Offseason Loser: St. Louis Cardinals



Why Were They Deemed a Loser?

There's nothing inherently wrong with a mostly inactive offseason. But what made the Cardinals feel like a loser is that they outright said at the beginning of the offseason that they wanted to unload their expensive veterans, spent much of the winter trying to trade away Nolan Arenado and ended up doing a whole lot of nothing.

After failing their stated mission, St. Louis entered the season neck-and-neck with the Pittsburgh Pirates, tied for the seventh-worst odds of making the postseason (+360), stuck somewhere between no-man's land and a rebuilding situation.

Since starting out 14-19, St. Louis has had one of the best records in baseball, spending much of the past month within shouting distance of the Cubs in the NL Central and in decent shape for a wild card spot.

Even with both Arizona and Atlanta woefully underachieving, though, are the Cardinals really a contender?

They don't need to decide today whether they will be buying or selling at the trade deadline, but it'd be an impossibly tough call right now, possibly landing on a deadline approach that is every bit as inactive as their offseason approach was.

And, who knows, maybe it works out for them? They don't have any surefire All-Stars, but they also don't have any glaring holes. They're just kind of average to above-average across the board, liable to be this year's team that treads water, sneaks into the postseason and peaks in October.

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