MLB Rumors: 3 pitchers Cardinals can sign to replace Adam Wainwright
By Curt Bishop
Cardinals Adam Wainwright replacements: Sonny Gray
The top three free agent pitchers available this winter are Aaron Nola, Blake Snell, and Sonny Gray. Gray might be the Cardinals best bet. This season with the Minnesota Twins, Gray owns a 2.79 ERA, which is the third-best mark in all of baseball.
He'll start Game 2 of the Wild Card Series for the Twins on Wednesday against the Toronto Blue Jays. The veteran right-hander will be 34 years old next season, but he has proven this year that age is just a number. He'll likely come at a cheaper price than either Nola or Snell.
He struck out 183 batters this season over 184 innings of work, and the St. Louis rotation is in desperate need of swing-and-miss pitching to give them a better chance to make a deep run in the postseason in the future.
The Cardinals this season relied heavily on a pitch-to-contact approach for their pitching staff, and with the shift gone, their approach backfired. Gray brings some of that swing-and-miss capability to any rotation, but the Cardinals need it badly in order to be in contention in 2024. The first order of business for St. Louis should be putting 2023 behind them and returning to contention next year.