As the MLB schedule reaches the Memorial Day checkpoint, the state of Cardinals baseball for 2025 is good … and if we factor in the low expectations, we can upgrade “good” to very good.
Not bad for a season that’s been labeled a reset from the recent past, a runway to the future, and a transition leading to a regime change in the St. Louis front office. The Cardinals – at least so far – have exceeded expectations and then some.
I can’t say enough about the outstanding job being done by manager Oli Marmol and his coaches. With the Cardinals caught between the past and the future – and slashing nearly $40 million from the payroll before the season – this team has established a strong identity and a relentless sense of purpose. Marmol faced a formidable challenge going into the season and was near the top of the “manager most likely to be fired” lists.
Well, three managers have been fired already and Marmol wasn’t one of them. As of Monday morning, Marmol, his coaches and an underfunded roster had more wins than teams managed by Terry Francona, Bruce Bochy, Alex Cora, Brian Snitker, Torey Luvollo. And more wins than teams managed by 2024 AL Manager of the year Steven Vogt and 2024 NL Manager of the Year Pat Murphy.
The Cardinals went into Monday with a 30-23 win percentage for a .566 winning percentage that ranked 9th among the 30 major-league teams.
After a terrible start to the season, STL had an 18-6 record for a .750 winning percentage that’s tied with Philadelphia for the best in the majors since April 30.
The Cards have kept busy at the task at reversing the early trends. Here’s what I mean …
* The Redbirds drifted to five games under .500 three times this season – the most recent being their 14-19 mark on May 2. On that day the Cards had the 12th best record among National League teams. But since then they’ve rolled to a 16-4 record that’s No. 1 in the NL and second overall.
* A little more than three weeks ago the Cardinals trailed the first-place Cubs by 6 and ½ games in the NL Central. Going into Monday, the second-place Cards had reduced the Cubs’ lead to two games.
* Mostly because of a vulnerable early bullpen, the Cardinals went 0-5 in their first five games determined by a one-run margin. After fixing the bullpen, the Cards are 10-3 in one-run games since April 25.
* The Cardinals lost 12 of their first 14 road games but have turned that around by posting a 9-3 record in their last 12 games away from Busch Stadium.
* The Cards lost three of their first four series of the season but since then have a 9-3-1 record in their last 13 series.
* For a while there were legitimate questions about the Cardinals’ ability to win games against stronger opponents. But if we look at the season ledger through May 25, the Cardinals have won two series from the Phillies, taken a series from the Mets in St. Louis, won a series against Houston, and bagged series victories against Kansas City and Arizona. Through Sunday the Cardinals were 14-11 against teams that currently have a winning record; in the majors only the Mets (15-10) and Yankees (16-12) had done better.
The Cardinals have done an admirable job of responding to every challenge thrown at them so far. In a short time they went from being one of the worst teams in the National League to one of the best.
After losing three of four games from May 18 through 21, the Cardinals recharged to sweep the Diamondbacks over the weekend – winning all three up-for-grabs games by a single run.
At no time have the Cardinals been demoralized or mentally defeated. They continue to play hard, maintain their poise, and fight back. St. Louis already has 12 comeback wins this season and is ahead of last season’s pace for comebacks.
It’s a likable team that plays with energy and enthusiasm. The Redbirds’ team personality is endearing, and that’s probably why more fans showed up to give the Cardinals large crowds in the three-game sweep of Arizona.
If we scan the league rankings in important categories, the Cardinals’ quality start is reaffirmed. And keep in mind that all of these stats include the numbers generated as the Redbirds struggled to a 14-19 record in their first 33 games.
All pitching: 8th among 30 teams in fielding independent ERA (FIP), and 13th in ERA.
Starting pitching: 8th among 30 teams in ERA (3.57), 10th in FIP (.368), 4th for most innings pitched, and No. 3 in quality starts with 25.
Bullpen: even with the terrible start baked into the numbers, the St. Louis relievers rank 10th in FIP, 16th in standard ERA, and 9th in Win Probability Added. And the bullpen’s stats have been much better than that over the last month.
Offense: 8th among 30 in runs per game (4.79), 4th in batting average (.261), 6th in onbase percentage (.332), 11th in slugging (.399), 9th in OPS (.732). Sure, the Cardinals are 24th with an average of 0.91 home runs per game – but much of that has been offset by their No. 3 ranking in doubles per game and MLB’s fourth-best batting average (.270) with runners in scoring position.
Hitting approach: Cardinal hitters aren’t easy to defend because they shoot the ball to all areas of the field. The Cards, for example, are tied for the MLB lead with 122 opposite-field hits. They rank third in batting average (.385) when pulling the ball, sixth in batting average (.333) when going oppo, and are tied for third with eight bunt hits.
Under the new batting coach Brant Brown the Cardinals have lowered their strikeout to under 20 percent, and have increased their walk rate, are No. 3 in the majors in contact rate, and have the third-lowest swinging-strike rate (16.8%) in the majors (Source: Baseball Reference.) And there are other indicators that point to a dramatic – and smarter – shift in the team’s hitting approach.
Defense: 1st in the majors in Outs Above Average, 1st in runs prevented, 1st in range rating, second in assists, 4th in defensive runs saved. And for the fans and media who use fielding percentage as a measure, the Cardinals are No. 1 in the majors at .991. The Cardinals’ defensive efficiency rating has improved 18 percent from 2024.
BIRD BYTES!
The Turning Point: For some inexplicable reason the Cardinals’ transformative bullpen recasting continues to be ignored by local media when presenting secondary theories to explain the team’s upswing. But the bullpen renovation was the season’s turning point. There is no doubt whatsoever about that.
Through April 23 the Cards ranked 26th in the majors with a 5.11 ERA and had more blown saves (6) than saves. Since April 25 the Cards’ relievers rank fifth overall with a 2.92 ERA, have saved nine games in 11 opportunities (82%), lead the majors with 23 holds, and are second overall in Win Probability Added.
Before the bullpen repair, the Cardinals had a 10-15 record. Since the bullpen fix, they have the NL’s second-best record at 20-8.
The key move was demoting setup reliever Ryan Fernandez to Memphis, putting a couple of different relievers into the mix, deploying Kyle Leahy in more high-leverage spots, and using Steven Matz and JoJo Romero as their primary left-handed relief tandem.
Jordan Walker: The third-year right fielder had an impressive weekend offensively against the Diamondbacks. And it continued a pattern. In his last 10 games through Sunday, Walker batted .375 with a .583 slugging percentage and .958 OPS.
This stretch included the game-winning homer in the 1-0 win at Kansas City, plus two different late-inning money hits that pushed the Cardinals to a 6-5 win over Arizona. In the sweep-clinching victory Sunday, the game was tied 3-3 at the start of the seventh inning. He led off with a single and came around to score on Victor Scott’s RBI single that plated the eventual winning run.
Here’s a great stat for Walker during his 10-game surge: he went 6 for 11 (.545) with seven RBIs and only two strikeouts when hitting with runners in scoring position.
Brendan Donovan: In his last 10 games through Sunday, Donovan had 17 hits in 40 at-bats for a .425 average and 1.027 OPS. The spree included five doubles, eight runs scored, a .600 average with runners in scoring position. He had at least three hits in five of the 10 games, including a four-hit barrage at Kansas City on May 18.
Donovan entered Monday in a tie for most hits in the National League (65) this season and was No. 2 among NL hitters in batting average (.328) and No. 9 in on-base percentage (.388.) Though power isn’t necessarily his game, Donovan still has a team-leading .460 slugging percentage among STL hitters with a minimum 100 plate appearances in 2025.
Donovan also had the fifth-lowest strikeout rate (10.9%) among NL batters, and his overall offensive performance is 40 percent above the league average.
Starting pitching: In sweeping the Diamondbacks, Cardinals starting pitchers Matthew Liberatore, Miles Mikolas and Sonny Gray limited a strong Arizona offense to five earned runs in 19 innings for a 2.37 ERA. Libby, Mikolas and Gray won their respective starting-pitching matchups against Zac Gallen, Merrill Kelly and Brandon Pfaadt. The best part of the three starts? Liberatore, Mikolas and Gray (combined) faced 177 batters and walked only one. (There was also one hit-by-pitch.) And the Diamondbacks went 2 for 14 (.143) with runners in scoring position against the Cardinals’ trio of starters. St. Louis starters have yielded 3 earned runs or fewer in 18 of the team’s 22 games in May and have a 3.15 ERA for the month.
Matthew Liberatore: After checking the Diamondbacks for one run allowed in seven innings Friday, Liberatore lowered his season ERA to 2.73. He’s having an excellent season. Here’s where Libby ranks among innings-qualified NL starters in several important categories:
Fielding Independent ERA: 2nd, at 2.53
Walk rate: 1st, at 1.21 per nine innings
Strikeout-walk rate: 1st, at 6.38
WHIP: 4th at 1.01
HRs allowed per 9 IP: 5th, 0.46
WAR: 6th, at 1.7
Standard ERA: 11th, at 2.75
Miles Mikolas: The 36 year-old righthander was stellar in Saturday’s win, getting nicked for a run in his six innings. Mikolas has allowed 20 earned runs this season but eight of those runs came in a brutal start at Boston on April 6. Since then Mikolas has a 2.08 ERA in eight starts, and that 2.08 ties him with Arizona’s Corbin Burnes for fourth best among NL starters since April 7.
In his last eight starts, Mikolas has a higher percentage of enticing hitters to swing at pitches out of the strike zone. And when an opponent at-bat ends with the hitter swinging at a Mikolas non-strike, they’ve gone 6 for 29 for a .207 average. And all six hits have been singles.
Mikolas does an effective job at mixing his pitches to the extent that hitters seem confused about what to expect. During this impeccable eight-start stretch, opponents are 25 for 128 (.195). And while they’ve stroked seven extra-base hits against Mikolas, he’s still held them to an overall .336 slugging percentage in his last eight assignments.
Lars Nootbaar: The Cards’ leadoff hitter has been trending terribly and must regroup. After the first game of the April 30 doubleheader at Cincinnati, Nootbaar had a .270 batting average, .404 OBP and .450 slug for a robust .855 OPS. But his offense has deteriorated since then. In his last 22 games through Sunday, Nootbaar batted with a .211 average, .277 OBP and .333 slug for a .611 OPS. And his walk rate over the last 22 games is an uncharacteristically low 7.9 percent.
Ivan Herrera: since returning from the IL on May 9, Herrera has bullied pitchers for a .396 average, .466 OBP and .542 OPS for a 1.007 OPS. Among National League hitters that have at least 50 plate appearances since May 8, Herrera ranks 1st in batting average, 1st in on-base rate, 6th in RBIs (14), and 7th in OPS. Based on wRC+ – a metric adjusted for ballpark and league effects – Herrera is 82 percent above league average offensively since returning, a figure that’s tied for No. 3 in the NL over that time.
Thanks for reading …
–Bernie
Bernie was inducted into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame in 2023. During a St. Louis sports-media career that goes back to 1985, he’s won multiple national awards for column writing and sports-talk hosting. You can access all of his columns, videos and the podcast version of the videos here on SportsHubSTL, catch him weekdays on the “Gashouse Gang” or “Redbird Rush Hour” on KMOX (104.1-FM and 1120-AM, and he is a regular guest of “Cardinal Territory” video show hosted by the great Katie Woo of The Athletic.