The St. Louis Cardinals lost again to the San Diego Padres on Tuesday night, much to the delight of former manager Mike Shildt, who now leads the NL Wild Card favorite Padres. Shildt made it clear before the series began that he has no regrets about leaving St. Louis, a franchise that appears to be on a downward spiral at the time of this writing.
“We don’t get many mulligans in life,” Shildt said. “I haven’t spent 18 years of sleepless nights thinking about how I did things here. I can rest easy knowing I did my best to run the organization. As Tony would say, I tried to do my part, do my little bit.”
Whether to believe Shildt or not is up to the reader, but the Cards are on the verge of missing the playoffs for the second year in a row. If that’s the case, there could be a scapegoat – or two – in a much-needed regime change. My money is on manager Oli Marmol, whose in-game decisions have baffled Cardinals fans since the moment he was hired. Say what you will about Shildt – he had his own weaknesses, of course – but Marmol hasn’t performed much better.
As for front office executive John Mozeliak, he benefits from years of experience in the St. Louis organization and will likely be moved rather than fired. His plausible successor, Chaim Bloom, was recently hired as a consultant of sorts. That makes too much sense.
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But for now, Cardinals fans are left to watch what’s left of a once-touted group of players. St. Louis entered the 2024 season with ambitions of the NL Central title, but that is out of reach thanks to the Milwaukee Brewers, who have a nine-game lead over the second-place Cubs.
The Cardinals are two games under .500 and seven games behind the Atlanta Braves for the third NL Wild Card spot. Their playoff chances are fading fast and fans have lost faith in the team. Don’t believe me? Just look at the attendance numbers. The Cardinals have only reached the 40,000 fan mark in 16 home games this season. In 2024, they will average over 4,000 fewer fans per game than they did in 2023. And on Tuesday, they hosted a season-low 27,224 fans.
There has never been a greater indictment of this team and its front office than this one. Cardinals fans are some of the most loyal in sports, but even they have reached a limit.
