The Cardinals spent 2026 treating parts of the roster like an extended tryout, but not every veteran with a long leash made the most of it. By the end of another losing season, Nolan Gorman and Matthew Liberatore stood out as two of the clearest misses in a year built around evaluation.
Gorman entered the season with a path wide open at third base after Nolan Arenado was traded. For a while, that looked like the kind of opportunity the Cardinals had been waiting to hand him. Instead, the left-handed bat kept running into the same problem: too much swing-and-miss and not enough impact.
In his first 55 games of steady starts, Gorman hit .210 with six homers and 66 strikeouts. He did show a little progress in his chase rate, but the contact never really followed.
The Cardinals had seen enough by the middle of June and optioned him to Triple-A Memphis. Even there, the results didn’t turn around.
When he returned at the end of August, it came because of injuries and poor play at the major-league level, not because he had forced the issue.
His second chance at regular at-bats never gained traction. In Memphis, Gorman hit .167 with two homers and a 33% strikeout rate.
Thomas Saggese also started to find his footing, which pushed Gorman’s playing time down in the season’s final month. Next year will be his sixth in the majors, and it now looks increasingly likely that he may need a fresh start somewhere else.
What happens next is tied to arbitration. The Cardinals can choose not to tender him a contract and make him a non-tender candidate this offseason.
They could also try to work out a new salary for 2027 in hopes of keeping him affordable and appealing in a possible trade. Either way, his price tag and trade value are both unclear, which makes a clean break a real possibility.
Liberatore’s case is different, but the results are just as hard to sell. He opened 2026 as the Cardinals’ starter on Opening Day, and that might end up being the high point of his season. He finishes with a 6-14 record and a 5.23 ERA, which puts him at second-worst in baseball in losses and second-highest among pitchers with at least 150 innings pitched.
The Cardinals gave him a full runway, hoping to finally uncover the form that once made him a top prospect in the minors. Instead, the season only reinforced how difficult that climb has been.
Liberatore had just two months with an ERA under 4.00, and both of those months ended at 3.98. Even then, opponents hit .283 against him during that stretch.
He’s now five seasons into his big-league career, and the overall body of work doesn’t offer much encouragement as a starter. If there’s a role that still fits, it may be in the bullpen, where he has had more success. With the Cardinals dealing with their own relief problems, moving Liberatore back to the pen could make sense for both sides.
In Other News...
Cardinals May Already Face A Huge Decision On One Rising Prospect
The Cardinals rebuild under the new front office has already brought a different kind of pressure, and Rainiel Rodriguez is becoming a big part of that conversation. The 19-year-old catcher has moved quickly, impressed at High-A and Double-A, and even picked up Baseball Americas Minor League Player of the Year award, which is the sort of ascent that forces a team to start thinking beyond the usual development timeline.
For a club sitting near the bottom of MLB payroll, Rodriguez represents both promise and a potential pivot point. St. Louis is still sorting out which players will be part of its next core, but the questions around Rodriguez are arriving faster than expected, including whether the Cardinals would consider a long-term extension before he has even reached the majors. [Read more 🡒]
Cardinals Top Prospect Is Making A Future Lineup Question Louder
Rainiel Rodriguez has gone from promising name in the Cardinals system to one of the loudest reminders that the organization may have a lineup decision coming sooner than later. The 19-year-old was named Baseball Americas Minor League Player of the Year after a season split between High-A and Double-A, and the bat traveled with him. Once he reached Double-A Springfield, he kept producing at a level that put him squarely on the prospect map and gave St. Louis another middle-of-the-order possibility to consider.
Rodriguez finished with a .999 OPS, 23 home runs and a .328 batting average in 87 games after the promotion, a run of production that only sharpened the conversation around what comes next. For the Cardinals, the question is no longer simply whether he can hit in the minors, but how long it might take before his presence starts to press on a future major league lineup. [Read more 🡒]
Cardinals Have Real Hope After Four Brutal Years Out Of October
Four straight Octobers have passed without the Cardinals, but there were signs this season that the organization is no longer just treading water while waiting for better days. The rotation got encouraging work from young arms such as Michael McGreevy, Andre Pallante and Kyle Leahy, each giving St. Louis something to build around, while the defense also took a step forward with strong work up the middle.
The bigger reason for optimism is that the lineup is starting to show more shape, with young pieces like JJ Wetherholt, Jordan Walker, Joshua Baez and Alec Burleson giving the club options at the outfield spots and first base. Injuries still complicated the picture, and the Cardinals remain in transition, but there is now a clearer path to a roster that can grow together instead of one that keeps asking the same veterans to carry the burden. [Read more 🡒]