Andrew Wang of “Dealin’ the Cards” podcast did us a solid with his neat little GM Simulator. Really fun little app and you can play here. Compare your desired outcomes with mine and other commenters down below.
Full disclosure, I have two articles in the pipeline but I’m having trouble bringing them to the finish line. Been working on one since August. “Can the Cardinals compete with a singular Draft-and-Develop Model?” Still too disorganized and as I’ve turned back to it lately, it turns out people in the Cardinal organization take a minute or two away from their 24×7 jobs this time of year. So be it.
The other is a “30,000 foot look at the Cardinal talent pipeline” in which I try and visualize strength and weaknesses by position group throughout the system, more than focusing on projecting individual players chances of success. The visual will show, for example, the fairly wide gap between the talent on the MLB roster and the next wave of position players, none of which are AAA level (or in other words, not MLB ready). I’m having trouble getting a visual that is organized and clear, but the pathways I’m trying to describe look like a California freeway interchange. Lots of overlaps and intersects.
It is time to get a little silly. What you will see here is not my usual rendition of how I think they look at things or try to explain why they are going down their chosen path. This will be my own silliness. Here is what I would do. I still try and maintain a touch of reality … the roster is what it is and I can’t wish that away. The Cardinals financial constraints, self-imposed or otherwise, are real and I don’t ignore those (so, no signing Skubal in my scenario). As well, the Cardinal’s long-term view, patience and “no short cuts” is decided. So I work within that. The opinions are mine. What I would do, given the imposed constraints.
Working the simulation
The GM Simulator tool produced some neat, interesting graphics. Nice job on their part. The key one in my mind is the changes I’d consider if I was in charge of shaping the 2027 roster. That one graphic didn’t fit (I changed a fair bit), so here is just the list of transactions I’d undertake.
Non-Tender
- Chase Davis
- Liberatore
- Scott II
- Gorman
- Prieto
A Davis non-tender is driven by other decisions I’d make, which are explained below. My transactions would make him redundant, and realistically, runway expires at the MiLB level, too.
Liberatore and Gorman are as much about saving money and getting more value for those dollars, but also about runway. I’ve seen enough. Same with Scott II. I had high hopes, but they are extinguished and there are other areas of greater hope.
Decline Option
- Ryne Stanek
I wrote this before it became official. They couldn’t fix his Splitter, which made him too vulnerable. Not hard to predict, most relievers don’t emerge at 32 years old.
Select Contract
- Ledbetter
- Cho
- Lin
- Levenson
You could change a few of these names and I wouldn’t argue. I try not to agonize over decision made at the marginal edges of the roster. Chase Davis could be kept instead of Ledbetter or Levenson. Ok. But Bloom acquired Ledbetter, which I suspect breaks all ties. Levenson is a question mark in my mind, but after all my machinations, I end up with 39 players and someone gets that spot and I picked him. As for me, I’m looking around in Spring to see if I can add incremental value in all 4 of these spots, except maybe Cho. I want to see more.
A point here…I selected the contracts of only those players requiring Rule V protection that I don’t want to lose. There aren’t a lot of guys that do NOT need 40-man protection today that I think are ready for MLB on Opening Day, so I kept them off the 40-man for now and hold them in reserve (Santana is a notable one). There are a whole slew of guys I think will come up during the season and require 40-man spots at the same time they get 26-man spots. To me, the best kind of churn, but one better served for Flag Day and beyond, and strategically timed to match their readiness as much as team need.
Free Agent Signings
- Trevor Rogers (4/$85m), Casey Mize (2/$26m), Mauricio Dubon (2/$16m)
Skubal is a dream idea that doesn’t fit any of Cardinal planning criteria listed above. The current rotation is solid but unspectacular. It really wasn’t the problem this year and looks to get better just with internal options, but the timing isn’t quite right. To my mind, Mize and Rogers raise the bar of the rotation without breaking the bank. Neither pitcher is TOR but I think this creates a better rotation that is more than solid and ready to absorb new guys that might need some time to stabilize. Working a Cijntje or a Doyle into the rotation is better if you have a lot of confidence in the other 4 spots. Losing the draft picks for signing Rogers might give them pause, but I believe it would be a Comp B pick and they are going to have to bite that bullet sooner or later, and could still get that pick back when Rogers is dealt away later (assuming all this young pitching works out).
Dubon is my super-sub, probably more IF than OF, although the system lists him as LF. He is better than Saggese/Fermin/Torres/etc. He raises the bar (and it is a low bar).
As a note, I tried to be realistic with my FA contract lengths and amounts. No low-balls here.
Trades
- Pallante and Mason Molina to MIN for Royce Lewis (to play Third)
- Crooks, Church, Jesus Baez to PIT for O’Neil Cruz (to play Center)
Some folks are going to say Cruz??? WTF? He has become an average defender in CF and that 3.3 fWAR would be quite an improvement in CF over what the Cardinals have gotten recently and expect next year. I also wonder how he might respond with a stronger set of players around him on the field.
Royce Lewis is my wild card. I’d want more scouting material than I have on him to be sure this is a good bet. If I could, I’d offer less but didn’t want to be that guy that offers our throwaways for someone else’s core player. I think at worst he’d solidify third for a while, since there are no answers internally, free agent or other good trade routes that can be imagined. But, what about Jesus Baez? Well, I traded him for Cruz. He is exciting to watch, but I’m not a believer.
The net result looks like the following, which also a really good graphic from Dealin’ the Cards.
The narrative
My first goal was to be realistic about money. I ended up with a $110m base payroll, which I think might be a bit higher than the Cardinals want to go, but I see it as in the neighborhood. My second goal was to improve the 2027 roster and make it competitive without creating serious obstacles for the next wave of prospects (Doyle, et.al.) or compromising the pipeline.
Line-up wise, I tried to keep the L-R-L orientation they like so much in the line-up, as well as setup the roster so some young guys like Baez and Bernal could hit lower in the line-up as they get acclimated to MLB baseball. My goal was to make the line-up deep enough that Masyn Winn could hit ninth. To me, if he is your 9th place hitter, that is probably a productive line-up. To me, likely way more consistent than the 2026 edition.
I worked to leverage current assets that aren’t really part of the future core (Crooks, Church, Pallante) to augment with shorter-term bridge talents that could improve the 2027 roster and I really did not a focus on adding more MiLB talent. The structure of my MLB acquisitions buys a little bit of time to continue to spruce up the position player side of the organization, with an eye that by this time next year, we may have a surplus of starting pitching talent that can be leveraged, without abandoning the 2027 season.
I debated about moving Liberatore to the bullpen but decided that the money was better spent on FA that could provide more value. Dollars invested into the rotation pay off more than dollars to the bullpen, usually. Mautz takes that LHRP role, although you could put Bruihl there and I wouldn’t object much. I see Cijntje and others adding firepower to this bullpen later in the season and suspect it will be needed. Bullpens are so volatile. I don’t do a lot with it, to create headroom for young guys and recognize that this is the kind of thing you can fix in July when you know what is working and what is not. I hold Santana (and now Eduardo Lopez) in reserve at the start of the year. By keeping Santana back, it gives me an extra 40-man slot to work with and allows me to choose the time when he is deployed (later).
I traded prospects Jesus Baez and Mason Molina under the auspices that when you have some really good prospects, the second-tier guys can bring back value and are likely to get blocked anyway. There is still a need to solve 3B in the longer term, but Dubon, Lewis and Jordan probably give you another year or two to sort that out. There is enough talent at High-A and AA that appear to offer opportunities (Ortiz, Padilla).
I feel like I have solved the C problem until Rodriguez emerges, but he seems good enough that when he does, he just displaces someone and the roster is better no matter who that is. Herrera? Pages? Jordan? 3B? C? 1B? DH? Doesn’t matter. Let that happen organically and when he emerges, you have another asset to disperse to improve another part of the roster.
At the end of the day, I kind of like this line-up for $110m and walk away feeling good that I didn’t give up a top-10 prospect to get some improvement in the current roster.
My last goal was to add athleticism and baserunning (speed), which I think I did. Wetherholt, Winn, Walker, Cruz, Baez bring an element that has been missing. This was my reasoning for not trading Tai Peete, but I could be convinced to do that for the right deal (a 3B solution better than Lewis).
This isn’t a world championship caliber team, but I think perhaps a legit wild card contender with a bit of upside if the young guys hit the ground running. As the young phenoms matriculate in, I think the floor of my roster is easier to build up than the current one. It is a step in the right direction, which stays in line with “no short cuts” and “build from within”.
Discuss.