Despite recent success, Paul Goldschmidt still on hot seat for Cardinals trade

The St. Louis Cardinals have been through quite the roller coaster of a season already in 2024. They began the year terribly, where it seemed they would be aggressive sellers at the trade deadline with their All-Star first baseman, Paul Goldschmidt, at the front of these trade discussions.

And then they turned their season around. The Cardinals got hot and Paul Goldschmidt got hot. They began climbing their way out of the hole they dug themselves in the NL Central and many analysts thought they could end up being aggressive buyers before the trade deadline.

But Baseball Reference doesn't quite agree with this Cinderella story rebound for the Cardinals. They give St. Louis less than a 5% chance to make the playoffs, which led to Bleacher Report's Kerry Miller placing Paul Goldschmidt in his top ten players to be traded this season.

With St. Louis' postseason chances slim, Paul Goldschmidt could still get moved

"If the trade deadline was today, there's no chance they'd be trading him away. But with Baseball Reference inexplicably only giving St. Louis a 4.3 percent chance of making the postseason, got to at least put him on the list," Miller continued.

Obviously, this leaves a lot to be determined over the next month and a half. St. Louis could go on an incredible run, moving their record closer to the Brewers than many expect. They could enter a tailspin and plummet down the NL standings.

Whatever the case may be, if St. Louis doesn't continue their hot streak and close the gap on the Brewers, they very well may be saying goodbye to their star first baseman.

Goldschmidt is slashing .223/.302/.354 on the year with most of his production coming from May 11 to May 28. In that span, Goldschmidt tallied 20 of his 51 hits on the season. He's since returned back to earth, but the talent and production is still there for the veteran. According to Baseball Savant, Goldschmidt's average exit velocity is 91 MPH, good for 78th percentile in the MLB.

Obviously trading Goldschmidt isn't ideal. It would be the worst case scenario for the Cardinals. But it's still an option. It's still a possibility and the Cardinals faithful needs to be prepared for that. If St. Louis isn't a real threat to make the playoffs, Goldy is as good as gone.