Former Cardinal outfielders who Cardinals might bring back

I noticed a curious thing when I was perusing potential outfielders for the Cardinals to sign. I noticed this when I made a case for Michael Conforto, which was understandably not received that well. If you hyper focus on right-handed outfielders, there’s a bunch of former Cardinals. It’s actually kind of crazy how many of them are former Cardinals in comparison to the appealing right-handed outfielders who’ve never been in the Cardinal organization.

Part of it is admittedly that there just aren’t that many appealing outfield options in general. You do not get very far down the list of outfielders before you start noticing that ideally they are fourth outfielders, platoon players, or bench players in the ideal situation. I may even make the argument that the list stops at just three outfielders, all left-handed: Kyle Tucker, Cody Bellinger, and Mike Yastrzemski. Yes, I am omitting an obvious name, and I’ll explain why later.

In lieu of this, why not take a peek at the former Cardinals, see how well they fit, see if they make sense to sign. The ability to play centerfield would be ideal so they could platoon with Victor Scott or Nathan Church. That doesn’t need to be their sole role on the team – it would just be nice if you didn’t have to sacrifice offense at CF when you played left-handed pitchers. Obviously another thing to look for is the ability to hit left-handed pitching. So in assessing the usefulness of former Cardinals, how well do they achieve those two objectives?

Harrison Bader

Play CF? Yes

Hit LHP? Yes (Probably)

On paper, Bader fits almost exactly what the Cardinals need. In his career, Bader has a 106 wRC+ against LHP, has been an elite defender in CF, and last year, he played almost as many innings in LF as he did in CF. So Bader could essentially be a full-time outfielder who moved over to CF whenever the Cardinals faced a LHP. They would still need to figure out the other two spots against LHP, especially if Jordan Walker is heading to AAA, but it’s a good start.

Problem: Bader might get paid to be a player he is not. His 2025 season looks extremely fluky, like it does not appear that Bader magically become a much better hitter in 2025. It looks like he got very lucky. He had a .359 BABIP when his career BABIP is .305. He had a .295 xwOBA which is roughly in line with his xwOBA in three of four seasons prior to 2025, and that fourth season was worse than that. He had a 108 wRC+ back in 2021 with a .290 xwOBA, but between 2022 and 2024, he peaked at an 85 wRC+.

I think Bader at an 85 wRC+ is certainly a useful piece, except it doesn’t really make a ton of sense on the Cardinals. That is not a wRC+ that will play in LF, and it doesn’t really make sense for Bader to steal Church or Scott’s job because we want to find out what they can do. On top of that, I don’t really know what’s changed with Bader, but his proficiency against LHP has evaporated. He has been a worse hitter against LHP in every season but one since 2021. He actually struck out nearly 36% of the time last year against LHP.

He has also taken a step back defensively, although it’s possible it was just an off year. Now an off year for Bader was +3 OAA in 500+ innings in CF and +3 OAA in almost 500 innings in LF. But if he’s more like a 90 wRC+ hitter (which I believe he is), that offense/defense doesn’t really work in the corners and the playing time he should get in CF wouldn’t justify his probable price.

Randal Grichuk

Can play CF? Probably not

Can hit LHP? Oh yeah

It appears that Grichuk’s days of playing CF are over. I will defer to how teams have used him recently, which include the Colorado Rockies, the Arizona Diamondbacks, the Los Angeles Angels, and the Kansas City Royals. He has played for these four separate organizations since 2023, and he’s played 20 games in CF for the Rockies and 3 total innings in CF since they traded him in 2023. Not games, innings.

And his performance in the corners certainly suggests a player who probably shouldn’t play CF either. In about 750 innings in LF since 2023, he’s been -3 outs above average. In about 615 innings in RF, he’s been worth -5 OAA. Not only can he not play CF, he seems to be below average defensively at this point in his career.

On the flipside, Grichuk can hit lefties. If he has anything left in the tank that is. At 33-years-old, he had just an 82 wRC+ last season, so him “hitting lefties” was him hitting for an 89 wRC+ against lefties. The year before, it was a 152 wRC+ and for his career, it’s a 118 wRC+. He has a 102 wRC+ projection from Steamer, so he is most likely an above average hitter against LHP. He can fit the platoon role real well, he just probably can’t play the position where you need the platoon the most. You could just put him in CF, don’t care about defense, and just value seeing what Scott can do when he doesn’t have to face lefties. That is an option.

Lane Thomas

Can play CF? Kind of

Can hit LHP? Absolutely

Pretty much the only thing Lane Thomas can do is hit lefties. In his short career, he has been a phenomenal hitter against LHP and a dreadful one against RHP. He has a career 135 wRC+ against LHP and just 84 wRC+. He’s basically early career Harrison Bader when it comes to his platoon splits. Some of it looks very legit, like he strikes out just 19% of the time against LHP, has a .208 ISO, and a .335 BABIP. He is markedly worse in each stat against RHP.

Can he play CF? That’s debatable. He’d have to be the rare guy who is actually better in CF than in the corners, which I am a little skeptical of. Because he’s been actively bad in the corners in his career. In 2,400 innings – two seasons worth of innings – he’s been -13 OAA in RF. In LF, he only has 491 innings, but he’s been worth -2 OAA. In 1,500 career innings in CF, he’s been worth +0 OAA., though he has never played more than 400 innings in a season. He played 284 innings last season and was worth -2 OAA.

In all likelihood, he isn’t a good defender in CF. That said, coming off a down year where he missed most of the season to injury, a reunion could make sense because he hypothetically can play CF and he definitely can hit lefties. He should never play against RHP, and given the outfield situation, he certainly would play too many games against RHP. He can probably get a make-good one year deal somewhere else that would want to play him everyday even though every team can see he sucks against RHP. So I wonder about his willingness to be a platoon player here. But again, he can look at the competition and see, intentions don’t matter, they will play me more if I hit, which is probably true.

Adolis Garcia

Can he play CF? Unlikely

Can he hit LHP? Not really

Once upon a time, Garcia could play CF, but he hasn’t played the position since 2023, and he only played 60 innings that season. He has also had a -12 OAA season in RF and then he bounced back last year with -1 OAA. But that doesn’t leave me with any confidence in his ability to play CF. So he can’t do that.

He also has been a worse hitter against LHP than against RHP. Do I buy that he is the rare player to have reverse splits? I do not. But if the premise of my article is try to find a platoon partner for the CFers, he’s not really a good choice. He has a career 105 wRC+ against RHP, and 97 wRC+ against LHP. If he ever gets the chance, I suspect these numbers will get closer together the longer his career goes on. He strikes out slightly more, but also walks more. He has similar power and his BABIP is 12 points worse against LHP. Having said that, he’s not a very good platoon candidate. He’s also been worth 0.6 fWAR in his last 1,184 plate appearances and will be 33.

When I first saw his name, I thought maybe I could talk myself into it, but I’m not seeing the case.

Tommy Pham

Can play CF? Not really

Can hit LHP? Yes

The argument for the above players is “Maybe if things go right, you can get something of value at the deadline.” I’m not sure that applies to Tommy Pham at this stage of his career. But maybe he still has a 124 wRC+ season like he did with Mets in the first half of 2023 – that produced a DSL prospect, who most recently had a 61 wRC+ in Low A ball at the age of 18. They must really like his defense. And that was 35-year-old Pham who had recently been productive, not a 38-year-old who just had back-to-back replacement level seasons.

I’m not arguing Grichuk or Thomas would get some great return. But I can see a return of some sort much easier than for Pham. Anyway, yes Pham’s career wRC+ against LHP is a 121 wRC+, but he was worse last season and equal in 2024. On top of that, his projection is a 95 wRC+, and his career wRC+ is 111, so it’s more like you can expect him to hit for a 105 wRC+ against LHP, which is not quite as appealing for someone who is below average defensively in the corners.

I’m going to ignore the DH Marcell Ozuna, the wishes he was as good as Mario Mendoza offensively Garrett Hampson, and the left-handed Jason Heyward. Oh yeah, and Dylan Carlson too, who has fallen so far, he’s not even listed on the MLB article of free agents I was using and for some reason Hampson is, but nonetheless, I don’t really think the Cardinals are interesting in trying with Carlson again.

This will probably be better received than my Michael Conforto suggestion, but it’s just about as exciting as that one. Let’s hope there’s a future trade that brings about an outfielder we are actually excited about seeing play.