Albert Pujols? Check.
Lance Lynn? Check.
Matt Carpenter? Check.
Tommy Pham? Check.
Cardinals president of baseball operations John Mozeliak has developed a trend in recent seasons of pursuing Cardinals reunions that make sense.
The team’s needs, whether it was some punishing slugging percentage against left-handed pitching, like in the case of Pujols and Pham, or veteran experience, like Lynn and Carpenter, were prioritized over whatever baggage could have existed between the former Cardinals and the front office.
In fact, once the conversations between the Cardinals and ex-Cards started, it turned out that baggage that may have been there at one time no longer existed. Players who have been Cardinals tend to get excited about the idea of being Cardinals again. Mozeliak may shut a door for a period of time, but he rarely locks one and throws away the key.
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Bringing players like Pujols, Lynn, Carpenter and Pham back into the fold after seeing them depart through free agency or trades has not just helped the team on the field. It’s improved clubhouse vibes and team chemistry. Some, like Pujols, far exceeded modest expectations. Maybe Pham will, too? So far, so good. But none, it should be noted, have flopped or failed.
Building the reunion crew has turned into a good baseball move. But I’m not convinced that’s what’s driving all of it. And I’m not a big enough cynic to think it was all about reaching for more ticket sales. I think these moves mean something personally to Mozeliak.
He has been candid lately about this being the winding down of his time at the tip-top of the baseball operations department. He seems to be open, eager even, for full-circle moments that make sense.
I like the trend. I hope it continues. Specifically, I’d love to see Sandy Alcantara come back to the Cardinals.
I wrote recently that a connecting of dots between former Cardinals starter Jack Flaherty and his old team didn’t make much sense at the trade deadline. That proved correct, and he’s a Dodger now, where he will have a chance to stick with the team many believed he always saw himself joining.
Best of luck to Flaherty, but he’s not the pitcher Mozeliak should feel most compelled to see wear Cardinal red again. That should be Alcantara, who the Cardinals once prioritized behind Flaherty, trading him away as a result.
This isn’t about what the Cardinals got wrong when they swapped both Alcantara and Zac Gallen to the Marlins in December of 2017 for two seasons of Marcell Ozuna, who spent half of his time with the Cardinals nursing a bum shoulder before regaining his impressive power with the Braves. There’s little point in going over the details of that one over and over again. It was a swing, one that made sense at the time. It turned into a whiff, due to what Ozuna (and Flaherty) didn’t do here, and what Alcantara and Gallen did elsewhere. What this is about now is how the Cardinals could maybe make things something close to right, and how the universe could be trying to align in a way that helps things along.
The Cardinals’ veteran-loaded starting staff is far from set after this season. Sonny Gray, Erick Fedde and Miles Mikolas are under contract for 2025. But team option decisions await Lance Lynn and Kyle Gibson. If you are still counting on Steven Matz as a rotation option, I don’t know what to tell you.
The Marlins are blowing up again. After stunning baseball with a wild-card appearance last season, this season has been a disaster full of defections. Kim Ng was pushed from the front office. Reigning NL manager of the year Skip Schumaker should run for the hills this offseason. Luis Arraez, Jazz Chisholm, Trevor Rogers and more are now former Fish.
Alcantara has had to watch a competitive team erode and detonate while recovering from the Tommy John operation that cost the two-time All-Star his age-28 season. He’s under contract through 2027, when a team option, if picked up, will pay him $21 million. That’s after he makes $17.3 million in 2025 and 2026. For context, Mikolas this season (and next) is making $18.5 million. Alcantara is affordable, if you believe he is going to bounce back to his Cy Young caliber potential, when he posted a 3.14 ERA between 2021 and 2023 while averaging 190 innings pitched per season and totaling a stunning 10 complete games.
His trade price would be high, of course, but not as high as before he missed this entire season due to an elbow operation. Alcantara is already back to throwing bullpens, but the team he is working to rejoin suddenly doesn’t seem very interested in paying good players to perform. Someone should save him. It should be the Cardinals.
Mozeliak’s reunion movement has so far been for players who thrived here before departing. A fresh twist on it would bring back the pitcher who would have thrived here had he gotten the chance. Mozeliak can’t undo the Ozuna trade, but bringing Alcantara back while he can and having him anchor the Cardinals rotation before Alcantara turns 30 could be the next best thing.