The St. Louis Cardinals made an enormous transfer in December to strengthen their offense and substitute Yadier Molina, signing veteran catcher Willson Contreras to a five-year, $87.5 million deal.

Nonetheless, since then, they’ve been quiet and have seemingly forgot to fill two notable holes.

Whereas they possess stable inside choices, some confirmed expertise may have helped them.

Listed here are two strikes the Cardinals ought to have made this winter.

1. Re-Signing Jose Quintana

Re-signing Quintana would have been a great begin.

Quintana was rumored to be excited about returning to St. Louis.

Nonetheless, the Cardinals made no effort to signal him and as an alternative let him stroll and in the end signal an reasonably priced two-year cope with the New York Mets.

After the entrance workplace talked of accelerating payroll, followers had been left disenchanted.

The Cardinals solely have one starter, Steven Matz, beneath contract for 2024 and there are nonetheless query marks within the beginning rotation.

Matz and Jack Flaherty are each coming off of injury-plagued seasons, whereas Adam Wainwright is coming off of an uncharacteristically unhealthy month of September, one which price him a spot within the postseason rotation.

That they had the cash to maintain Quintana, however waited and in the end ended up with Andrew Suarez on a minor league contract.

This isn’t what we meant by ‘purchase a beginning pitcher.’ #STLCards https://t.co/gYroBiBFr2

— STL Sports activities Central (@stlsportscntrl) January 27, 2023

2. Signing A Left-Handed Bat

This may be forgiven, because the Cardinals have loads of stable lefty bats on their roster, similar to Nolan Gorman, Alec Burleson, Lars Nootbaar, and Brendan Donovan.

However a confirmed bat would have been good for them to have.

The Cardinals in the end had been unable so as to add someone as a result of they didn’t have an on a regular basis function obtainable.

Nonetheless, they may have completed one thing easy, similar to bringing again fan-favorite Matt Carpenter to separate time on the designated hitter place.

It additionally would have allowed the crew to probably store Paul DeJong, who has struggled in recent times.