Locked On Cardinals - Daily Podcast On The St. Louis Cardinals - I Can't Believe The St. Louis Cardinals Are Ranked This Low!

Starting point is 00:00:00 One of the things that I fear most about the Cardinals in 2025 is what one national writer predicts is going to happen. We'll talk about it today on Locked on Cardinals. You are Locked on Cardinals, your daily St. Louis Cardinals podcast, part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Hey, there Cardinals fans, I'm J.D. Haffron, and I'm a national radio sports anchor born and raised in the Lou and a lifetime Cardinals fan, and I'm your host for Locked on Cardinals. part of the Lockdown Podcast Network covering your team every day. You can follow me on TwitterX at JD Sports Radio and the podcast at L-O-W-Discor Cardinals. I want to thank those of you who make Locked-on Cardinals your first listen to every day. We're free and available wherever you get your podcast.

Starting point is 00:00:48 You can find us on YouTube. Make sure you come on by, like, subscribe, comment, interact with us, and hit that notification button so you know when the new episodes are posted because this is a show serving Cardinal Nation and giving the best fans in baseball, all of the info about the birds on the bat. This episode is brought to you by booking.com. Booking. Yeah, the right stay can make you a fan of any city, even your baseball rivals. Book today on booking.com, the official accommodation partner of Major League Baseball,

Starting point is 00:01:15 get the booking.com app today. So the St. Louis Cardinals, we're going to talk about scary things, by the way, being that this is the Halloween season, you can see some of the decorations in the back if you're watching on YouTube, if you're listening just to the audio version of this. Sorry, you can't see anything. But, you know, we're in the spooky season now. And having conversations with some people yesterday got me thinking about how I'm kind of scared about what's going to happen here in 2025. Because the Cardinals are going with this reset, right?

Starting point is 00:01:51 You know what that. You've heard that word over and over now. The reset that the Cardinals are going to do. And they're doing it for a good reason. It's not like they're just like, let's just try this. That's not the case. The organization has become stale. They've fallen behind the times of other organizations in the league,

Starting point is 00:02:08 and they need to revamp things so they can compete at the level that they are used to that us, the fans are used to. 2023 sucked big time, right? 71 wins, just crap had to trade people away. Not a whole lot of fun. This past year, it was better. 83 wins. Didn't make the playoffs, though.

Starting point is 00:02:29 but they weren't the embarrassment that they were in the previous year. Most fan bases would be pretty thrilled with a 12-win increase from one year to the next. But not in St. Louis, not when the bar was as low as it was the previous year. And just getting over the 500 mark is not something that the fans are interested in. They want better. They're demanding changes. They want winning. And now it appears that the franchise is,

Starting point is 00:02:59 moving in that direction, right? They're like, all right, you're right. We've got to switch some things up here. We need to take a deep look into what's going on in our player development. Why this thing isn't going the way it used to? Like this machine that we call the St. Louis Cardinals isn't running so smoothly. We're not getting the prospects that are coming up and replenishing veterans that are moving on. Why are people who are in our organization moving on? They're not having the success here, but they move on and go, a place else and things get so much better for them. A lot of stuff, right?

Starting point is 00:03:33 Things that you know about as a fan of the St. Louis Cardinals's problems that we've been dealing with. But what does that mean for 2025? What does that mean for next year? If 83 wins was a step in the right direction, are they going to be better in 2025? Because my worst fear is that next year is going to be lost. Like just a lost season altogether. that this reset isn't going to really kick in until 2026 after John Mosea

Starting point is 00:04:07 Locke is gone from the role of president of baseball operations and Heinbloom takes over completely. And even then, the Cardinals might still be a few years away from competing for a World Series. As they wait for this new homegrown talent that they're hopefully going to start developing, hopefully that, you know, they're cooking this up where, you know, you know, Hime's going to look at the behind-the-scenes stuff and take care of the prospects and, you know, figure out a way to get it. So they are churning out prospects again. But while we wait for them to cook that up and reach the big leagues and prosper,

Starting point is 00:04:48 what's going to happen with the major league team? Are the Cardinals going to be a better team in 2025 without? Paul Goldschmidt, Kyle Gibson, Lance Lynn, Andrew Kittridge. You know, those are some big pieces to the puzzle of an 83 win team. What if they trade one of their big remaining salaries like Nolan Aranaata, Wilson Contreras or Sunny Gray? All of them have no trade clauses, by the way. So they have to be willing to move on from St. Louis. But will trading one of them make them better than the 83 wins that they got this year?

Starting point is 00:05:25 What if they trade Halsley? So when we talk about, you know, slashing payroll and getting rid of salaries, we still don't know what the payroll limitations are going to be. We're not going to know for a while. As I've told you before, John Moseilac has said that, you know, that's post-world series stuff. So we're not going to know for a while. At least we don't think we'll know for a while. So we don't know how much slashing is really going to be taking place just yet. But, you know, these are strange waters for us, car. fans who haven't had to deal with this much possible turnover since the 90s. And the turnover that's going to take place isn't exactly setting us up to be better next year. Like usually if we're going to turn guys over, we're adding pieces, right? We're trying to become a better team. This year, they're hoping that they'll get better, you know, addition by subtraction, that cut some payroll, other guys step up.

Starting point is 00:06:32 and hopefully will be as good, if not better next year. I'm scared to death that that is not what's going to happen, that they're going to get even worse. You know, the business side of things are set to take over winning. You know, before it was like, do what we can under these limitations to win. Now it's like, now we've got to go away from some of these guys that helped us win to get to payroll limitations. Unless we get significant progression from some of the young talent that's in the organization right now.

Starting point is 00:07:14 And I'm talking about Jordan Walker, Nolan Gorman, Victor Scott II. Plus, you need the continued progression of guys like Mason Wend, who was outstanding, Andre Palante, Michael McGreevy. My fear is that 2025 is setting up to be a lost season as part of this reset. which doesn't exactly excite me or any of the fans about anything that's going to happen this offseason or for next season. You know, of course, I hope Walker and Gorman become the stars we hope they'd be. I hope Mason Wend is awesome again, if not better, in 2025.

Starting point is 00:07:54 It would be amazing if Quinn Matthews came up next year and flashed the brilliance that we saw this year, which earned him a slew of awards, including the Cardinals minor league player of the year award, minor league pitching prospect of the year award, minor league debut of the year award. I mean, it's nothing to just sneeze at. Like, these are major awards that Quinn Matthews just walked away from. Can he make a significant impact on the roster next year? You know, is that one of the things with Sunny Gray? if you end up trading Sunny Gray away, is that opening the door for Quinn Matthews to step in?

Starting point is 00:08:34 Like he's not going to immediately, I believe this you don't think. He's going to immediately be your ace, but is that what we're thinking? But what's more realistic? If I told you the Cardinals are going to be 500 again with this current roster, or that all of these kids are going to step up and they're going to be a better team in 2025, you just watch. What's more realistic? I think most people are going to say door number one.

Starting point is 00:09:02 And one national writer is predicting that as well. And I'm going to tell you what he has to say about where the Cardinals rank among the non-playoff teams and how they're set up for 2025. We'll get into that next on Locked on Cardinals. This episode of Locked on Cardinals is brought to you by booking.com. Booking.com. Explore those U.S. cities. You always secretly wanted to learn more about some of my favorite places across. the nation include Miami in Las Vegas, Boston, New York, San Diego, LA, Nashville, Kansas City.

Starting point is 00:09:35 Thoughts and prayers going out to all of you in Florida who are getting ready to get smacked by this hurricane again, man. It's been a tough couple of weeks, and I hope everybody remains safe down there. But when everything gets fixed and when everything is fine again, booking.com is going to be the place you're going to go to book your hotels, your bed and breakfast. your vacation rentals, your resorts, and so much more. Because you might just find your perfect stay, and you can find it even in your baseball's rival city. So when 2025 does roll around, and you want to go see the Cardinals and Cubs at Wrigley,

Starting point is 00:10:11 you can go through booking.com and book whatever it is you need in Chicago. They've got a wide variety of choices across the U.S. You can go incognito to all of your baseball rival cities. Booking.com can help you book a state that's close to your home teams or your rival stadium from hotel. that actually overlook the stadiums, like, say, in Cincinnati or in Pittsburgh, family-friendly resorts that have nothing to do with baseball whatsoever. Just you want to go somewhere and relax and enjoy the atmosphere in certain cities. That's cool, too.

Starting point is 00:10:45 They got cute bed and breakfast and few of the misses want to go somewhere. Booking.com is so many choices across the U.S. The right stay can make you a fan of any U.S. city, even your baseball rivals. booking.com, booking dot yeah. Thanks for making Lockton Cardinals, your first listen every day. You can leave comments on YouTube as well as on Twitter X anytime you want. Your feedback is always welcome and encourage. And if real quick, I want to put a shout out to our girl Haley over at Locked on Blues.

Starting point is 00:11:17 Congratulations, St. Louis Blues, winners in their first game of the season. So just like here at Lockdown Cardinals, anything going on with the Blues, good and bad, but good right now after they're winning in Seattle. Haley has got you covered at Lockdown Blue, so go check her out if you haven't already. All right, back to baseball. The Athletics Jim Bowden put out an article on Wednesday, ranking the 18 major league baseball teams that didn't make the playoffs, and who was best positioned for 2025?

Starting point is 00:11:48 And in his opinion, could be a long season and seamless. I'm going to link the article in the description. Check it out for yourself. It's going to be in the show notes. as well for you guys listening to the audio version. But of the 18 teams who didn't get in, he has got the Cardinals, and he ranks him 1 through 18. He's got the Cardinals ranked as number 13.

Starting point is 00:12:13 So bottom half, that means that Jim Bowdoin believes that only five other teams in baseball are set to have worse seasons in 2025 than our St. Louis Cardinals. That's not good. That's not what you want to hear. And the teams he lists have obvious reasons why they should be below the Cardinals. The Miami Marlins, he's got them at number 14, Skip Schumacher out of there.

Starting point is 00:12:44 When's the Manager of the Year award next year? Nothing goes right. A lot of injuries to the pitching staff, and he moves on with his life. They traded away stars like Jazz Chisholm Jr. to the Yankees, Louisa Rice and Tanner Scott to the Padres. Among others, they sent a lot of people. way. Next on the list is the athletics at number 15, who have no home right now. We'll be playing in Sacramento at a AAA stadium next year. Still have some decent talent. Don't get me wrong. You know,

Starting point is 00:13:14 Brent Rooker, who I would love to see in a Cardinal uniform, that would be great. Lawrence Butler, Shea Langelliers, Mason Miller, J.P. Sears. There's some talent with the A's, but things are going to be weird. They're going to be really weird as they play in Sacramento. It's going to be a bizarre situation. that's sure. Colorado Rockies next at 16, NLWR 61 and 101 this past year. Again, the Rockies have some guys that have some talent, but they just have not been able to put it all together. They're losing Charlie Blackman.

Starting point is 00:13:46 So you can see why they'd be below. The Los Angeles Angels, just a mess of an organization. They just let the greatest player in the world walk right out their door. Just let them walk. show Hey, Otani just across the street, goes to the Dodgers. And they're playing, or paying too often injured guys.

Starting point is 00:14:10 Mike Trout, who we have a lot of respect for. But Mike Trout has been hurt every year for the last couple of seasons. To make $37 million a year until 2030. Anthony Rendon, making $38.5 million until 2027. You can see why they're in a bit of a pickle, if you will. Then you got the White Sox coming at number 18. What do you want me to say? 121 losses last year.

Starting point is 00:14:39 But that's it. Record setting 121 loss. Those are the only teams that Jim Bowden feels are less than the Cardinals. Everybody else in the league he thinks this is better. All of them. That is frightening to me. Another scary thing. That is frightening to me.

Starting point is 00:14:58 And yes, this is one man's opinion. Doesn't mean he's right. But it doesn't make me believe that they'll be, that the Cardinals will be all that much better than where he's got them. Or the fans will start filling Bush Stadium again to go see a team that's in reset mode anytime soon. So here's the exact quote that Jim Bowden says about the Cardinals. Cardinals announced that President of Baseball Operations, John Moseilock, who you see on the screen,

Starting point is 00:15:32 will step down after the 2025 season and be replaced by Heim Blue, who will oversee their player development department in the meantime. They will not be resigning Paul Goldsmith this offseason. They're expected to listen to offers on Nolan Arnato, Sonny Gray, Wilson Contreras, and other veterans on the roster. The Cardinals are ready to build around a core of young players that include shortstop Mason, when, D.H outfielder, Alec Berlison, Sega baseman, Nolan Gorman, center fielder, Victor Scott II, and corner infielder, outfielder, Jordan Walker.

Starting point is 00:16:05 They might have to take a step backward in 2025 as they prepare and build for 2026 and beyond. And that is scary to me. That is scary to me. I don't want to go backwards. And I realize that paying some of these. guys that were on the roster, the exorbit amount of money that they are getting to not just be average players, I get why cutting that is the right thing to do. Like, I understand moving on from, from Gibson, Lynn, Colchman, I get it. I kind of want to keep Ketridge. I don't, I don't,

Starting point is 00:16:46 I don't understand what, it's not like he's going to break the bank, why he has to be a part of the, you know, evacuation of the Cardinals roster right now. I would love for them to do something with Michaelis and Matt. I just don't know how they're going to do it. I don't know how much they'd have to eat. I don't know who in their right mind would want them. So I think you're kind of stuck there. I understand moving on from Keenan Middleton.

Starting point is 00:17:11 Money wasted right there, unfortunately, because of injury. But I just, I hate the fact that it feels like that we have to suck in 2025 to turn the program as a whole around. I don't know why that has to be the case. Now, Bowden doesn't come out and say that. He doesn't say, well, this team is going to stink. And we should all quit on them already. He doesn't say that.

Starting point is 00:17:35 But ranking them where he did doesn't seem like he has a lot of faith in what's going to happen next year. But he says some of the same things that I mentioned in the first segment, you know, that if the team is going to compete in 2025, the youth that you thought was going to be good this past year and didn't show up, needs to step up in a major way. And I'm talking specifically about Jordan Walker and Nolan Gorman. They have to be better.

Starting point is 00:17:58 They have to be keys in your lineup. They have to be main cocks. Like Jordan Walker has to be a three, four, or five guy. So does Nolan Gorman. He's got to be a three through six guy. He's got it. And he has to be good at it. You can't suck at it.

Starting point is 00:18:11 He's got to be good. Just because you put him there doesn't mean he's automatically going to hit. We learned that about Paul Goldsmith this year. Just because you bat him clean up and third does not mean he's hitting like a who's supposed to be batting in the cleanup or third spot a few order. He was more of a guy that should have been hitting seven most of the year in most lineups, right? But they need the youth to step up.

Starting point is 00:18:33 That's going to be a huge piece of this. I still don't know how they will replace Sunny Gray if they trade them. Like, if you trade them, you're leaving yourself with Eric Fetty, Miles Michael, Stephen Mats, Andre Palante, and Michael McGreeby. one guy has had one good half of baseball at his career. And I get it. Eric Fetty was very good at the beginning half. And we saw a couple of games when he got traded over to the Cardinals where he wasn't so bad.

Starting point is 00:19:03 But other than that, hasn't had the most success at the Major League level, right? So you're putting a lot of faith in him hoping he'll be more like the guy in the first half with the White Sox than what we saw in the second half of the Cardinals. Okay. Miles Magalas. a guy who has been terrible for two years, one of the worst pitchers in baseball for two years. There's really no way around it. Personally, I have nothing against Miles Michaelis. I think he's an entertaining guy.

Starting point is 00:19:31 I'm sure he cares a lot, but he's just not very good. Okay, the stat. Go look at the stats. Him and Patrick Corbyn are the two worst pitchers in baseball for two straight years. Stephen Matt's. Can't stay on the field. Can't stay on the field. That's all you need to know.

Starting point is 00:19:48 It doesn't matter how good he is when he's on there. You're not on there enough to make an impact. And then you've got two younger pitchers that you hope continue to be as good as they were this year after surprising everyone this past season. Not a single one of you. Don't lie. Not a single one of you. But Andre Palante would be a really good starter and important piece for the Cardinals this past year. Come on.

Starting point is 00:20:17 not a single one of you, but Michael McGreevy was the answer to the number five spot coming into the season. Nobody did. If that was the case, he would have been up a long time ago. The Cardinals didn't even see it that way. Michael McGreevy came out of almost nowhere to have a really good impact on this team. God bless him. I hope he continues. I really do.

Starting point is 00:20:43 Former first round pick, there was clearly talent there. It just didn't blossom in the mind. ever and then all of a sudden something clicked this year and it worked out so hopefully that continues that would be a great story Quinn matthews Gordon Grecepo some of these other guys those those are the who you're going to fill the roles with I guess I don't know unless there's some cheap veterans out there because I don't want to pay 12 million for Kyle Gibson next year but maybe they have to if they trade sunny gray away maybe they have to bring him back I don't know. But that that's kind of scary.

Starting point is 00:21:23 That rotation, as of right now, a Fetty Michael's, Matt's Palancee-McGrievey rotation if you trade Sunny Gray, a little bit scary. Trading Hellsley, I think, yeah, would suck. Trading Ryan Helsley would suck. But you can find ways to close out games, you know. I loved what I saw for Matthew Libertoria this past year. Is he a closer? I don't know.

Starting point is 00:21:45 I don't know. But I love what you saw. You still got a Jojo Romero there. You've got some other guys, Ryan Fernandez. You know, you could find somebody to close. But, you know, if you're doing this reset and you're not expect to be that good, how many games you really close in anyway, right? So I think it's a lot easier to do that than find starting pitchy.

Starting point is 00:22:07 But Jim Bowden has rated the highest. I'm going to go to these rankings again real quick. The highest of the 18 teams that didn't make the playoffs. He's got the Mariners at number one, Diamondbacks two, and Rangers number three. But when you go through the ranking still, he's got the Reds, the Cubs, the Pirates, all ahead of the Cardinals.

Starting point is 00:22:28 He's got them at number five, seven, and ten, and then the Cardinals at 13. So, and then obviously, Milwaukee made the playoffs, so he's better than them. So Jim Bowden is expecting the Cardinals to finish in last place, is what he's telling you. Isn't that scary? When it was last time you heard that?

Starting point is 00:22:48 Cardinals are probably a last place team this year. What? What? That's what he's saying, though. That's what he's saying. Once again, I'll link it in the description and in the show notes for you. And you can check out the full article on your own. Speaking of Trading Hellsley, the yesterday show, got the fans talking and I want to revisit that episode and get the fan feedback so you guys can hear it on the idea of moving. The All-Star Closer from the Cardinals. We'll do that next on Locked on Cardinals. Hey, NFL fans, you can start the season with a big return on Fandul, America's number one sports book. you know sometimes you'll be watching games and you just pick up a little hunch and you want to play some vet and where does that hunch come from it could be from the game you're watching on TV could be you paying attention to your phone and being on the Fandual app has got its perks when you're doing that because when you get a hunch in the middle of the game you can be on the app and you can check out not only the latest stats but also view live play by play and so much more on the same page where you actually place your bet so it makes things very easy very easy very convenient for you. It's not like you have to, you know, I've got to log out and then I've got to go to this page and do this and they get back to where they made it very, very simple for you. So when you're starting to feel like, ooh, he's going to have a big second half or something like that. It's right there. Fingertips available to you. You'll get started with $200 in bonus bets. That's guaranteed when you place your first $5 bet. That's $200 in bonus bets guaranteed when you place your first $5 bet at fandle.com. That's fandul.com. Game time is an authorized ticket marketplace of Major League Baseball that makes getting tickets faster and easier.

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Starting point is 00:25:45 Download game time today. Last minute, tickets, lowest price, guaranteed. Thank you for making Lockton Cardinals your first listen today. the Lockdown MLB podcast for everything going on with the playoffs right now. Our host, Sully, is all over it, all over it. Anything that's happening with the guardians, the tigers, the Padres. What an exciting game that was against the Dodgers, Yankees, all of them, all of them. He's talking about it all.

Starting point is 00:26:19 Part of the Lockdown podcast network, your team every day. Again, as always, I want to thank you guys for participating in the YouTube videos and contribute to the discussion about all things Cardinals that we've ring up in our episode yesterday. We were talking about trading Ryan Helsley and what kind of packages you could get in return in exchange for the All-Star Closer. We're going to start with Scott here who says trading Helsley is a no-brainer. We need young prospects and the cards would never give him a five to six-year deal.

Starting point is 00:26:48 There'll be 31 when his new deal starts, hard pass on that. And that's certainly one of the negatives about what's getting ready to happen with Ryan Helzley, new deal means he's probably going to want something that's five to six years. Spot rack has got him making like a six year, 80 something million dollar deal is what he's worth right now compared to the rest of the market. And the Cardinals have been very much reluctant to hand out that length of a contract to any pitcher, much less a closer, to give them five to six years. So that's why it seems like it's probably in the cards to trade.

Starting point is 00:27:26 Ryan Housley away. Mary Honeybee says it seems they could get a lot more than those proposed trades. I wouldn't do any of those. The best is a ninth ranked? How about no? Exclamation points. Now, part of the reason that those proposed packages might seem low to you, Mary, is that Halsley is going to be a free agent after next season.

Starting point is 00:27:54 Okay? So he's got his one more year of arbitration. which is going to get this massive bump in the salary, and then he's going to be a free agent. And in all likelihood, he'll want to test the free agent market to get the best deal that he can, which means he's basically a one-year rental for whomever trades for, which naturally will bring the price down because there's no guarantee.

Starting point is 00:28:15 So like when we were talking about this year, like when Dylan ceased and people were like, well, if you trade for Dylan Cs, the great thing is you've got a couple of more years of team control with him. it's one of the things that made Eric Fetty. An attractive trade piece at the deadline is not only did you get him for the rest of last year, but you also get him for another year beyond that. Helsley is set to become a free agent.

Starting point is 00:28:38 And also, remember this, that outside of this one season where granted, he was freaking amazing. Injury history has been a thing. He's 30 years old already. You know, if we were talking about, say, Mason Miller for the A's, and it was his age, and you had more years of control available, you'd expect a much better return package than you're going to get for Ryan Helsley. It doesn't mean you're not going to get something good.

Starting point is 00:29:02 It just means like people aren't going to be giving up their, you know, top one, two, three prospects of return for Ryan Helsley. More than likely. It doesn't mean somebody won't, but odds are it's probably going to fall into the packages like that we, we kind of brought up yesterday. Stephen says, why a package? Why not just one 19-year-old power hitter?

Starting point is 00:29:24 Hellsley is the real deal. Get the best player we can get, not the most players we can get. Plus, Heelsley will have a lot of teams fighting to get them, get a hitter, maybe a center fielder, get some power from center field in the lineup. Stephen, to use a phrase from my guy, Peter Bukowski, over at Lockdown Packers, the idea in trading for a package instead of one person means you get more bites at the apple. And what that means really is, so say you swap Helzley for just, one prospect, but it's a higher prospect. So it's like, like you mentioned, like a 19-year-old power

Starting point is 00:29:58 hitter, maybe a top five guy in somebody's organization. That's the swap. It's him for Halsley. Even though he might be ranked higher, there's still no guarantee. Baseball's weird, right? Where there's no guarantee that that guy is going to work out, right? Like odds are against prospects ever making it to the major leagues and being what we thought they were going to be in the draft. And go look through first round picks in major league draft. over the course of the last few years and go see how many of them actually pan out. Like, it's not as great as you think. So swapping him for one guy puts a lot of pressure on that one prospect.

Starting point is 00:30:38 And if it doesn't work, I mean, look what, Randy a Rosarena for Matthew Libertor has been like. Like a Roserana goes on to do good things. I would imagine Howseley will go on to do good things. And then it took a while for Matthew Libertor to find a spot in the Cardinals organization. on this roster where he could prosper. And people are like, what a bust of a trade. That is terrible. But if you trade Ryan Helsley for like three or four guys,

Starting point is 00:31:07 the odds that at least one of them works out is far greater. And maybe you get lucky and maybe even two or three or four of them. Become productive members of your organization. That's what it means to have more bites at the apple, right? You get more chances for somebody to actually pan out and be really, really good, whereas if you just go for one and it doesn't work out, you're kind of screwed and it looks really, really bad on you. I've said repeatedly,

Starting point is 00:31:32 I would love to see if they could swap them and get something more major league ready in return, you know, watching the playoffs. One of the guys I was thinking about this past year was like, what would it take to pull Spencer Torkelson out of Detroit? You know, he's 25 years old. He's a former number one overall pick at success. The previous year where he hit over 30 home run.

Starting point is 00:31:53 had like 90-something RBIs. And then last year, he plummeted. Things just did not work out in Detroit. Ends up regressing, get sitting down. And I'm like, there's talent there, though, right? Right. I mean, 31 and 90 at the Major League level, that doesn't just happen and go away.

Starting point is 00:32:11 There's still talent there. What would it cost to pull them away from the Detroit Tigers? Cardinals are going to be in the market for a first basement, right? So he'd be the kind of guy that maybe the Cardinals can target if they were to go for somebody who is like major league ready already. I'm sure there's other situations like that around the league there where there's a guy who was a higher pick hasn't quite lived up to expectations yet. And maybe you can try to bring one of them on board kind of the way the Padres did with Jerks

Starting point is 00:32:39 and Pro Far. You know, Jerks and Pro Far a few years ago was like number one prospect in baseball and couldn't stay healthy. Things weren't working out. Nobody remembers him in Colorado, by the way, except probably people from the Like nobody remembers that he was a part of that organization. And he shows up in San Diego and things work out under the expert tutelage of Mike Schill. But things finally clicked for him.

Starting point is 00:33:05 You know, they've talked about during the playoffs, his diet and stuff and how he's quit lifting weights. And he's become just quicker and leaner. And it's worked out. It's worked out. So maybe something like that could get done. But in those deals that we mentioned yesterday, Michael Carpenter, who wrote the blog, He was just going off deals that he was comparing him to deals that were made for a role of his Chapman when he went to the Cubs. Josh Hater, when he went to the Padres.

Starting point is 00:33:32 And then Tanner Scott, he just went to the Padres too for the Marlins. So that's how he kind of came up with those different packages and what level of prospects it would take to get Helsley from the Cardinals. So that's why they look the way they do. But again, maybe the Cardinals can do better. maybe they can do better. Maybe they see something where like, this guy led the league in saves. He's incredible.

Starting point is 00:33:54 He throws 102 miles an hour. He's lights out. He's hell's bells. Maybe we ought to fork over a little bit more, make sure he's our. So it's a possibility. It's a possibility. Anyway, time's up.

Starting point is 00:34:07 Got to wrap it up for it today. Thanks for making Lockton Cardinals your first listen every day. If you haven't already, give us follow on Twitter X at L0 underscore Cardinals and a JD Sports Radio. Like, subscribe, and comment. on our YouTube channel, help our love for the Cardinals grow. You guys are the best fans in baseball for a reason.

Starting point is 00:34:25 I will see you next time a Lockdown Cardinals. Supposed to have a guest tomorrow, by the way. Jeff Jones, supposed to join us. What is today? Wednesday, supposed to join us on Thursday. So make sure you tune in. And if you got any questions that you want me to ask, Jeff, hit me up on Twitter X or hit me up in the comments section here on this episode.

Starting point is 00:34:43 And we'll get it over to Jeff and see what we can find out. So let us know. All right. Have a good one. Thanks for watching Locked on Cardinals.

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