Nolan Arenado’s time with the St. Louis Cardinals may be coming to an end after ten years of being the best player. The 34-year-old Hall of Famer was supposed to save the team, but a terrible 2025 season, which was his worst yet, has changed everything. The Cardinals are now telling their star player that they don’t have room for him anymore. Arenado has $37 million left on his contract and nowhere to go, so he has to now make the hardest decision of his career.

During meetings in November, Chaim Bloom, the Cardinals’ president of baseball operations, made it very clear what the team wanted to do. “We are on the same page with Nolan. I believe he’s going to the Hall of Fame. One of the better players in the history of the game. We all feel like it’s best to find a different fit,” Bloom stated publicly.

This declaration, which was polite in tone, was a big change for the organization because of bad performance metrics. Arenado’s 2025 season got a lot worse: he hit just. 237 with a .666 OPS, which were by far the worst numbers of his career. He also hit only 12 home runs in 401 at-bats. His 52 RBIs were the fewest he had since his rookie year in 2013, which is a big change from the way he was going to the Hall of Fame.

Bloom’s comments showed not only his interest in creativity but also real decisions about how to change things. The Cardinals are rebuilding with young players, so veterans like Arenado will have to look for work elsewhere. “It’s about building our core to where we can get this organization back to where it needs to be. Taking the necessary steps—not taking shortcuts.”

Bloom said that Arenado’s declining performance and a big $42 million salary over two years (with the Colorado Rockies covering $5 million) make it more difficult to rebuild. Arenado’s no-trade clause made things harder when he stopped a move to Houston last winter. But a lot has changed since then. The Cardinals are now focusing on younger players.

Arenado himself admitted this path with a calm acceptance. He told the Belleville News-Democrat, “I think it seems like that’s where this organization is headed. What’s best for me is probably to come back healthy and show that I’m healthy and hitting the ball hard. I think this organization’s heading toward young players, letting them go, and that just comes with the territory.”

Apart from Arenado, starting pitcher Sonny Gray and utilityman Brendan Donovan are also other players who are gaining interest in the market. Bloom said how the Cardinals have “definitely been listening” to Gray. “It’s not a surprise. I mean, he’s still one of the better pitchers in the league. We value him very highly,” Bloom said. “Just with where we are and thinking long term, we’ve talked to him, and I think we all feel like there might be something that makes sense, but we’ll continue to explore that.”

In the end, Arenado’s acceptance stems from a harsh reality. Teams pursuing him must absorb a $42 million commitment over two years while accepting a player who hit .237 last season—well below the league average of .260.

Mitch Keller and the Cardinals’ rotation gamble

Arenado gets the St. Louis Cardinals out of a money mess, but it shows that their pitchers are having a bigger problem: they’re not doing well. Bloom doesn’t want quick fixes. He wants to make something real that will last. So, of course, he looked at Mitch Keller, the Pirates’ starting pitcher. Is Keller the missing piece that St. Louis really needs?

Keller’s campaign looks bad on paper: he has a 6-15 record and a 4.19 ERA in 32 starts. But the story changes when the context comes out. “The Pirates have a starter, right-hander Mitch Keller, who meets some of the traits the Cardinals are looking for in their search for a rotation addition,” noted baseball analyst Derrick Goold. Pittsburgh’s historically weak offense didn’t give Keller much help with runs, so he had to take losses that weren’t entirely his fault. His underlying metrics—strikeout rates and innings pitched—show that he is a good mid-rotation player, not the other way around.

Keller also makes sense in terms of contracts. St. Louis won’t have to spend a lot of money on pitching for three years because he won’t be able to leave until 2028. That goes along perfectly with Bloom’s plan to rebuild and his long-term vision.

But here’s the problem: Pittsburgh won’t just let him go. The Pirates want more than one prospect, which makes it hard for the Cardinals to choose. Should they give up young talent now to fix the rotation, or should they be patient and build through the farm system? Bloom says that rushing into trades is the wrong way to rebuild. Sometimes it’s better to do nothing than to pay too much.