The good and the bad as the Cardinals reach .500 after a third of a season

Wednesday’s series-clinching win over the Cincinnati Reds brought the St. Louis Cardinals to a 27-27 record, their first time reaching the .500 mark since a win over Oakland on April 16.

It’s a minor milestone as milestones go, but given their failure to reach even that level this late in the season in 2023, it’s a marker of some progress.

The team was never as bad as they appeared to be at their low water mark, hitting nine games below .500 on the day before Mother’s Day following a defeat in Milwaukee which stretched a losing streak to seven games. Nor are they probably as good as they’ve been lately, going 12-3 in the 15 games since.

While their run differential would suggest that they’ve actually significantly out-performed their pace, the record seems close to correct. This team is a significant improvement on last year’s team but likely to finish very close to an even record without substantial additions being made in season.

Or, if the front office chooses again to punt (unlikely they’d do so twice in a row), they could slide as players are traded off.

There are paces to track at this point in the season which are encouraging, and those which are flashing warning signs. Here are a few of each to sort through:

POSITIVE – Masyn Winn’s control at the plate

Without a doubt, Winn entered the season primed to be one of the league’s premier shortstops, and he has more than lived up to that defensive reputation. The assumption was that his offense would need to be carried by his defense; if Winn could put together a stretch at the plate that was only a little below average, the Cardinals would have been able to live with that.

Instead, he’s been 29% better than a league average hitter, as measured by OPS+, and his batting average has taken root just north of .300 in the midst of a 17-game hitting streak that’s only bested by Joe McEwing’s 25-game stretch in the history of Cardinals rookies. As a 22-year-old, Winn is on pace for nearly a 7-win season as measured by Baseball Reference’s wins above replacement formula.

Only eight times in Cardinals history has a shortstop put up at least a 6-win season, none since Ozzie Smith recorded 7.3 in 1989. He accounts for four of those eight seasons, with one each belonging to Dick Groat, Solly Hemus, Rogers Hornsby and Bobby Wallace. Even if Winn’s pace fades slightly, his season can be historic.

NEGATIVE – Jordan Walker’s power outage

When the Cardinals dispatched Walker to Memphis in April, it was to his benefit to take some pressure-free reps and to the team’s benefit to remove an OPS which began with a four from the everyday lineup. An intentional slow start in the minors gave him time to do some mechanical work that the team hoped would reflect in his results.

Despite mustering a .278 batting average for Memphis, Walker is still lagging behind in the power department. He has just eight doubles and a triple in his first 105 minor league plate appearances this season, and crucially, has yet to hit a home run at any level since spring, representing a two-month power outage.

A hitter who mustered 16 big league homers and a .445 slugging percentage last season hasn’t simply lost all ability to provide power, but it’s certainly missing in action at the moment. There is certainly some tension around the Cardinals as they wait for the power to arrive; based on last year’s demotion and promotion schedule for Walker, the hope was clearly that he would’ve shown more signs of coming around by now.

POSITIVE – Ryan Helsley thriving with structure

In his first 25 appearances this season, Helsley has pitched exactly 25 innings. His 18 saves lead the big leagues, and the team is 22-3 in games in which he appears. Heading into the season, the team and the pitcher worked together to build a reliable routine in which he would only appear in traditional closing spots, and he has thrived under that framework.

Despite showing some cracks in the armor over the last week with the Chicago Cubs in particular being willing to jump on his fastball, that can be largely chalked up to the grind of a season. Availability has long been Helsley’s one questionable ability, but he’s on pace to make 75 appearances without seemingly much stress at all. Many predictable hands make for much lighter work.

Helsley also benefits from depth. The righty “chase relievers” who pitch in games the Cardinals are trailing – Ryan Fernandez and Kyle Leahy establishing themselves as chief among them – have held down the fort well enough to be trusted with leads as well. Executing the Helsley plan works best with strong support around him.

NEGATIVE – A lack of trust in Triple-A pitching

Andre Pallante’s six strong innings in Cincinnati on Wednesday may be proof of a solution for the fifth starter’s slot until there’s more clarity on Steven Matz’s return from a strained back, and at a minimum, the Cardinals should feel comfortable returning Matthew Liberatore to a full-time role as a reliever.

Zack Thompson appears to be reclaiming his velocity in the minors and Gordon Graceffo has supplied consecutive strong starts. Still, it’s clear that the organization tap danced around calling up a starter for as long as possible because they lacked confidence that any among the starting group at Memphis could be trusted in either the long or short term.

All of Kyle Gibson, Sonny Gray, Lance Lynn and Miles Mikolas have seen their health hold up thus far, save for a small hamstring hiccup for Gray. The risk with pitchers over 30, though, is that their bodies could betray at any time. Should the rotation spring any further leaks, their lack of trust in the options in the minors could come to the forefront as a going concern.