Bernie’s Redbird Review: The Cardinals Need More From These 10 Players In The Final Two-Plus Months Of The Season.

THE REDBIRD REVIEW 

Good day to you. Thanks for checking out my columns on the Cardinals. Here’s another look at the Redbirds as they enjoy some rest and recreation during the All-Star break.

10 CARDINALS
WHO MUST DO BETTER
AFTER THE ALL-STAR BREAK

I didn’t seek to list these in any special order; I’m just taking them one-by-one. And I’m not including players who may or may not return from injuries.

+ LARS NOOOTBAR. Injuries have limited him to 46 starts in 2024. Because of the frequent interruptions, he hasn’t had a chance to make a weighty, sustained impact. And when Nootbaar is hurting, the Cardinals’ offense is hurting. In 193 plate appearances this season, Noot is batting .229 with a .318 onbase percentage and .418 slug for a .712 OPS. His wRC+ is four percent above league average offensively.

Since returning from the IL early this month, Nootbar is 6 for 29 (.207) with one home run. That solo homer has accounted for his only RBI in his seven games. But it’s hardly a surprise that Nootbaar needs time to get his swing in tune.

What the Cardinals need from Nootbaar: A return to his May form. Nootbaar started 21 games in May before succumbing to injury. And he was outstanding, batting .275 with a .370 OBP and .475 slug. His wRC+ was 41 percent above a league-average hitter. He mixed in four homers, two doubles, a 13 percent walk rate and 12 RBIs. That’s not all; Noot batted .316 with a .988 OPS with runners in scoring position in May. If the high-energy outfielder can repeat his May the rest of the way, the Cardinals and their fans will be very happy.

+ NOLAN GORMAN. In his last 42 games (38 starts) before the All-Star break Gorman batted .192 with a .245 OBP and .370 slug. He plugged in for some power, with seven homers and 22 RBIs in 146 at-bats. But no home runs are possible on a swing-and-miss, and the chronic whiffing continues to malign his career development.

There’s nothing spicy about Gorman’s .370 slug since May 31. His 40.2 percent strikeout since that day is the worst by a major-league hitter.

When Gorman is pushed into a metaphorical corner with a two-strike count this season, he’s hit .129 with a 104 swings and misses and a 61 percent strikeout rate.

When he’s down 0-2 or 1-2, he’s batted .102 with a gee-wiz 72.5 percent strikeout rate. And when Gorman has been behind 0-2 or 1-2 in the count since May 31, he’s batted .058 with 42 strikeouts in 52 at-bats.

The raw-power might is still there; he’s one of only 29 hitters with 17+ home runs this season. But Gorman just can’t activate that power with any consistent regularity.

Gorman’s current strikeout rate (37.5%) for 2024 would be the worst by a qualifying major-league hitter in a full season since the expansion era began in 1961. And among hitters that had at least 300 plate appearances in a season, Gorman’s 37.5% punch-out rate would be the eighth-highest since ’61. Gorman has entered the realm of the strikeout kings, hanging in the same company as Joe Gallo, Chris Davis, Miguel Sano, Mark Reynolds, Chris Carter, Patrick Wisdom, Melvin Nieves, Russell Branyan, Keon Broxton, Rob Deer and the late St. Louisan Dave Nicholson.

(Sidebar: In 1964, Nicholson hit one of the longest homers in baseball history, a missile that soared an estimated 573 feet beyond the dimensions of Comiskey Park in Chicago. But in seven big-league seasons Nicholson smashed only 61 home runs to go along with his 573 strikeouts. He had a career strikeout rate of 34.5 percent from 1960 through 1967 at a time when the overall MLB rate was around 15 percent. )

What the Cardinals need from Gorman: Contact. Obviously. Among 141 big-league hitters that have the requisite number of plate appearances to qualify for the batting title, Gorman has the worst contact rate overall (63.3%) and the second-worst contact rate on strikes (74.6%).

+ PAUL GOLDSCHMIDT. If you look hard enough there are a couple of things to like in Goldy’s hitting profile. If you want to bright-side it, so far in July he’s on track to have the highest batting average (.259), slugging percentage (.444) and OPS (.717) for any month this season. Of course, that can change by the end of July.

Here’s what I want to talk about today: Goldschmidt has turned into an out-making machine. And that is much, much different from what he’s been throughout his career. In his extensive career peak period, he was a high onbase percentage guy who took plenty of walks and hit .300 or close to it.

Coming into this season Goldschmidt’s OBP had never been lower than .346 in a full big-league campaign. But at the 2024 All-Star break, he’s batting .230 with a sad .291 onbase rate. Only 20 qualifying MLB hitters have a lower OBP than Goldy, who is nearly 100 points below his career onbase percentage (.388) through 2023.

The result: many, many outs. Truckloads of them. At the break, Goldschmidt’s 294 outs made are the ninth-most in the majors. No other Cardinal has made more than 264 outs.

This is a combination of several things. His advancing baseball age. The low batting average that we’ve already mentioned. And (so far) a career-low walk rate (7.4%) this season that’s well below his career standard (13%) coming into the season.

Goldy’s walk rate has plummeted to 4.1 percent since the beginning of June and is a shocking 1.8% in July.

Goldschmidt’s impoverished OBP problem is made worse by a 28.2 percent strikeout rate that would be his poorest in a season since his initial call-up to the majors for 48 games in 2011. His swing-and-miss rate is higher than usual. It will be hard for Goldy to inflate his low OBP and slugging percentage when he doesn’t walk or hit for average.

This season 39 percent of the outs made by Goldschmidt have come on strikeouts, and that’s the highest such rate of his career. He’s staring at too many strikes as they zip by; only seven MLB hitters have observed more called strikes than Goldy’s 321 this season.

Goldschmidt isn’t doing himself any favors with this approach. This season only one MLB hitter has faced more 0-2 counts than Goldschmidt. And only one hitter has encountered more 1-2 counts than the St. Louis first baseman.

Goldy keeps digging holes in the batter’s box, putting himself at a considerable disadvantage by getting buried in two-strike counts. It isn’t easy for him to overcome those pitcher-advantage counts to salvage the at-bat with a walk or hit.

Since the start of May, Goldschmidt’s OBP is a sickly .277, which ties him with former Cardinal Paul DeJong at No. 136 on a list of 150 qualifying hitters. I don’t know what else to say after that.

What the Cardinals need from Goldschmidt: more hitter-friendly counts. More walks. A higher onbase percentage. He won’t do that unless he stops making so many outs. Unfortunately for this proud man and his team, Goldschmidt has developed a really bad habit of getting himself into jams – and not getting out of them.

+ KYLE GIBSON, SONNY GRAY, MILES MIKOLAS, LANCE LYNN. The group of four starters have been getting smacked around too much in recent weeks. In a combined 14 assignments since June 26, the highly experienced veterans have gotten hammered for 55 earned runs in 71 and ⅔ innings. That’s a 6.93 ERA, my friends.

In fairness, I must point out there have been five quality starts mixed in there: two by Lynn, two by Mikolas and one by Gray. But in the nine non-quality starts, the four were blasted for 48 earned runs in 39 and ⅔ innings, an ERA of 10.89. That’s drastic stuff. No pitcher can be good every time out, but I think it’s reasonable to ask for more consistency.

The foursome has collectively allowed 1.45 home runs per nine innings over that time. All have been pounded for opponent slugging percentage that range from .507 to .624. That’s what happens when your group gets mashed for 13 homers, 24 doubles and two triples in only 71 and ⅔ innings.

This is hazardous. The good news: there’s plenty of time to turn it around. But if these fellers don’t turn it around … well, that would be really bad news, and the fate of the team would suffer.

What the Cardinals need from the four starters that have an average age of 35.5 years: more innings, more consistency, more effectiveness, more quality starts, more 1-2-3 innings, fewer home runs going off, fewer doubles and triples littering the yard. The Cardinals need stability from them.

+ NOLAN ARENADO. The problem, of course, is Arenado’s reduced power. He has eight home runs this season. The best way to show the loss of power is looking at his home-run ratio in each season as a Cardinal.

2021: a HR every 17.4 at-bats
2022: a HR every 18.5 at-bats
2023: a HR every 21.5 at-bats
2024: a HR every 43 at-bats

Alarming. Home runs are down across the majors in 2024, but the drop isn’t extreme. Last season MLB hitters homered every 30.7 at-bats; this year they’ve gone deep every 28 ABs. Arenado’s diminished home-run power is much worse than the overall league trend in ‘24.

Complicating the challenge is Arenado’s problematic Statcast metrics. His hard-hit rate (27.6%) and barrel rate (3.1%) are in the bottom eight percent of major-league hitters. His average exit velocity (85.8 mph) is in the bottom four percent. His bat speed is in the bottom 26 percent. Arenado has a .381 slugging percentage this season, but based on quality of contact it should be .353. So the shortage of power isn’t just a slump or a rut or a phase. It’s serious.

So what can Arenado do? Eat extra spinach? I have another idea which I’ll get to in a bit. Numerous times this season I’ve written about the correlation between Arenado’s pull-side power and home runs. Long story short: he doesn’t pull as many fly balls and line drives as he once did – not even close – and that’s a major predicament.

Here’s the annual number of pull-shot homers by Arenado since he joined the Cardinals in 2021:

34 in ‘21
30 in ‘22
23 in ‘23
6 in ‘24

How does Arenado work around that? I don’t think he can. As a Cardinal he’s never homered to the opposite field. He’s hit five straightaway home runs including two this season. If Arenado isn’t pulling balls in the air, his home-run total will remain low. That’s the reality.

Is there something in between – to be found in the so-called middle ground? Arenado doesn’t have to hit 20+ pull-side homers. But what if he could hit 12 or 15?

I noticed something this morning when researching the innards of Arenado’s hitting profile.

He isn’t swinging at enough strikes.

A lot of hittable pitches are sailing by him.

And when Arenado swings at strikes and connects, he still puts up solid numbers. This season when Arenado contacts an in-zone pitch, he has eight home runs, nine doubles and a .436 slugging percentage. He used to generate stronger numbers when clouting strikes, but relative to this stage of his career, a .436 slug is fine. Not great, but fine.

When Arenado swings and puts bat to ball on pitches thrown over the heart of the plate this season – the prime-cut offerings – he’s batted .346 with a .529 slug and seven home runs. Nothing wrong with that.

Here’s the issue …

Before this season – and excluding the shortened 2020 season – Arenado swung at strikes at a rate of 69.5 percent. But he’s become much more picky and selective this season. Or maybe it’s just a matter of losing confidence in his ability to punish strikes.

Arenado is being more passive, and that’s working against him.

This season Arenado has swung at 60.5 percent of the strikes that came his way. That’s substantial. Nine percent below his career norms. I have to think this is one of the reasons behind Arenado’s powered-down mode.

This is an important factor to know: Arenado has good plate discipline. He isn’t sabotaging himself by chasing pitches out of the strike zone. In fact his current chase rate would be the fourth lowest in a season during his career. And his current swinging-strike rate (7.6%) would be the best of his career.

This is also true: Arenado’s current called-strike rate (19.4%) would be the highest in a season for his career. And that’s definitely working against him because so far he’s seen the highest percentage of strikes in a season (49.8%) since 2016.

Arenado can still drive the ball when hitting strikes. But by declining to swing at so many strikes, Arenado limits his number of chances to drive the ball and turn the power up. Arenado is unlikely to the point where he slugs .550 or higher when hitting a strike, but he certainly has enough left in that swing to hit with more authority than what we’ve seen to this point in 2024.

What the Cardinals need from Arenado: more aggressiveness at the plate. More confidence. Fewer called strikes. More swings at strikes. The formula is there to improve his power profile.

+ JORDAN WALKER. If the former prize prospect can find a more impactful swing and get the ball off the ground, he could be a huge bonus for the Cardinals if he gets another shot with the big club later this summer. But Walker in 59 games at Triple A Memphis since his demotion, Walker is batting only .243 with a .311 onbase percentage and a flat .372 slug. He has four homers in 239 at-bats, and nine of his Memphis teammates have clubbed more home runs. Another outfielder at Memphis, Matt Koperniak, is outperforming Walker by a wide margin – hitting .306 with a .356 OBP, .493 slug, 12 homers and 19 doubles.

+ GIOVANNY GALLEGOS. The righty reliever was one of the best setup guys in the majors from 2019 through 2022 but began to decline in 2023. He was nearly defenseless on the mound earlier this season before the Cardinals shut him down with a shoulder impingement. Since returning on June 26, Gallegos has a 2.25 ERA in six appearances – but that’s misleading. His average four-seam fastball velocity (92.5 mph) is still down from previous levels, and his swing–and-miss stuff is insignificant. The slider looks good, and Gallegos gets a healthy amount of whiff–swing action on it.

But that four-seam fastball … not good. He’s gotten a miniscule whiff-swing rate of 3.85 percent with the pitch, and hitters have crushed it for a .308 average and .539 slug in 13 at-bats. He’s walked three – with no strikeouts – when using the four seamer since his return. His 4.91 fielding independent ERA since coming off the IL is a more indicative read on his effectiveness. Manager Oli Marmol is using Gallegos in low-heat, low-leverage situations, and it will take a long time for Gio to regain trust for high-leverage spots.

It’s easy for me to write “the Cardinals need more from Gallegos,” but what’s left? In 2021, Gallegos averaged just under 95 mph on his four-seam fastball, and had a whiff-swing rate of 25.4 percent. In 2024, that high-caliber fastball isn’t there. The Cardinals bullpen will need help over the final two-plus months but I don’t know if Gallegos is capable of summoning the awesomeness of his old four-seamer.

Thanks for reading …

–Bernie

A 2023 inductee into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame, Bernie has provided informed opinions and perspective on St. Louis sports through his columns, radio shows and podcasts since 1985.

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Stats used in my baseball columns are sourced from FanGraphs, Baseball Reference, StatHead, Baseball Savant, Baseball Prospectus, Brooks Baseball Net, and Sports Info Solutions and Cots Contracts unless otherwise noted.