The DOOR IS CLOSED for the Cardinals. With the trade of Brendan Donovan, the Cards ownership & management have achieved their goal. Dump all the players with a significant salary and of course significant ability. Get the salary base as rock bottom as possible. After depleting their team of their quality players, the team is now comprised of “he looks good; or—he has a good future; or he’ll develop” type of team. We’ll be in that phase for 2-5 years.

…From the basic premises, that you “GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR”, when a team reduces its salary significantly, you CLOSE THE DOOR on reaching high, playoff type performances. Despite the playoff bar being lowered so that 40% of teams reach the playoffs! In fact, the Cardinals have only 8 players who are being paid above the minimum salary of the MLB!  The very rock-bottom MLB minimum team salary in 2026 is $780,000. (A surprising number & a very healthy starting point from my view of a career for a rookie). Nonetheless, with only 8 players over the minimum salary, it paints a clearer picture for us as fans of what to expect in 2026. According to the payroll figures that I saw this week, the Cardinals have a total MLB payroll of $ 99,000,000 for the 2026 season. Last year it was $144,000,000. Roughly, that’s about 1/3 less spending by management for this roster this year. And…you thought the Cardinals were “bad” last year?

…Sure, the vast majority of players on this roster are young as the Cardinals have CLOSED THE DOOR on acquiring talented veterans who’s salary is distasteful for the current ownership to swallow. So, the Cards have gone almost completely to “total development” of their own players. But…we really don’t know HOW MANY will compile long-term, successful careers or if they’ll be “in & out” in a hurry. By the way, the average length of an MLB career for a pitcher is 4.8 years.                                                          ….How long does it take to get an MLB Pension? Here’s the breakdown: Once a player reaches 43 days of MLB service, they become eligible to start collecting future pension benefits. 43 days of MLB service time equals one-quarter of one full year of service time. One full year of MLB service time is equal to 172 days. With each additional quarter of MLB service time, a player continues to accrue pension benefits.  At 40 quarters or 10 years of service time, a player maxes out MLB pension benefits.                                                                                                                                                                                             ….Sooo….many of the  MLB pitchers aren’t in the league long enough to qualify for a sizable pension. Further, the newest trend in training pitchers is to throw your fastball as often as you can and as hard as you can on each pitch to get strikeouts. Their pitching careers are being shortened even more due to arm “issues.” Are you surprised?

… The Cardinals long time approach of “pitching to contact” seems to have been totally removed by the MLB with this newest approach. (P.S. Don’t the pitchers “get it”… pitching to contact extends your career??) That may be one factor why owners/management DON’T WANT IT. The longer they pitch, the more they get paid!!

… The Cardinals have been under .500 for 2 of the last 3 seasons.  The last time that happened was 1994-97 as the Cardinals were under .500 three times in 4 seasons. With all the trades (trading proven players for “talent”) and other transactions this off-season, it seems clear that .500 would be a very, very lofty goal to reach. I doubt that it’ll even be close to .500 in 2026. Yes, the acquired players and young players, on paper, seem to have “talent” but we really don’t know for sure until they do it every day on the field for 6 months.

…I think the DOOR BEGAN CLOSING all the way back to 1991 when Cardinals fired Mike Schildt. He was fired by the Cardinals in October 2021 due to irreconcilable “philosophical differences” regarding the team’s approach, specifically a deteriorating relationship with his coaching staff and front-office direction. Despite a 90-win season under Schildt, tension arose over personnel, coaching staff structure, and offensive strategy between Schildt & management. President of Baseball Operations for the Cardinals, John Mozeliak, decided a change was necessary before the final year of Shildt’s contract. Which makes little sense to me…just 1 more year…yet still fire him? I think the Cards began CLOSING the DOOR on winning with the Schildt firing!

…The Cardinals have only been really “good” the 1^st year after Shildt’s departure, in 2022 when the Cards recorded a 93-69 record. Since that time, the DOOR HAS REALLY CLOSED as far as piling up really strong winning records. For example, in 2023- Cards were 71-91—the lowest number of wins since 2009; 2024—83-79 and in 2025—it was 78-84. The last time that the Cardinals won a post season game was in 2019 DESPITE the continued massive expansion of teams in the post-season. With the upcoming 2026 “kiddie roster” season, reaching the .500 mark seems like an unreachable target for the Cardinals, at least to me.

…But…we had been really, really spoiled by the Cardinals. The DOOR WASN’T CLOSED for decades!!

A year-year breakdown of these successful years—2011-WON WORLD SERIES; 2012-Lost NL Championship Series(won 2 rounds); 2013 Lost World Series (won 2 rounds); 2014-Lost NL Championship Series; 2015-Lost Divisional Series; 2019-Lost NL Championship Series; 2020-Lost NL Wild Card game; 2021—Lost NL Wild Card game; 2022- Lost NL Wild Card Series; then in  2023, 2024, 2025—Missed Playoffs!! So there was a streak of 9 playoff seasons over a 12 year stretch from 2011 through 2022. To give you an idea, during that same time frame (2011-2022), the NY Yankees missed the playoffs THREE times—same as the Cardinals!!!

…What has happened to the fans in attendance? It isn’t hard to imagine…here are the exact numbers:

Take a look at attendance numbers for the past 4 seasons:

2022: 3,320,551 (Avg: 40,994); 2023: 3,241,091 (Avg: 40,013); 2024: 2,878,115         2025: ~2.33 million total (Avg: 27,778 – 28,829 per game)* How can you not know the exact figure?  2026—what do you think it’ll be? I’m thinking 1.5million fans will be tough to reach.                                It’s approximately a 20% drop in attendance from 2024…ugh!  Some fans blame the huge drop-off in attendance to the Covid Year of 2020..sure, that was a part of it…but the play on the field was a larger factor to my eyes. Meanwhile, by contrast, fans haven’t stopped watching StL City, attending St Louis Blues games,  going to restaurants for dinner, attending the Muny Opera, etc, etc                                                                                                                                                          … Some fans claim that it’s “dangerous” around the Stadium. I just don’t see it. There are dozens of police around the ball park. But it’s a fact that many folks DO have that concern. Maybe, I’m just oblivious to it??   It also seems that many other Fans just don’t want to come because the Cardinals product doesn’t entertain them any longer (they don’t win)              …. With the removal this off-season of Nolan Arenado(Cards still had to send app $16m with him), Willson Contreras(Cards sent along app $4m), Sonny Gray(also included app $20m) and Brendan Donovan($5m), the Cardinals, (from my eyes) will be, CLOSING THE DOOR COMPLETELY on any aspirations of a competitive team. The hopes of being a contender in the league have disappeared. Yes…their salaries are gone…as well as their highest talented players!! Although the Cardinals have committed to still paying a total of $45 million for Arenado, Contreras, Gray & Donovan to play elsewhere for the remainder of their contracts. The moves saved the Cardinals an estimated $53 million in guaranteed payroll commitments. So, they are spending $45m for players who will be playing AGAINST them while saving $53m?!                                                                                                                                                                 …. All this makes me wonder if the DeWitts don’t have long term plans to move or sell the team. Possible destinations could be (in no particular order)….Nashville, San Antonio, Charlotte, Mexico City, Orlando, Portland, Raleigh. I sure hope that my fears of selling the team don’t materialize.   Unfortunately for St. Louis, I don’t know of another Gussie Busch who will “step in” to buy & develop the Cardinals like he did back in 1953. It benefitted him AND St. Louis for almost 7 decades.                                                                                               …Distance has also become a factor.  Many StL folks have moved farther & farther away (many in St Charles county) from the City. Those folks just don’t want to spend 45m-1 hour drive each way after a 2.5-3 hours game. I can’t blame them. Due to these factors and other factors, and the fact that the Cardinals product doesn’t entertain fans any longer, they don’t come to watch in person.                            … I hope that the move isn’t completely out of the St Louis Area. Places like Nashville, Portland, San Antonio/Austin, Charlotte and even Mexico City are cities already expressing interest in MLB teams.  .…Thanks for your read. I suspect that all of you will have some thoughts on this REWIND. Please share.  No one is right or wrong…they are YOUR thoughts.  If you prefer, post them on my Facebook page, right under this same article posted there.  Bob