The St. Louis Cardinals have arrived in Jupiter and the reports about players being in the best shapes of their lives has begun! The newly renovated and almost finished Roger Dean Chevrolet Stadium is hosting the Cardinals and Miami Marlins for the next six weeks as most of us wait for the days to get longer and the last of the snow to finally disappear.
Over these six Sundays before Opening Day, I will look at each of the position groups for the Cardinals and look at their season projections and compare those expectations to the rest of the league. With the Cardinals either projected 66 wins via PECOTA or 77 wins via FanGraphs, that shows how much variance there could be surrounding the team in 2026. I expect the Cardinals to finish somewhere in the middle of those two numbers, where a 74.5 total line would give me the least confidence one way or another. As things stand, I am in on the Cardinals over 69.5 via FanDuel, but that could still be too optimistic with a lot of hope and expectations surrounding the team’s young players.
I am starting this series by looking at the starting pitching, the group that remained healthy all year, and in most organizations, that would usually mean a successful season. Unfortunately, that health meant Cardinals fans had to suffer through 51 starts by Miles Mikolas and Erick Fedde before the team threw in the towel on the latter and allowed the former to finish out his tenure with the organization. By measure of fWAR, the 2025 staff finished 20th in baseball and 10th in the National League. The rotation is arguably the most revamped group on the roster as Chaim Bloom challenges the player development team to create high-level pitching talent that the St. Louis organization was always known for, although this version will feature more firepower than previous iterations of the pitching prospect group.
St. Louis Cardinals Rotation: Who’s in, who’s out?
Recently, I pointed out how RosterResource’s projected depth chart has the entire starting nine for the Cardinals as home grown talent. The same cannot be said for the rotation, and that might not be a bad thing at this point in the rebuild process. On this week’s Cardinals on My Time, I had Josh Jacobs from Dealin’ the Cards come on to look at the rotation competition, one that I view as the most wide open in camp. Rather than rehash that discussion here, I want to look at the guys we put into our rotation, compare that to projections, and then see how they stack up with the NL and the Central.
The Locks: Matthew Liberatore, Dustin May, Michael McGreevy
Potential Opening Day starter and face of the pitching rebuild Matthew Liberatore is now at the front of the rotation. When he was acquired from Tampa Bay, there was intrigue about his potential to be an ace, and while Opening Day starter and ace mean two different things, he is looking to merge those two together in his second year as a full-time rotation piece. He will be supported by 28-year-old veteran Dustin May, who we all felt could be a perfect fit for the staff, as another guy looking to build off of another full workload season. Behind those three sits Michael McGreevy as a stabilizing, mid-rotation innings-eater who could still take a step forward to move past those projections. We were begging for him to make the bigs last. year, but we may have just been to caught up in wanting to see something different on the mound at Busch that we could have put unrealistic expectations on what he truly was at that point in his career.
Looking at those three, ZiPS DC projects that McGreevy will have the lowest ERA of the group at a 3.92. By measure of fWAR, McGreevy and Liberatore lead the group with a 1.8 and May comes in right behind with a 1.7 fWAR. The workload of these three especially will be interesting to follow as they all look to prove something from last year. Libby tailed off after the second half, May pitched his most innings in years, and McGreevy will be entering his first full season in the majors. They are all projected to fall between 141 and 159 innings, but if health allows, they should all surpass that total, which the Cardinals would like to see in a season full of questions.
In the National League, that fWAR would put McGreevy and Libby among the top 40 starters in the league, showing that they are more viewed as rotation depth pieces rather than staff leaders. The top 20 pitchers in the NL all have a projected fWAR of 2.5 or greater. In the NL Central, those numbers would put them as the 12th-best pitchers in the division, falling behind four of the five projected Reds’ starters, three of the Brewers’ pitchers even after trading away Freddy Peralta, three Pirates’ starters with Paul Skenes leading the charge, but those two only fall below one Cubs’ pitcher in Matthew Boyd.
As is true every season, injuries could play a defining role in the postseason picture. While the Reds have high-level talent, those pitchers are young or have a checkered injury history. The Pirates have done a good job adding pieces to their lineup, but the Brewers have traded away more than they have gotten back, and behind Boyd, the Cubs’ rotation does not strike me as intimidating. This is not to say the Cardinals can compete in the division, but goes to show that I believe the 66 win projection by PECOTA could be low due to the gray areas around the Central. If the Cardinals can repeat their health success from last year with this year’s group, that could be an exciting move towards the future for the organization. ZiPS DC projects all three starters to go a combined 29-30 this year.
The competition: Andre Pallante, Kyle Leahy, Richard Fitts, Hunter Dobbins
I think there is going to be little argument for those first three spots, the order may be up for debate, but the names are likely there in most everyone’s depth charts. The fourth and fifth places, though, are pretty much wide open and with the major league-quality depth available, that got me thinking about the six-man rotation I wrote about earlier in the offseason, and that was before they acquired Dobbins. I would still be open to that idea, but the team has not said anything towards leaning that way, so I will look at the rotation as a traditional five-man setup.
Last season, we focused on how poorly Mikolas and Fedde pitched, but Pallante was not much better. He was able to eat 162.2 innings, but did so with a 5.31 ERA and went 1-10 with a 6.64 ERA in the second half of the year. Pallante was a nice stabilizer to the rotation in 2024, but regressed in his first season as a starter after bouncing between long relief, the minors, and starting until 2025. His offspeed stuff was not great last season, which caused his below-average fastball to be touched up at a higher rate, which then forced Pallante to try to nibble around the zone. That unfortunate mix of struggles put him into the competition, rather than a rotation lock for this season, but I think last season was just so bad in the second half, we are bound to see some improvements. Like Josh said on the podcast, a Pallante improvement may not be spectacular still, but he could become valuable to the organization in one way or another if he can become a reliable starting arm. I still have him as a favorite for a rotation spot coming out of Jupiter. ZiPS sees Pallante’s bounce back season ending in an 8-9 season and a 4.30 ERA.
For the last spot, again order irrelevant, I am again sticking with the one the organization is familiar with and seeing if they can make Kyle Leahy become the 2026 version of Matthew Liberatore last year. Leahy’s overall line last season was solid as he settled into that anytime role out of the bullpen, throwing in 62 games, covering 88 innings and putting up a 3.07 ERA and an improved strikeout rate.
I think we see him go from Kyle Everyday-hy to Kyle Every5thday-hy (rolls off the tongue) at least to start the year since Marmol and Bloom have kind of put those expectations on him since he started the last game of the regular season. Leahy has a solid pitch mix, featuring six different offerings, with his offspeed combination being his bread and butter to get a strikeout. Even with his heavy usage all season, Leahy did not experience the same regression that his counterparts did, actually bumping up his peripheral numbers after the break.
In a competitive team, a move to the rotation may not have made much sense because of his effectiveness out of the bullpen, but where the Cardinals are, he could create even more value as a starter if this transition works. Liberatore saw a similar bullpen role in 2024 before being moved to the rotation, and the Cardinals could copy/paste that plan for Leahy moving into the regular season. Interestingly, ZiPS has him penciled into the rotation on RosterResource, but the projection model only has him grabbing 18 starts out of 46 appearances. That would result in a 6-6 record over 135 innings and a 4.03 ERA with some regression in his strikeouts and walks. That regression would make sense as a starter, with less opportunity for digging deep for a big strikeout like he might have to in a jam coming out of the bullpen. That type of progression in 2026 though, could put Leahy in the conversation for a cheaper extension, although he will be turning 29 during this season and is controllable through the 2030 season. Part of the reason I would push for that rotation spot is because of that “advanced” age when compared to the rest of the rotation. If he can prove his value in the rotation, his future outlook could change for the better.
That leaves the major league trade acquisitions of Fitts and Dobbins on the outside looking in. Fitts is probably closer to competing for a 26-man slot than Dobbins, as the latter had ACL surgery last season but said he has progressed well and is throwing aggressively off the mound. Both pitchers are similar to each other when you look at the back of their baseball cards as they both have a traditional starter’s pitch mix, led by a mid-90s fastball, slider, and curveball. They are both a little more pitch-to-contact, with Fitts using a sinker to go off of his other pitches, while Dobbins features a splitter rather than a typical change up. They tend to be around the zone with their offerings and provide positive depth as projectable 26-year-old arms. If all goes to expectations, both could insert themselves into middle rotation arms for the future. ZiPS DC projects both to have similar seasons as well, with each tallying just under 100 innings with five wins and a mid-4 ERA.
It may not be sexy, but it could be an effective rotation, especially in this first year of the rebuild where the offense will have plenty of growing pains of their own. The ability for the starters to go 5-7 innings any given down could be a welcomed boost for the Cardinals as they sort through their arms and see who is the next “dude” or if they are full of “guys”.
What do you think? Who do you see cracking the Opening Day rotation? Is Libby the de facto #1? Is a six-man rotation a possibility? Let me know!
SELF PROMO OF THE WEEK
- Random Cardinal of the Week takes a mini pause on the “random” aspect so we can pay respects to Black History Month. This week, Bill Greason was featured as Jim went into the history around the Cardinals and integration.
- Redbird Rundown discussed Spring Training and we put together packing lists for certain players. For example, I chose Thomas Saggese as one of my players and, in order to make an impression this year, he needs to bring TGRI Ooze and the Swiss Army Man movie to Jupiter. See who else we packed for on the full episode, premiering tonight at 6pm! Millennial references were running wild, so this was a fun one!
- Please like, comment, and subscribe/follow! Card/bobblehead/promo giveaways coming soon!
Thanks as always!