MLB Rumors: A real Cardinals ace, Astros injury woes, end of the road for Gary Sanchez

MLB Rumors: Do the Cardinals need an ace?

Much has been made about the St. Louis Cardinals need for starting pitching at the trade deadline, and that point remains. Mike Mozeliak cannot put off improving this rotation any longer.

Over the last few seasons, Mozeliak and the Cards front office have found ways to make incremental changes at the deadline, such as trading for a Jose Quintana or Jordan Montgomery, that essentially plugs a hole but doesn’t fix the root problem. This is an organization which once had Sandy Alcantara and Zac Gallen in their farm system. There are currently young pitchers in their system in the come up, but they won’t play at Busch Stadium for a few years yet.

Dylan Cease, for one, has been a name connected to St. Louis should they take a major deadline swing. Beyond that, though, an internal option could be emerging. Miles Mikolas, fresh off another impressive start, hasn’t given up more than three runs since April 11. His horrendous start to the year ballooned his ERA, but Mikolas has lowered his earned run average by six full points since then, and threw seven innings of scoreless ball against the Reds on Thursday.

“I look at that as my job every time out — being at the top of the rotation and being an older guy, something I pride myself on is having big games when we’re struggling, a big game when our bullpen is running thin or we’re resting guys,” Mikolas said. “That’s my job, and I don’t look at it as me doing [anything extra].”

Mikolas is embracing the role of ace, whether the Cards want to hand him that title or not. St. Louis signed him to a contract extension this offseason for a reason. Hopefully, the Cards pitching needs aren’t as severe as we thought.