Cardinals Legend Gives Honest Thoughts On St. Louis' Offseason

The Cardinals legend weighed in on the odd offseason

Feb 26, 2021; Jupiter, Florida, USA; A general view of the St. Louis Cardinals logo on the stadium at Roger Dean Stadium during spring training workouts. Mandatory Credit: Jasen Vinlove-Imagn Images / Jasen Vinlove-Imagn Images

The St. Louis Cardinals finished above .500 last year but you wouldn't be able to guess that from the way they handled the offseason.

St. Louis wanted to trim the payroll and that's all the offseason was about. There was plenty of chatter about trades, but the Cardinals weren't able to make any big deals. The team's top veterans -- like Nolan Arenado -- remain in St. Louis but the organization didn't really go out and add any talent either even when it noticed that the trade strategies weren't going to come to frutiiton.

It was an odd offseason, to say the least. Now, Opening Day is a few weeks away and the Cardinals have a very similar roster as it did in 2024 and it's going to be interesting to see how the team can respond.

Team legend Yadier Molina joined The Athletic's Katie Woo for an interview and one thing that he discussed was the team's offseason. Unsurprisingly, he sounded a little surprised as well.

"This is the first time this franchise didn’t really sign anybody in free agency, right?” Molina said. “When fans see something like that, it’s weird. It’s weird for us as fans right now. I don’t want to say they are not competing. That’s disrespectful to the players. But as a fan, that’s something we’re thinking about, how are we going to compete this year?

"The Cardinals have a great manager in Oli (Marmol). There are some people there that really care and they love to teach. St. Louis has a really good coaching staff. We have great talent on the field. We have some young guys that can really play this game. I’m going to support the young talent and see what happens. Baseball is crazy, you never know what will happen."

It was pretty surprising, but maybe the Cardinals could shock the baseball world in 2025.

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