The Cardinals moved the first of what’ll surely be several veterans earlier today when they traded right-hander Sonny Gray (and $20MM) to the Red Sox for a pair of younger pitchers and a player to be named later (or cash). There’s no telling right now the order in which their offseason dominos will fall, but Jeff Jones of the Belleville News-Democrat reports that left-handed reliever JoJo Romero has been drawing trade interest throughout the first few weeks of the offseason.
Romero is about as straightforward as trade candidates get. He’s a productive, affordable reliever on a rebuilding club who’ll be a free agent this time next year. MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz projects a $4.4MM salary in 2026, which is Romero’s final season of club control.
The 29-year-old Romero came to the St. Louis from Philadelphia in 2022 and established himself as a staple in the Cardinals’ bullpen beginning in 2023. Over the past three years, he’s worked 156 2/3 frames with a 2.93 ERA and roughly average strikeout and walk rates (22.9 K%, 8.5 BB%). He sat 93.7 mph with his sinker this past season and kept 53% of his opponents’ batted balls on the ground en route to a sparkling 2.07 ERA.
Romero has been one of the Cardinals’ top leverage relievers, evidenced by a dozen saves and 57 holds across the past three seasons. He also posted career-best numbers against righties in 2025, limiting them to just a .220/.327/.315 batting line.
[Related: Top 40 Trade Candidates of the 2025-26 MLB Offseason]
The Cardinals’ case for trading Romero is bolstered by a generally weak class of left-handed relievers on the free agent market. There are some relatively solid options out there, including Caleb Ferguson, Danny Coulombe, Hoby Milner, Justin Wilson, Caleb Thielbar, Drew Pomeranz and Sean Newcomb (who quietly enjoyed a career-best season in the bullpen). Most of those southpaws will pitch next season in their mid-to-late 30s, however. Ferguson is 29, but Coulombe, Milner, Wilson, Pomeranz and Thielbar are all 35 or older. Newcomb is 33 but has minimal track record in recent seasons.
Romero is younger and more consistent than most of the options available in free agency. His projected $4.4MM price tag is probably less than what the majority of those free agent options will command, too. The Cardinals found themselves in a similar situation with closer Ryan Helsley last offseason but bizarrely opted to hang onto him, hoping that demand for Helsley would increase and net a larger return in July, when the supply of impact relievers was more limited. Instead, Helsley had a first half that was solid but not quite up to his elite standards the two prior seasons. The Mets still swung a trade to acquire him, but it’s fair to wonder whether the Cards would have done better had they flipped him last winter.
It doesn’t seem likely that the Cardinals, under new president of baseball operations Chaim Bloom, will repeat the approach that predecessor John Mozeliak took with Helsley. Bloom has already shipped out Gray, and the general tone in all of his offseason media sessions has been one of improving the player development department and taking a long-term approach to building the Cardinals back up. The return for Romero isn’t going to be franchise-altering, but he ought to command a prospect or two that the Cards can plug into their minor league ranks. Holding onto him runs the risk of an injury or poor first-half performance tanking Romero’s stock; a trade at some point this offseason feels quite likely.
Yankee
Took the words right out of my mouth. The Yankees have the pitching prospects the Cards are looking for to pull this off
Yes they do
61 innings of 2.07 ERA. Not too many teams that couldn’t use someone like that. Hate to see him go.
Yeah I like the fit there too. Shouldn’t cost a sp prospect from the top tier group on the yankee farm imo but I would think the yanks have a second tier guy they could send.
Mariners
He could be a fit on so many different teams. Trade him now, and don’t risk losing his value that he has.
Cards traded Edmundo Sosa to Philadelphia for him. Sosa ready to break out.
Sosa ready to breakout? I think you’re overestimating his skills — he’s not even an everyday player.
Solid backup ready to take over for Bohm or even Stott.
I feel like if Sosa were going to break out, he would have by now.
He’s 29 it’s time.
He’s not an everyday player but he hits every day he plays.
Any team could use a solid lefty reliever that’s going to be making under 5m. Every team should be calling Chaim what package it would take to get him. Even dumpster-diving Hoyer should give Chaim a call, you never know!
Are the Cardinals going to roll w O’Brien as their closer this year?
He looked really good most of the time. Not sure who else internally you give a go. Unless they get a free agent closer looking to bounce back on a decent deal. Maybe somebody like kenley jensen
I hope not regarding Jansen if they’re rebuilding. I have O’Brien in an NL keeper and just took him in a slow draft. Figured Romero was his competition so I would like to see him gone.
Svanson looked pretty dang good. I think he could give O’Brien a run for the closing job.
Likely
Still like the Mariners attempting to land Brendan Donovan and JoJo Romero….But…If you can’t get Donovan and can get JoJo, that still does help the M;’s!!!!! He is good and they need another high leverage lefty!
Get ready to give up some big controllable arms if it’s a package for those two. Both are valuable trade chips and probably gain more total for the Cards in separate trades.
Agree. Both are difference making players. Cost to obtain would be high.
Perhaps E Duran, Osuna and Corniell or Santos would work for Romero, question to also ask is what more would Cards want if Donovan was added?
Got get him reds
Sox had 5 lefties a month ago and now only have one. Breslow needs to call Bloom back
Jojo gonna go go. But where?
Cards looking to dump salaries. Here’s a mock trade
Cards send entire Wilson Contreras, Brendan Donovan, and Jo Jo Romero to Yankees for one of Will Warren or Clarke Schmidt (coming back from elbow surgery), Oswaldo Cabrera, and 3 mid prospects in Roderick Arias, TJ Rumsfield and Dillon Lewis.
Cards getting out from another albatross contract and getting a young starter back, a super utility young switch hitter to replace Donovan and 3 young prospects.
Not sure Yankees do this because looks like they are in desperate need of starters and taking on 89m DH makes zero sense unless Contreras can play above average defense at first to platoon with Rice and occasional defense at catcher to give Wells and Rice a third option and RH bat. He’s hasn’t caught since 2024 and only 5 games that season.
@ $17m/year for the next two years, Contreras’ offensive production is not only above market value, his defensive is solid at 1st, sir.
Ya not sure where this idea that Wilson is some crazy bad contract came from. He’s worth more than a salary dump.
So basically the Cardinals would be a
sending the Yankees all the pieces they need to get to the WS and are getting beans in return? For all 3 of those guys I would be expecting at least 2 or 3 top 10 prospects maybe even a top 5. Above Average hitters who play 4-5 positions like Donovan aren’t an abundant resource.
A young starter is beans? A young roster super utility beans? 3 prospects, all in lower minors and rising, one of whom the Yanks dumped entire international money to sign is beans? Don’t look at where the kids rank because every org values prospects much much differently than BA rankings!
You’re giving up a 35yo DH with large contract, a versatile infielder/outfielder who has one more year left after this, and a bullpen arm that is not someone who will make or break any roster!
Absolutely zero of your player analysis for the Cardinals players are correct. You purposely undervalue what you are proposing to get to make it seem like the trade is fair, but that does not reflect any of these guys’ actual value.
The Cardinals are looking to acquire young talent, not dump salary. That’s why they were willing to kick in $20M in the Gray trade for a decent return. Even counting that $20M, their payroll is already lower than it has been in several years.
Meanwhile, they’re not looking to trade Contreras at all, who by the way is being paid fair market value and plays a good defensive 1B.
where do you get Contreras is an albatross? Tell me you don’t know what you’re talking about, without actually saying you don’t know what you’re talking about…
Contreras isn’t an albatross contract nor an $89M DH.
He would be a nice acquisition for anyone, especially my squad who needs a lefty reliever in the back end of the bullpen somewhere.
The problem with trading Romero is that he is the ONLY left-handed relief pitcher with any MLB experience that the Cardinals currently have on their 40-man roster after releasing Thompson and non-tendering King (along with Liberatore successfully moving to the starting rotation this past season).
Does it make sense to trade a good, relatively cheap relief pitcher when they’ll need to replace him in free agency, anyway?
The Cardinals actually didn’t lose Thompson, due to him being on the IL for an entire year, he’s currently been added to their AAA roster.
Does it make sense to ride him out in his final year on a club going nowhere and get nothing for him?
Since they have to give the 2026 lefty bullpen innings to somebody, then yes it does. Otherwise, they’ll have to sign a veteran lefty reliever free agent to replace those innings and then lose him for nothing next offseason instead. (Preferably, they should sign one anyway to pitch alongside Romero and then trade Romero at the trade deadline.) Maybe it makes sense if the Cardinals were to sign a free agent lefty reliever to a multi-year contract, but I can’t see them doing that this offseason
If it’s going to happen either way, they may as well stick with the guy they already have who has performed really well over the last few years. Maybe they can get an MLB lefty reliever as part of a trade for someone like Donovan or Nootbaar, but they should probably hold Romero until they do pull off such a trade.
There shouldn’t be a comma before “too.”