Oli Marmol is practically begging the Cardinals to make obvious deadline trade

Marmol wants to see his best pitchers in the rotation, and he wants to see it ASAP.
St. Louis Cardinals v Arizona Diamondbacks
St. Louis Cardinals v Arizona Diamondbacks | Chris Coduto/GettyImages

If the run up to the trade deadline on July 31 was going to determine whether the St. Louis Cardinals would be buyers or sellers, this past weekend's ugly sweep at the hands of the Arizona Diamondbacks felt like a pretty clear answer. The Redbirds got outscored 22-7 over three games in the desert, and they're now mired in fourth place in the NL Central and behind four different teams in the race for the final National League Wild Card spot. A playoff appearance now feels pretty far-fetched, much less a meaningful run at a pennant.

With that in mind, it sure feels like it's long past time to abandon 2025 and start looking ahead toward the future. At least manager Oli Marmol certainly thinks so: When he was asked about young righty Michael McGreevy's promotion back to the Majors to start Monday's game against the Colorado Rockies, Marmol wasn't shy about letting his feelings be known.

"I hope it's not a spot start," Marmol said, per MLB.com's John Denton. My hope is that he can stay with us. I hope it works out that way."

We appreciate Marmol's commitment to the passive voice here, but the fact remains that the Cardinals themselves are in charge of determining whether or not it "works out that way". And yet, they've consistently refused to just give McGreevy a permanent spot in the starting rotation, despite his 3.72 ERA in Triple-A this year and his success when called up to the big leagues (4.22 ERA, 3.37 FIP over four starts).

Instead, St. Louis has stubbornly clung to veterans like Miles Mikolas and Erick Fedde no matter how badly they get lit up. You could maybe talk yourself into that strategy when the Cardinals were committed to contention in the near term. Now, though, it borders on malpractice, and there's no reason to wait until the trade deadline to pull the trigger.

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Oli Marmol is desperate for Cardinals to cut their losses with Erick Fedde

It's clear what St. Louis and president John Mozeliak are hoping here: Give Fedde as long a runway as possible in the hope that he'll turn things around and rebulid some value that can be recouped in a trade. But that's not happeing; if anything, Fedde is getting worse. And the longer the Cardinals insist on running him out there, the longer they wait to let McGreevy develop.

“And I think there's a lot of value in this next stretch for several reasons," Marmol told the media on Monday. "For him to get a taste of being around (pitching coach) Dusty (Blake) and the pitching staff and game planning and being around big league hitters.”

Every rep Fedde gets in the Majors is one that McGreevy doesn't, a missed opportunity to get more comfortable on a big-league mound against big-league competition. Considering how important McGreevy might be to the next competitive Cardinals team, that's inexcusable, and Marmol seems to realize as much. The reality is that nothing's going to change in Fedde's market between now and July 31; St. Louis has finally come around to the notion that they should start looking ahead to 2026, and that should start as soon as possible.