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This weekend, John Mozeliak said the quiet part out loud.

Presented with a chance to publicly defend third-year manager Oli Marmol, the Cardinals’ longtime president of baseball operations instead suggested the fate of the 2024 club could determine much more than Marmol’s future.

“Well, I think these are times that are difficult,� Mozeliak told KMOX (1120 AM) sports director Tom Ackerman during a Sunday call-in to the team’s flagship radio station. “I still think he (Marmol) understands the job. I think he knows how to manage. I think he’s trying to, you know, put the right combination of players in, but you know, at some level, you have to have some performance.

“Yeah, I understand fans are not happy with myself. They’re not happy with Oli. I don’t think anything I say here today is going to change that. So I think we have to just keep trying to go back, trying to get this to work. And look, we understand that if it doesn’t, people are going to be held accountable. And ultimately, that starts with me.�

That quote probably won’t make Marmol feel much better, but it did seem to represent a change in how Mozeliak talks about the organization’s ongoing struggles.

For a long time, any notion of Mozeliak being on shaky ground could be dismissed immediately. And there still is reason to wonder if chairman Bill DeWitt Jr. really would push out his long-tenured and trusted lieutenant before Mozeliak’s previously announced plans to hand over the baseball operations wheel to someone else after his current contract ends following the 2025 season.

But this was a rare tone from Mozeliak. It wasn’t the defiance he presented for so long. It wasn’t the humility he stressed this offseason. It was an intentional resetting of the conversation. People keep talking about Marmol’s future, and while that’s a fair topic to discuss, it seemed as if Mozeliak was making it clear the bigger topic is his own.

For good reason.

Just as there should be no debating that Mozeliak helped the Cardinals be great for a long time, it has become undeniable he also helped oversee the Cardinals straying from their lofty perch.

The Cardinals’ actions often show they are thinking about change before they do it, even if their words say differently while signs mount.

Remember this past offseason, when the Cardinals all but announced an internal competition among front-office candidates to eventually replace Mozeliak as the lead decision maker on the baseball operations side. Chaim Bloom, the new addition, has been quietly making the rounds. His competitors know they are under examination.

For those paying attention, it would not be a staggering shock if the timeline was expedited. What would be shocking is Mozeliak getting fired in dramatic fashion by DeWitt. There would be a so-called transition to soften the blow if it indeed went that route. That’s how this group prefers to do things, if you’re in good standing.

Remember this past offseason, when the Cardinals were adamant that the short-term contracts they were handing out were not a sign of protecting a potential rebuilding route if one was forced upon them by poor performance. When the dust settled, the roster was old and proven on one end and young and hopeful on the other end, with a lot of unknown in between. It’s a roster that is a trade-deadline selloff from a pivot toward youth.

The Cardinals didn’t used to sell at the trade deadline, until they had to admit it was the best option. Keep that in mind when they suggest they don’t think their fans would tolerate something resembling a rebuild.

Truth is, more fans would be open to it than ever before if this season continues to sag. Such is the distaste with a gradual decline that has gone from receding postseason relevance to last season’s last-place flop to this season’s last-place pace.

If — and despite what some are hollering about, it’s still an if — things continue to break bad, there probably won’t be a better option than calling the Paul Goldschmidt and Nolan Arenado era a disappointment and using the ending of it to benefit the future as much as possible. That could mean maximizing returns for every veteran not nailed down in addition to embracing sky-high deadline prices for performing pitchers.

If Goldschmidt’s expiring contract goes, then you might as well move Arenado, too. If the Cardinals sought veteran rotation arms at recent trade deadlines to bolster their seasons, you better believe other teams would be interested in the Cardinals’ veterans arms this time around. As long as Ryan Helsley is healthy, he will draw bidders.

If this team can’t become a winning bridge between eras of contention, it will be time to scrap the bridge. The promise of a youth movement can and will excite. Fans would get behind it, even if some will be surprised with just how painful those growing pains can become.

Here’s the rub:

If that’s the way this trends and ownership already is preparing for a new direction in baseball operations, it can’t let the current regime make those moves.

At least it shouldn’t.

Once feared elsewhere and cheered here, this version of the front office has too many misses and not enough hits, especially when you remember the biggest recent hits, trades for Goldschmidt and Arenado, are not the kind of moves that will have to be made if the Cardinals have to sell again — and bigger this time around.

Former Cardinals are thriving elsewhere. You know the names. No need to list them here all over again.

Current Cardinals are plateauing annually. You know the names. No need to list them here all over again.

A former Cardinals manager is winning with the Padres. You know the name, even if no one spells it right. Mike Shildt wasn’t fired for so-called philosophical differences. He was fired because he and Mozeliak’s front office had personality problems and differing views of where the organization was headed.

One side of the argument seems to be aging better than the other so far. This front office calling the shots on another manager’s firing or hiring seems a bit reckless.

Identifying, properly projecting and developing talent into its full potential used to be key components of Cardinal success. Rivals envied the blend. The Cardinals never were down long because they had it. Somehow it got messed up, and it happened on Mozeliak’s watch. Count up the free-agent whiffs if you like, and there are plenty, but those whiffs often happened in part because internal options were not optimized.

A true draft-and-develop organization doesn’t have three of its most proven hitters added as trade acquisitions or free-agent signings (Goldschmidt, Arenado and Willson Contreras). It doesn’t have just one homegrown starter among those taking the mound this season. And that one is Lance Lynn, who spent the best seasons of his career pitching elsewhere because the Cardinals let him walk into free agency before bringing him back.

Last season, Mozeliak surprised some by admitting pretty early that the Cardinals were raising the white flag and shifting into sell mode. For context, that was in mid-July. No one cashing a check from the Cardinals is punting on 2024, at least not yet. But Mozeliak’s quote on Sunday suggested those obsessing over the manager’s job security might be misreading a bigger story.

Over the years, Mozeliak has used his radio appearances to subtly point to where he believe blame belongs.

He just pointed at himself.