2024 St. Louis Cardinals Season Preview

Author: scooter mcgavin

After a 3 year hiatus, the St. Louis Cardinals season preview is back. A lot has changed over the last 3 years. Both Dave and Oz have gotten married and have had (or are having) a kid, Ryan Specialty IPO'd, and our sweet prince is now slinging motorcycles and studying for exams. I'll let you all decide which of those was the most surprising (FN1). While we have all gotten older and wiser while making positive changes in our lives, the Cardinals have... just gotten older.  The Redbirds enter 2024 with the 3rd oldest roster but the 10th highest projected wins. For just the seventh time in our lives and only the second time in the last 23 years the Cardinals ended the 2023 season with a losing record. Ownership & the front office proceeded to address those issues by signing a bunch of players with an average age older than us, and a collective WAR of 3.8 in 2023 - buoyed by Sonny Gray's 5.3 WAR. But that’s fine - these are the St. Louis Cardinals and they always make the savvy moves.  Let’s look at how some recently departed players have performed after they left the nest:

  • Adolis Garcia (ALCS MVP)

  • Randy Arozerena (ALCS MVP)

  • Sandy Alcantara (Cy Young)

  • Zac Gallen (Top 5 Cy Young)

  • Luke Voit (Top 10 MVP finish - 35 HRs, 95 RBIs in first season away from St. Louis)

  • Matt Carpenter (1.138 OPS first season away from St. Louis)

  • Marcel Ozuna (1.067 OPS first season away from St. Louis)

Excuse me while I go puke on the floor outside of my upstairs guest bathroom (FN2).

 

It is time to stage a coup against the Dewitt family and John Mozeliak.

 

Before you laugh it off as a drunk man's dream - hear me out.  Many of the most successful coups in history overcame seemingly impossible odds, had significant resource constraints, revolted against an entrenched (and in some cases previously celebrated) establishment, and were led by people in approximately their mid-thirties.  

  • Napoleon Bonaparte was 30 when he staged a coup and ended the French Revolution

  • Adolf Hitler was 43 when he was named Chancellor of Germany

  • Thomas Jefferson was 33 when he wrote the Declaration of Independence

Average age of those individuals when they made their move? 35.3 years old.  All three were disregarded and openly mocked when they first surfaced the idea, and all three overcame seemingly insurmountable resistance before they were ultimately successful.  Rather than concentrate on what we are currently lacking (money, power, even the slightest bit of influence), let's concentrate on what we do have: the truth.  And the truth is that the Cardinal's organization is significantly weaker now than at any point over the last 20+ years due to bad investments both on and off the field. The Cardinals were one of the few teams holding equity in their regional sports network, which is now worthless with the bankruptcy of Diamond Sports Group.  Fan distrust has never been higher in our adult lives as the team has only won 2 playoff series in the last 10 years (that happened QUICK), while the front office has mostly been stuck in neutral - aside from the fact that Paul Goldschmidt and Nolan Arenado were basically handed to St. Louis. Through a coordinated social media campaign exposing their incompetence, we can take down Bill Dewitt Jr. and John Mozeliak and turn this ship around.  And if you still think the odds are too far against us to make an attempt - what do you think the odds were when Taylor Swift was born in the small town of West Reading, Pennsylvania that she would be getting pipe from a 3x Super Bowl Champion tight end ~35 years later? Spoiler - her odds were not good.

 

The good news for us is that this organizational deterioration has only allowed the rest of the NL Central to catch up.  The Cardinals had such a lead on the rest of the field they now have peers, and it is unlikely anyone runs away with the NL Central in 2024.

Fangraphs Projected 2024 Standings

Looking at this and a couple of items stand out:

  1. The NL Central is trash. The Cardinals are slight favorites, but out of the pre-season division favorites they have the lowest Playoff and World Series odds.  Most projected second place finishers have higher playoff and WS odds than the Redbirds. Whoever wins the NL Central can safely plan a nonrefundable mid-October vacation.

  2. The Dodgers & Braves dominate the NL (and all of baseball).  Even though they are the standard bearers - the Braves having pre-season odds >20% of winning the World Series is absurd.

  3. The Yankees and Angels appear to be overvalued to start the season (something to keep an eye on in early season betting)

  4. The Rangers coming off of a World Series and getting Scherzer & deGrom back ~mid year and appear to be slightly under valued.

  5. The Rockies are the worst run organization in all of American sports.

Aside from the questionable (or lack of) free agent signings, the Cardinals do have some exciting young position player talent in the form of Jordan Walker (21), Nolan Gorman (23), Lars Nootbar (26), Mason Winn (21), and Victor Scott II (23). Assuming everyone remains healthy this team should score some runs and be entertaining to watch.  It's having a young core like this, though, that makes it all the more frustrating the Cardinals did not go out and sign 2+ top-tier starting pitchers and significantly improve their bullpen depth.  


Wait, what's that? JORDAN MONTGOMERY & BLAKE SNELL ARE STILL AVAILABLE?!?! The Cards payroll must be maxed out.


2021 - 2024 St. Louis Cardinals Payroll

2021: $169M

2022: $165M

2023: $154M

2024: $162M


Nope.

 

Opening Series Plays (Thursday March 27th - Sunday March 31st)

  • The Cardinals start the season with four games at Dodger Stadium and the wise move would be to hammer the Dodgers. Even with another front line starter the Cardinals are nowhere near as good as the Dodgers or Braves.

  • Yankees open at Houston - hammer the Astros

  • Angels open at Baltimore - hammer the Orioles

  • Rockies open at Arizona - hammer the Diamondbacks

Cardinals Season Prediction

Cards finish 81-81, miss the playoffs for the second straight year, and Yadier Molina is introduced as the manager for the 2025 season.

 

World Series Prediction

The Dodgers beat the Astros in 7 games. Kershaw starts and wins Game 7.