Cardinals get top 10 pick in MLB Free Agent Draft for first time in 25 years

Retired Cardinals reliever Jason Motte arrived at the Winter Meetings on Tuesday without a lucky rabbit’s foot or four leaf clover in hand.

Instead, ahead of his duties as the first ever St. Louis representative on stage for the MLB draft lottery, he strolled through the Gaylord Opryland resort with a sealed rosin bag clutched in his hand. It’s a gift, he said, for the high school pitchers he coaches in Memphis.

Perhaps a little grip enhancement might’ve improved the bounce of the ping pong balls.

Motte sat on stage while St. Louis Cardinals Assistant General Manager and Director of Scouting Randy Flores sat in a sequestered room already in possession of the knowledge the world would soon acquire – the Cardinals will draft seventh overall in the 2024 draft, sliding two spots from their final placement in the standings after being leaped over by the Cleveland Guardians (first) and Cincinnati Reds (second).

The lottery draw solidified the first Cardinals pick inside the top 10 since they selected JD Drew fifth overall in 1998. It’s the third time they’ve picked seventh, following their selections of infielder Leron Lee in 1966 and pitcher Mike Dunne in 1984. Neither had especially distinguished stints in St. Louis, though both did make the majors. Perhaps most notably, Dunne was traded alongside Andy Van Slyke and Mike LaValliere to Pittsburgh in exchange for Tony Peña on April Fool’s Day in 1987.

Tuesday’s fall likely felt like a frustrating prank.

“I kind of think we’re going to get the first pick,” President of Baseball Operations John Mozeliak joked ahead of the announcement of the drawing results. Certainly there’s no penalty for optimism, and Mozeliak denied having any particular anxiety about the brief slice of time when Flores, one of his lieutenants, knew the results of the drawing and he did not.

Representatives of teams who were inside the room where numbers were drawn were sequestered after witnessing the drawing, forbidden from contacting anyone outside that room so as to avoid revealing the results of the lottery before the television broadcast.

“I’m a patient man,” he mused. “I’ll find out.”

Patience, whether vice or virtue, has become an absolute necessity and what has thus far been a glacially slow Winter Meetings.

As the industry waits with bated breath for Shohei Ohtani to announce the next destination for his otherworldly talent, other deals are seemingly jammed behind him in the queue. The Cardinals, by virtue of already adding three starters to their rotation, have been far and away the league’s most active team. Now, with the trade market stymied by the frozen free agent market, Mozeliak said that it appears the team’s best chance to plug the holes they see in their bullpen will likely be among those free agents.

That proclamation was certainly an adjustment of his stance from a day prior, if not an outright pivot. His forthright declaration of a desire to trade outfielder Tyler O’Neill raises obvious questions about the strength of the outfielder’s market, especially now that the team’s focus is crystalizing in free agency.

Two available, attractive options who could supplement the back end of the bullpen are free agent Japanese lefty Yuki Matsui and Korean righty Go Woo-suk, the latter of whom would require a posting fee paid to his team in Korea.

With Go only a year away from his own free agency, the LG Twins would face the decision of whether such a fee would be sufficient to overcome their desire to retain their closer in 2024. His posting from Korea carries with it a 30-day window for striking a deal, which opened Tuesday.

Mozeliak declined to comment on whether the Cardinals had actively engaged in discussions with any players who have been posted, citing the limited number. Indeed, Go is the only reliever who meets that description.

“Potentially, yeah,” Mozeliak said when asked if there are back end relievers who the club covets as international free agents. “If you’re an international free agent, then there’s no real timeframe, right? There’s no end. If you post, then there is a certain window. So I think depending on the type of player you’re talking about, two different answers.”

Among free agents who pitched in the Majors last season, two relievers who resemble the depth pieces the Cardinals seek did agree to contracts on Tuesday, with Kirby Yates inking a deal with the Texas Rangers and Chris Devenski returning to the Tampa Bay Rays. Mozeliak indicated that those deals didn’t really impact their pursuits, other than the vague hope that they may represent lubrication of the seized market.

The Major League portion of the meetings wraps up Wednesday afternoon with the annual Rule 5 draft. The Cardinals, with an open slot on their 40-man roster, are eligible to make a selection, and have historically gambled on bullpen depth via those selections.

Last winter, they snatched Wilking Rodríguez from the New York Yankees with hopes he could contribute to their bullpen. After a year of a sore shoulder and two abortive rehab attempts, he was outrighted from the roster, opted for free agency, and then re-signed to a minor league deal for 2024.

Just one more piece of bad bouncing ball luck in a 2023 that seems determined to continue to ricochet.