October 26: Right-hander Adam Wainwright has officially retired, per the transactions tracker at MLB.com. That appears to have opened up the 40-man roster spot to make this claim possible. Wainwright announced coming into the 2023 season that it would be his last.
October 25: The Cardinals announced that they have claimed infielder Buddy Kennedy off waivers from the Athletics.
Kennedy, 25, has a small amount of major league experience, getting into 40 games over the past two seasons with the Diamondbacks. He hit .206/.293/.299 in his 123 plate appearances while playing second and third base. He was claimed off waivers by the A’s in September, though they kept him in the minors on optional assignment.
The infielder has fared far better in the minors, including in 2023. He hit .318/.444/.481 in 417 Triple-A plate appearances while with the D’Backs, walking more than he struck out and producing a 133 wRC+. He slumped after getting claimed by the A’s, though in a small sample size of just 46 trips to the plate. In addition to playing second and third base, he also saw some time at first base and left field in the minors.
The Cardinals have plenty of multi-positional players on the roster but never seem to have enough, with players like Taylor Motter, José Fermín and Juniel Querecuto getting playing time in 2023. It is speculated that the Cards will put some of their position players on the trading block this winter, since they are in dire need of starting pitching upgrades. If that indeed comes to pass, adding Kennedy to the roster gives them an extra layer of depth to call upon when the time comes. Kennedy still has one option season remaining.
The little Millville machine!
They needed a Buddy. Does he sell carpet in the offseason?
Nah, but he did help manage the A’s various scams to qualify for government money.
Not sure, but he’s terrible at making toys.
Related to former Cards 2B Adam Kennedy?
Or former president John Fitzgerald?
How bad is taking scraps from the A’s?!
ouch, @stymeedpne.
I thought the same thing.
Cardinals hoping Buddy got some of grandpa Don Money abilities.
Does this signal that one or more of their five second basemen will be moving?
It’ll probably be Gorman instead of Edman or Donovan. They will need to trade something someone else covets to get a meaningful piece back and there is no sense in seeking filler level pitching. Whoever they trade is gonna hurt, but it is better than giving away Adolis or Randy and keeping the outfielders they have on the roster…
I hope you’re wrong, but you’re probably right.
Mo isn’t a fan of Cubans!
I’m going to be very angry if they trade Gorman. We need offense too. Pitching was horrible but if you subtract from the offense, the offense will be bad. The offense was barely above average last year.
@CardsFan57… I’m already halfway out the door already, but if the Cardinals trade away Gorman, I will slam it shut as I exit, for good.
snakebyte32-
I wish you would stop challenging Mo by saying things like “better than giving away Adolis or Randy and keeping the outfielders they have on the roster…”
Now he’s going to try to really out do himself. This could get very ugly.
Signing anybody off the A’s – wow, just wow.
Way to go Mo!
He could be the next Aaron Miles.
I don’t get this unless they plan to flip Prieto.
I’d say they’re going to surprise a lot of fans with the number of players they are going to move. Look at the second basemen on the 40 man, plus the two they got at the deadline.
I really hope they don’t trade any starting position players. If they really want to compete, they need to sign starters instead of subtracting from the line up. I’m okay seeing Carlson, O’Neill, Burleson, Baker, and one of Knizner or Herrera go. I’m also fine with trading position players from the minor leaguers. Subtracting from the MLB lineup will just create a new set of problems.
Whatever they do, I don’t want to see the young players who are the future of the team traded away.
Spare parts doesn’t bring back top tier pitching.
That’s why they need to buy the pitchers. The team won’t win if they rely on an aging lineup. I cringe every time I read someone suggesting they trade Gorman. He and Walker are the future of the team. I’d rather the team wait on pitching than to trade the future offense away. They need to extend Gorman, Walker, and Nootbaar if they can.
Pitching alone doesn’t win either. It takes balance. You aren’t going to go anywhere raiding the needed offense for pitching. It’s not like the team was an offensive juggernaut this past year.
Bidding against 29 other teams for pitching doesn’t seem like a smart strategy either. The last time the Cardinals outbid the rest of the league for pitching it was Steven Matz and before that Andrew Miller so….
“Top tier” in today’s market (and the rest of eternity) is probably never going to happen, without them drafting and developing a future star player. DeWitt may as well just sell the team, because he’ll never be willing to spend the money required to secure established, “top tier” talent, unless they’re already on the wrong side of 30. I think the Cards will have to grow their own before they’ll ever have a top-tier SP again. There’s always the chance a trade for an “unknown” could work in their favor, but given their poor talent evaluation ability, that’s not a possibility worth really hoping for. But what do I really know? Not much about anything.
Grow their own…. Like Gallen and Alcantara?
It can if the spare parts have value.
Burleson would be an overpay for glasnow. Burleson plus a 45FV prospect is a fit for Cease.
Either of these plus gray and imanaga in FA and theyre done witout touching the core.
Very doable with 50m to spend on pitching, Glasnkw would put them over for a year but they might do it after a crappy 2023.
They are bidding against maybe 6-7 teams in reality. Amazing luck for the Cards to have a strong FA pitching class and the least conpetition for years.
Extending Paul DeJong was seen as a good move when it happened too.
DeJong had a pretty terrible end to that contract (which is what we all remember) but over the whole contract it was decent value.
But the good years were Arb-eligible years they bought out, hindsight is 20/20 I’m one who thought it was good at the time. Young talent is a hard to project sometimes.
Gorman, Walker, and Nootbaar are not DeJong.
Hope not.
The job that Flores has done in the draft is amazing in actuality. I just hope they don’t pick up a pitcher with a QO so he can actually have an opportunity to make a selection toward the top of the talent pool. So buying top pitching or even next tier should be off limits in my book. I look back at the career of Waino and recall what we had to give up to get him. J.D. Drew was often injured, but loaded with potential and he provided a monster year for the Braves after the trade. I wish the Cards could get that kind of a return for O’Neill, but clubs seem to evaluate talent differently in today’s market so that seems unlikely. I still see it as Gorman, Edman, Nootbar getting shipped. Carlson is a lottery ticket at this point. We would all be disappointed if he breaks out in another uniform as his trade value is limited after what we have seen the last couple of seasons and any pitching the Cards get back would either have the same type of unreached potential thus unproven or of lower quality but usable. I would be curious if Miami would have any interest at all in Contreras. They need a catcher and more offense. The Cardinals would be better off with Herrera under the tutelage of Molina in my opinion. I think the season would have been different if the Cardinals had pulled off the trade/extension for Murphy that the Braves did. We all thought the cost was much too much after the reports came out of the A’s ask, but in hindsight I think we should have pulled the trigger on that trade and clear the log jam in the outfield. Now we still have all of the players from that ask, a lost season of Goldschmidt and Arenado control, less value for all the players in that ask and a scramble for pitching that could have been acquired with the money spent to bring in Contreras… I may be babbling some, but my point is anything could happen with a trade, but you have to be willing to lose something of value to another to get anything valuable in return and I think after how STL snagged both corner infielders for peanuts that many Cards fans think that is how every trade should go.
Miami needs a catcher and could use a SS as well. Does Edman and Knizner bring a rotation type pitcher back?
You forgot I mentioned their poor talent evaluation ability… where would the Cards be right now without Flores?
Speaking of Flores, he’s the guy I hope will get the job once Mo finally gtfo. I think (and hope) there’s only 2 seasons left dealing with his grotesque superiority complex.
Flores has done a nice job. Flores doesn’t make the trades. Every fanbase seems to over value their own players and think the world is ending when someone they traded succeeds elsewhere.
I don’t have a problem overvaluing my favorite team’s players, its manager, its POB or the owners. I would’ve used the wrecking ball before the last season’s deadline and made major changes.. but if I made the decisions, the offense wouldn’t have been expected to bailout a junk pitching staff an entire season, either, so who knows what would’ve happened if Mo & Co would’ve actually done their job spending someone else’s money. I don’t watch (or care about) any team other than the Cardinals. I don’t expect winning seasons, championships, etc. What I do expect is an organization to do everything it can to field a competitive team, every season. I don’t think that’s too much to ask for, but the organization always has excuses to explain its own lack of effort.
I’m sure they planned on flipping Prieto and other position players acquired at trade deadline.
Motie has a plan. He will git ‘er done. There is nothing that a sprinkle of nostalgia can’t fix.
Hey Bud, let’s party