Looking back on the St. Louis Cardinals’ decision to trade Sandy Alcantara

The St. Louis Cardinals have traded away promising players to fill holes on the major league roster. How have they fared on other rosters?

The St. Louis Cardinals have a real knack for developing above-average players, and they make good use of those players to fortify the big-league roster, either through promoting them to important roles with the squad or dealing them to other teams for more established reinforcements.

The latter was the case on Dec. 14, 2017, when the Cardinals packaged pitcher Sandy Alcantara and others in a trade with the Miami Marlins to acquire outfielder Marcell Ozuna.

(This was the same day the Cardinals traded away another outfielder, Stephen Piscotty, sending him to the Oakland A’s so he could play back home and close to his terminally ill mother.  This was one of the most thoughtful and decent moves I’ve ever heard of.  We’ll revisit that trade another time.)

Ozuna was coming off a massive season in Florida, with Triple Crown numbers of a .312 batting average, 37 home runs and 124 RBI.  He also recorded 30 doubles and a couple of triples, scored 93 runs, reached base at a .376 clip and had a 149 OPS+.  This was a whole new level for Ozuna, and while St. Louis couldn’t have expected him to keep it up, they certainly were hoping for a serious presence in the lineup.

What the Cardinals got was two years of a thoroughly adequate hitter.  Ozuna’s 52 homers and 177 RBI in that pair of seasons were nice, but his overall triple-slash line of .262/.327/.451 led to just a 107 OPS+.  Dealing away four players for a slightly above average-hitting left fielder is not what anyone in the Gateway City was hoping for.

The most advanced and notable of those four players is the focus of today’s examination.  Alcantara had reached the majors at 21 years old in 2017 as a September call-up, and he delivered 8-1/3 frames of 4.32 ERA ball, allowing nine hits, striking out 10 batters, and walking six.  It was a tiny sample, but the results were encouraging.

His prospect pedigree and the remainder of the trade package were enough to entice the Marlins to make a deal.  They assigned Alcantara to the minors to start the season, brought him up for one start in June, and recalled him in September for good.  His 3.44 ERA in 34 innings looked nice, though the 23 walks he surrendered were worrisome.

The 2019 campaign is when Alcantara really started to establish himself.  He made 32 starts, threw 197-1/3 innings with a 3.88 ERA, and cut his walk rate by about 40%.  That performance earned him an All-Star nod, thus far the only one of his career.  He did lead the league in losses, but his 6-14 record belied his success.

As is the case with every player, 2020’s 60-game season is difficult to thoroughly evaluate.  That being said, Alcantara performed quite well over his seven starts, throwing 42 innings with a tidy 3.00 ERA, allowing just 35 hits and reducing his walk rate another full percentage point, from 2019’s 9.7% to a solid 8.7%.

Alcantara continued to steamroll hitters last season despite another poor win-loss record, this time 9-15.  He made a league-leading 33 starts, was one of the very few pitchers to top 200 innings (pitching 205-2/3 frames), and posted a 3.19 ERA.  He walked a tiny 6.0% of batters and recorded a strikeout rate of 24.0%, the best full-season mark of his career.

The Marlins realized the talent they have in Alcantara, and the notoriously thrifty franchise moved to lock up his services through at least 2026 via a five-year, $56 million contract that could grow to six years and $75 million if Miami exercises its option year.

Having a potential ace pitcher for just $11M per year in guaranteed money (essentially the same rate the Cardinals will be paying the thoroughly average Steven Matz over the next four seasons) is a boon for any team.  Of course, those first three years would have been arbitration seasons for Alcantara, and the contract is structured to pay him accordingly, with salaries of $3.8M, $6.3M, and $9.3M in the 2022-’24 period.

Cynics will justifiably point to the Marlins’ previous behavior of trading away players when their contracts start to get really pricey, and Alcantara will receive $17.3M in 2025 and ’26 from some team – maybe Miami, maybe not.  Time will tell if current ownership and CEO Derek Jeter will retain their top performers and top earners for the duration of their deals.

No more time is needed to judge the trade that sent Alcantara and others from St. Louis to Miami.  While Ozuna was solid for the Cardinals for two seasons, that’s all he was.  Meanwhile, the Marlins received a budding ace – among other players still to be examined – and have seen him blossom into a full-fledged, top-of-the-rotation stalwart who very well could continue to make this deal all the more lopsided.