After trades, injury-free 2025, Cardinals must confront pitching depth shortage
The St. Louis Cardinals enjoyed exceptionally good luck with the health of their pitching staff in 2025—so much so that it was the first season since at least 1982 in which they did not endure a single pitching arm injury in the big leagues after Opening Day.
That is unlikely to be a repeatable outcome, and it does not inspire a great deal of confidence given the current state of the roster.
“If the season started today, I would say I would not be super comfortable with the depth that we have,” Cardinals president of baseball operations Chaim Bloom said from the team’s temporary Winter Meetings headquarters. “It doesn’t, so we have some time.”
Bloom emphasized that his assessment was “not at all a shot at the guys we do have,” but the arithmetic is simple enough: The departures of Sonny Gray via trade and Miles Mikolas via free agency leave the Cardinals without their two most experienced and reliable starters from a year ago.
Andre Pallante, who struggled throughout 2025, is the returning pitcher with the most starting experience in the majors, and he has not been included among the group guaranteed to be in that role when camp opens.
Left-hander Matthew Liberatore is seemingly the closest thing the Cardinals have to an “ace” starter on the roster. He has made 53 career starts over four seasons, the majority of which were largely unimpressive until he broke through last season as a reliable arm in the middle of the rotation.
Liberatore’s developmental path could lead him to headline a rotation, but he is not there yet. Even as the Cardinals commit to not sacrificing the future for the present and embark on a euphemism-heavy rebuild, the team must take care to ensure present-day pressures do not create unrecoverable damage.
“Chaim’s been clear about wanting to add another [pitcher],” manager Oli Marmol said. “Who that is and what that looks like and the résumé that comes with that is an unknown at the moment, but what you try to do in the immediate is have conversations with the Liberatores and the [Michael] McGreevys and allow them to take that next step in their careers.”
If Liberatore and McGreevy account for two of the five spots in the expected rotation, there is certainly room to add more than one starter from outside to supplement the group of Pallante, Richard Fitts and Kyle Leahy, who will compete for their own spots. Several free agents who are coming back from injury or poor performance—such as Aaron Civale, Tyler Mahle or Germán Márquez—would fit that description. Trades of roster players such as Brendan Donovan also could provide opportunities to fill those gaps.
At this point last year, the Cardinals were crafting a pitching plan for 2025 that included easing McGreevy into spot starts with an eye on establishing him as a rotation fixture later in the summer. That plan was executed almost as designed, though with the added challenge of seeing Erick Fedde struggle into being designated for assignment rather than being moved at the trade deadline.
Left-hander Quinn Mathews, perhaps the team’s top starting pitching prospect behind 2025 first-round pick Liam Doyle, was limited by injury and struggles with adjustments to just 99 innings over 24 starts last season. While he continued to show a knack for strikeouts, his average per nine innings dipped year over year as his walk rate spiked. Bloom said Monday that “the sky’s the limit for Quinn,” while cautioning that Mathews might slot into a similar role next season as McGreevy did last year.
“I do think there’s things you’d like to see Quinn show to show he’s ready to do that,” Bloom said. “I think he finished better than he started, for sure, but there’s still some things, hopefully some lessons that he can apply, and still some things you’d like to see him do to show that he’s really conquered [Triple-A].”
Bloom disagreed with the idea that the Cardinals would need to complete trades involving their position players before gaining the necessary clarity to pursue additions in free agency, leaving open the possibility the team could move quickly if the right deal materializes. While that does not guarantee roster movement in the roughly 72 hours before the Winter Meetings conclude, it is at least an indication there is no mandatory linear progression to the things the Cardinals hope to achieve.
While recent conversations have centered on future seasons, the upcoming year will still need to be played. Even as the Cardinals say they will not make any concessions competitively, it is clear the 2026 season will be largely focused on avoiding mistakes that could threaten a future competitive window.
That includes not allowing the pitching staff to collapse under the weight of innings that were crudely held together last season. There is an immediate need for load-bearing inning construction, and that is top of mind as Bloom assembles his first roster in St. Louis.
“You really want to craft [a plan] around what your players can handle, what they’ve shown they can handle, what you think they can handle,” Bloom said. “There’s a lot that goes into it. You have to be prepared to adjust.”
