JJ Wetherholt with his .359 OBP and 11.8 BB% certainly qualifies). As well, Walker thanks in part to his deceptive speed is a much less of a double play threat than Herrera, and as a fellow righty swinger he’d keep the lefty-righty lineup balance that Marmol wisely favors. Walker has a couple of career starts at the No. 2 spot, so it’s not entirely unfamiliar territory to him. Maybe there’s a case to be made for his comfort level in the three or four spot, but that seems like a reach. The point is I kind of like the look of this possible lineup in another week or so:

1. JJ Wetherholt, 2B

2. Jordan Walker, RF

3. Alec Burleson, 1B

4. Ivan Herrera, DH

5. Lars Nootbaar, LF

6. Masyn Winn, SS

7. Nolan Gorman, 3B

8. Pedro Pagés, C*

9. Bryan Torres, CF**

*I prefer Jimmy Crooks, as recently detailed in this space, but I’m bowing to realities.

**Hold your fire, more on this in a moment. I’m not married to the idea.

The bottom half of the lineup is going to remain a problem, but I’d love Walker’s thump just behind Wetherholt along with the possibility of getting him an extra trip to the plate.

As for that long-term consideration, is it time to approach Walker about a long-term contract extension? Increasingly, I have my doubts that we’re going to see any pre-arb extensions any time soon. Wetherholt’s age is a complicating factor, as he and his reps probably aren’t fond of hitting the free agent market for the first time when he’s shin-deep into this thirties (that would be the case with any extension that buys out multiple free agent years). As for Winn, Chaim Bloom and company may want to see a higher gear at the plate before committing to him beyond his team-control years.

That brings us back to Walker. He entered the current season with just a bit more than two years of MLB service time, which means he’s going to be arbitration-eligible this coming winter. That also means he’s in line to be a free agent after the 2029 season, when he’ll still be just 27 years of age. A 27-year-old with big-time power and the ability to capably man an outfield corner with speed and a big arm is going to get paid on the market.

There’s risk here, of course. It’s possible that Walker’s 2026 performance to date turns out to be illusory on some level or that his fine-tuned swing mechanics get lost all too often over the longer haul. Every day, I find this to be less and less likely, but the possibility is still there. That said, I don’t find going in on Walker long-term to be any riskier than, say, committing the better part of a decade to a player who has yet to reach the majors, which a number of teams have done. The other side of this is that Walker probably becomes less and less willing to sign an extension the longer this general level of production keeps up and the nearer his free agency creeps.

As for comparable extensions, Bobby Witt Jr.’s with the Royals may be a high-end model. He was 24 with exactly two years of MLB service time when he inked his 11-year, $288.8 million pact with KC prior to the 2024 season. Witt was a former No. 2 overall pick coming off a 2023 campaign in which he finished seventh in the American League MVP vote and a credible rookie season in 2022. As such, he was more of a known quantity than Walker is now, so a discount may be in order. Perhaps we’re talking about the ground between Witt’s extension and the seven-year, $106.5 million deal that Andrés Giménez signed prior to the 2023 season. At that point, Giménez was also 24 years of age with a bit more than two years of service time. A Walker deal would heavily lean toward the Witt side of that continuum, I suspect. Would something in the $240-250 million neighborhood be enough to buy out a slew of Walker’s free agent years? From the front office standpoint, this is, I think, something worth seriously pondering and seriously pondering very soon.

On Bryan Torres

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First up, some bullpen talk.

Jay writes:

Svanson has allowed 1 or more runs in 11 of his 18 (61%) appearances. Is he out of options? Otherwise, watching him toil in the majors, no matter how much Bloom/Oli believe in him, …

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Let’s start with a couple of Pedro Pagés questions, including one from our celebrity interlocutor.

The great Will Leitch…

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