The Cardinals’ bullpen should look quite a bit different in 36 hours than it does now. Closer Ryan Helsley is one of the most coveted available relievers and is very likely to move. Phil Maton and Steven Matz are impending free agents who should be traded as well. There hasn’t been as much public attention on southpaw JoJo Romero, but he’s another trade candidate.
Katie Woo of The Athletic reports that the Padres are among the teams to show interest in Romero. St. Louis has presumably received interest from a few clubs on the 28-year-old lefty, who carries a 2.12 ERA across 34 innings. Romero has fanned 24% of batters faced with a 52.9% ground-ball rate. He has collected 16 holds without blowing a lead all year, and he’s coming up on three months of quiet excellence.
Romero had a rocky April, allowing eight runs (seven earned) with seven walks and strikeouts apiece in 10 1/3 innings. He has allowed just four runs, one earned, since that point. Romero owns a 0.38 ERA with a 28.1% strikeout rate while keeping opposing hitters to a .200/.277/.271 slash line over his past 27 appearances. While he’s obviously not going to maintain that level of dominance, he has fired 93 innings of 2.90 ERA ball while picking up 46 holds over the past season and a half. He has gotten plus ground-ball marks with solid swing-and-miss rates while sitting around 94 MPH on his fastball.
Unlike the trio of more frequently mentioned rentals in the St. Louis bullpen, Romero is under club control for another season. He’s playing on a $2.26MM salary this year and should land in the $4-5MM range for his final arbitration campaign. The Cardinals should nevertheless look to move him to a clearer contender this summer, especially if they lower their already diminished playoff odds by trading Helsley and Maton.
San Diego has a trio of left-handers in the bullpen. Adrian Morejon is among the best in baseball. Romero would be a more reliable second option than Wandy Peralta or Yuki Matsui. Adding to the bullpen could be viewed as a luxury buy for a team with clearer holes in left field and throughout the bench. President of baseball operations A.J. Preller has left the door open to further adding to an already excellent relief group. It’s also possible they could acquire a leverage reliever while dealing away one of their current late-inning arms (most likely closer Robert Suarez) for outfield or rotation help.
Late night trade lets go.
Over/under 3.5 hours sleep for Preller before trade deadline?
Taking the under.
He can sleep on August 1st…
Considering the needs of the team, this makes no sense.
Romero would conceivably be packaged with Suarez, Cease, Salas, Cronenworth or *gulp* DeVries for a leff fielder, catcher, different starting pitcher (pick any two). Time’s a wasting tho.
It does if they plan on dealing Suarez and cease
Teams won’t pay much for Suarez (he has 2 years of player opt in, would if he gets injured?). And it doesn’t make sense to deplete the rotation going into the playoffs unless they get a SP as good as Cease? Don’t they want to win THIS YEAR?
Jojo might be precursor to moving another one of their RPs, who have more value in a trade than Suarez does. Like Adam for example.
Or, they might actually try to just add to the RP staff, because in the playoffs as we Padres fans know full well, a strong bullpen can win a WS.
Pen arms are always in need. You can never have enough of them.
Morejon can’t pitch every single day. Yuki is unreliable, Peralta has been pretty good.
Especially if they make the playoffs, NL has a lot of lefty sluggers.
Stymeedone:
It does if they trades Suarez and move Morejon to the Closer role. We need a lefty we can count on for high leverage situations more so than Matsui and Peralta.
If they get rid of Suarez, say with Cease to the Yankees and get a catcher and LF back, then they slide the remaining 3 Horseman back and add Romero. It’ll be
Romero (L)
Adam (R)
Morejon (L)
Estrada (R)
To close out games……
What catcher and LF would they get back for Cease and Suarez?
If they trade Suarez they will likely mix and match based on who is up. It’s not a matter of L/R. Heck most games they go L-R/R/R when they use them.
First, I’d rather have Suarez than Romero closing games, and Suarez who has 2 year player option (which makes him a huge risk) in 26 and 27 is not going to vetch much of a bat for LF/DH – not likely one that is better than Sheets. As for Cease, why go into the playoffs with Pivetta, King (yet to return from injury), Darvish (who has not looking like Darish) as your core three starters? Not a good scenario. Would trading Cease for prospects and turning those prospects into Robert Jr. really improve the teams chances this year?
There are few catching options out there to improve the team offensively.
Guess they could trade Suarez and cease for prospects as part of a package for Kwan. That would make some staying 2025.
Then backfill with a different starter and reliever. Perhaps they get Bieber with Kwan.
Idk, preller is likely trying to do something be and complicated. Who knows with this guy.
It wouldn’t surprise me if this TD Preller doesn’t make a splashy deal. I do think that whatever happens will reflect more on the temperature of this ownership group than AJ doing the most he can to win this year. We’ll see.
Can someone just make a trade already!!!!!!!!!!
I need a trade bro. Can anyone give me a trade?
This has got to be the most boring deadline so far.
Bro Bro Bro.
Broing/boring
I think they should keep Jo Jo and let him audition for next year’s closing role.
I think with only 1 more year of control and bloom taking over, they should at least shop him. Cards are going to be very mediocre next year. If they get a great offer id take it.
Yeah if they get a great offer of course take it, but odds are the best they’ll get is a good one.
Take good. They won’t be competitive next year, though they may well have a decent window from 2027 looking at the ages of the roster
Bloom should be the one to trade the 2027 free agents this off season so he can determine the prospects coming back.
Yeah, can’t wait for the guy who ruined the red sox to make decisions for us. Mo 2.0
No, the plan all along was to compete in 2026, and they should be able to do so with the right offseason moves. Keeping Romero would help with that.
Are they going to sign 2 top starting pitchers and Kyle Tucker?
They’ll probably HAVE to sign one starting pitching rental since all our young starting prospects have had TJ this year or are too brittle to start. Signing a legit 2/3 starter would be nice.
Sonny, Libby, McGreevy, and Pallante will fill things out. But Pallante is our 5th starter; I really hope they don’t just settle for/sign a warm body to be our second 5th starter for ’26.
Looks like Quinn is the most likely in-house candidate for ’26.
Except Quinn is having shoulder inflammation and getting lit up in Memphis. My guess is they will make due with McGreevy and Graceffo.
I don’t think they’re looking at Graceffo to start. His funky delivery seems like a recipe for elbow/shoulder issues.
Quinn is beat up, too, but he hasn’t had TJ this year, and Tink Hence is hurt so much, seems like he’s destined for the bullpen, if anywhere.
Quinn’s probably going to get a look in the spring as a starter, but it feels like a rental is our only real hope for a legit rotation piece.
This team has a lot of good-ish role players, but I think they have a chance to compete with a few key acquisitions/moves (i.e. a starter, a legit slugging DH, a few bullpen pieces, and … ?).
The good news is that Wetherholt is destroying AAA pitching right now.
Yes, no doubt about JJ. He’s an exciting piece with ++ bat-to-ball skills and + power…can he play third base every day? Otherwise, he might be the odd man out in a crowded infield, unless Donovan gets moved, which seems possible, if not very likely.
I love Donnie, but I’m willing to roll the dice on JJ filling the 2B spot and bringing some slug to the club. It’s risky, and Donovan is my favorite Cardinal…tick tick tick.
JJ is playing short in Memphis. I’m sure he can handle either 3rd or 2nd just as well.
Donovan can always move around to where he’s needed, just like he has this year and every other year of his career to date.
They already have 2 legit slugging DHs with Herrera and Burleson, depending on where each one plays in any given game. Herrera could easily top 20 HRs in a fully healthy season with maximum playing time, while Burleson hit 21 bombs last year, should hit a similar number this year, and will likely have even better years in the future.
Romero would be expensive because there’s no need to trade him. He’s next year’s likely closer.
The Cards should have to be blown away by the offer to trade JoJo.
With one more year of control, he would be a piece for someone at next years deadline should the Cards be sellers next season.
That’s the risk/reward that makes the deadline fun. If they hold him he has to be good/healthy to move him next year.
It doesn’t matter what trades you make, your still losers
You’re
If we trade RH we’ll need Romero…this would be a terrible move.
Preller has been given an opportunity for YEARS to put together a contending team. He has finally done it, but in nobody wants to contend and not get past the Dodgers for the the NL west pennant or NLDS. It’s time to make some substantive moves that will push the team beyond the Dodgers and their gawdy payroll. Moving Suarez is one of those moves I support. He is not a lock-down closer, a one-run lead in the 9th is not safe with him toeing the rubber. Most of Petco is nervous when he enters in a close game, and with the rest of the relief staff able to do their jobs, it’s time to move Jeremiah Estrada into the close role, deal Suarez and Cease, and get a LF and catcher who can help us turn the offense up a notch.
Doesnt Suarez lead MLB in saves?
The Cardinals could move Romero in the right deal, but it would probably be better to keep him to help them compete next year. It’s hard enough replacing three of your best relievers in one offseason (whether traded now or as free agents), replacing four of them would be even more difficult. At least when the Cardinals successfully rebuilt their bullpen after 2023, they already had Helsley and Romero in place.
Oddly enough Cardinals have catching options too
While Cease and Suarez don’t appeal to Cardinals obviously
Dealing Cease Suarez and circling back to grab Romero and a catcher makes sense.
The Cardinals will have to trade catchers at some point. They have more good ones in the pipeline than they can use.
But who can hit?
Pages is excellent, defensively, Pozo is intriguing, and Jimmy Crooks is in the pipeline, but doesn’t profile as exceptional at anything (as I understand it)…but at some point, we’re going to need a good defensive catcher who can hit.
We have too many glove-first players on this team and not enough slug.
Something has got to give.
They should trade either Pages or Crooks. The two younger catchers look like better candidates as the catcher of the future. I think they should go ahead and move Crooks if they are settled on Pages as the primary for now. See if Crooks can be packages with something to bring back a promising outfielder or pitcher.
Probably gonna take a long, hard look at the position by spring. If someone can rise up and take it, the job is waiting to be filled with a better option.
Crooks has hit well in the minors. He won the MVP in the Texas League on a .900+ OPS.
The right team with bullpen needs could get all four of those guys.
One stop shopping. You’d really only be paying for Helsley and Romero. The other two pending free agents could go for cash.
The Padres had 3 relievers in All Star game and one of the lowest bullpen ERAs. So they are interested in adding a top reliever?
It would certainly cost more to get Moreno than they’d get back from trading Suarez.
Usage and possibly a potential pivot if they trade Suarez (I don’t see it, personally).
I wouldn’t mind Preller grabbing Maton, although it doesn’t address the lefty situation. Better production than Romero and still cheap. I want Matz, too, except the contract stinks for a reliever.