What other teams may be seeing when they look at Nolan Arenado

And why what they see is making a trade difficult – but not impossible – for the Cardinals to pull off

We’re all waiting for a trade of Nolan Arenado to happen. Even if you don’t wish for such a thing to transpire, dealing the veteran third baseman is a stated goal of lead operator John Mozeliak going into the 2025 season. For his part, Arenado is willing to waive his full no-trade clause provided a deal sends him to a team that, per his estimations, gives him a better shot at contention across the remainder of his contract than what St. Louis promises.

So you have two motivated parties, but in this particular instance a trade takes three motivated parties – the third being, you know, a team that actually wants Arenado for the next three seasons. The Astros were one such team, but Arenado invoked his no-trade protection to block that deal. Houston quickly pivoted to address their corner-infield needs via other means, and now they have no need for him. Finding someone else who satisfies the necessary criteria is proving to be a challenge. After former Card Paul Goldschmidt inked with the Yankees, the Bronx came to seem like an even more plausible destination for Arenado. The Yankees since the departure of second baseman Gleyber Torres to Detroit via free agency are faced with the prospect of leaning on deep-decline DJ LeMahieu for every-day duty. That’s not optimal, particularly for a lineup that will be trying to get over the loss of Juan Soto. Still and yet, Katie Woo recently noted this:

“However, multiple league sources say that while the Yankees like Arenado, they aren’t interested in taking on the majority of his contract, something that would almost certainly need to happen from the Cardinals perspective.”

Arenado, you'll recall, is owed $74 million through the 2027 season. His former team the Rockies are obligated to pay $10 million of that tab, so the starting point is $64 million in front-loaded fashion. We know from the Astros near-deal that the Cardinals were willing to include $15-20 million in cash, so that means the obligation for Arenado’s new team, assuming similar parameters, would be $44-49 million. To put that in current-market perspective, Tyler O’Neill comes closest with his recent three-year, $49.5 million pact with the Orioles.

Those are reasonable rates for a third baseman who still grades out as one of the best in baseball with the glove. What teams are no doubt seizing upon – whether as a negotiating tool, out of genuine concern, or, more likely, a mix of the two – is Arenado’s steep decline at the plate. Put simply, there’s collapse risk here, especially if the aging curve starts eating into his defensive value.

First, let’s note the three-season wOBA (what’s this?) and xwOBA (what’s this?) trends for Arenado as he heads into his age-34 campaign:

• 2022: .381 wOBA, .339 xwOBA

• 2023: .327 wOBA, .320 xwOBA

• 2024: .314 wOBA, .296 xwOBA

Arenado has a long history of out-performing his expected batting stats, and indeed he’s done so every season of the Statcast era (i.e., since 2015). The problem, though, is that his levels of expected production have cratered, and by this point it’s a pattern – meaning that it’s fair to expect more of the same as Arenado moves into his mid-30s. Decline isn’t always linear, especially for greats like Arenado who have a high level of talent and generally speaking a capacity and willingness to adapt. However, he’s reaching a point at which the loss of batted-ball authority is so steep that it’s hard to believe he’s not inexorably in decline. Consider: