Don't let a bad team keep you from a good time
Why I’m excited about the probably-bad 2026 St. Louis Cardinals
How much am I supposed to hate the Los Angeles Dodgers?
There are serious problems with this world. There are evils that we cannot fully comprehend because while we can fully articulate them, it is impossible to foresee stopping them. And then there's dumb sports stuff that doesn't actually matter. Sports are where those of us who do not believe in the literal existence of karma…
So this is what rebuilding looks like
It feels appropriate that the news that St. Louis Cardinals fans had been anticipating for what is now years, the trade of third baseman Nolan Arenado to the Arizona Diamondbacks, would drop less than three days after their biggest rival signed the top third baseman on the market, with the Chicago Cubs signing Alex Bregman.…
The greatest baseball game ever played
I was 22 years old for Game 6 of the 2011 World Series, a few months out of college in an era that will inevitably cultivate cultural nostalgia but for which I feel little warmth. We were still in the throes of the Great Recession, I was working lousy hours in a call center because…
Pastime
Last night, the St. Louis Cardinals earned one of the more thrilling victories that they will notch in 2025. Once trailing by three, they tacked on five runs in the fifth inning. After surrendering that lead, with Riley O'Brien giving up a game-tying double to Ronny Simon in the top of the ninth inning, the…
An alternate history: What if the Cardinals hadn’t made the Marcell Ozuna trade?
In terms of pure results, steeped entirely in hindsight, the worst trade that the St. Louis Cardinals have made in the twenty-first century, by a mile, was on December 13, 2017, when the Cardinals acquired outfielder Marcell Ozuna from the Miami Marlins in exchange for four prospects. The prospects, at the time, felt minor--the one…
Hopelessness
I know for a fact that a nonzero number of St. Louis Cardinals employees have read, and presumably will read, St. Louis Bullpen posts. I say this not as a way of congratulating myself but as a bland statement of how sports blogging community works--this website does not generally generate the level of interest of…
So, um, what is the plan for the Cardinals?
Last off-season, everything that the St. Louis Cardinals did fell into place relatively quickly. They signed Kyle Gibson and Lance Lynn by Thanksgiving and then added Sonny Gray the next Monday. They traded Tyler O'Neill two-and-a-half weeks before Christmas. Even the Matt Carpenter signing, which felt like a checkout aisle impulse buy, happened on January…
How the Cardinals should spend their money this offseason (and how they should spend the money they won’t spend)
They could spend a lot of money, but there are some better options than others if they aren't going to do that.
Meet the 2025 Cardinals. Same as (or worse than) the 2024 Cardinals.
You could make a case, despite a few decidedly mediocre seasons in the back half of the decade, that the St. Louis Cardinals were the Team Of The 2010s. The San Francisco Giants won the most titles, but were nondescript otherwise. The Boston Red Sox got a pair themselves but also had some downright lousy…
St. Louis Bullpen 