The A's Should Kickstart the St. Louis Cardinals Rebuild With This Trade
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The Athletics are a pretty solid offensive club, but they do have a couple of holes they'll be looking to plug this offseason. Those would be at third base, where they don't have a surefire answer but a few options, and second base.
The St. Louis Cardinals have a very solid second baseman of their own in Brendan Donovan. The 28-year-old will be entering his second year of arbitration in 2026 and is projected to earn $5.4 million next season.
This past season he hit .307 with a .366 on-base percentage, along with 10 home runs, a pair of stolen bases, and a 128 wRC+. He's a roughly league average defender at he position, landing slightly into the positive or negative depending on which metric you choose, but always right around the middle.
Why Donovan is Perfect for the A's
While the offensive stats are terrific, he makes sense for the A's for a couple of other reasons as well. First off, he's a left-handed bat, and the A's have become fairly righty heavy of late. Having Donovan in there would give the lineup a little more balance on a day-to-day basis.
While his batting average and on-base are certainly terrific, it's his walk and strikeout rates that really stand out. Across 515 plate appearances in 2025, he ended up walking 8.2% of the time, which is in line with the A's team-wide walk rate. While his strikeout rate of 13% wouldn't have quite been in line with Jacob Wilson, it's still well below league average.
When we compared the A's in all three phases of the game to the four teams that are still in the postseason, we discovered that the A's best chance to improve the offense was to walk a little more and strike out a little less. One way they could do that would be to add someone that already has those skills.
Plus, Donovan plays a position of need for the A's. With Zack Gelof undergoing surgery at season's end, who will play second to begin the 2026 campaign is an open question. The A's will want to make the postseason in 2026, and getting rid of some unknowns may be the best route forward for the club.
Lack of Options Outside the Organization
While the A's have said that they're open to "a lot of possibilities" at both second and third base this winter, there just isn't a huge pool of available players to choose from that would be clear upgrades for the A's to consider.
There are just nine teams in baseball that received at least league average offensive production at second base this past season, and six of those clubs made the postseason. The Cardinals, Tampa Bay Rays, and Arizona Diamondbacks are the remaining three, and just St. Louis is entering a phase where they're taking a step back.
The A's have internal options to consider at both second and third, but Max Muncy, Darell Hernaiz and Brett Harris aren't sure things at the big league level just yet. The offseason presents an opportunity for the club to look for an upgrade from outside of the organization.
Third base is also a position without many available options, though there were 11 teams that had at least league average production offensively. Only five of those teams made the postseason, but the Giants, Rays, Royals and Astros options are cornerstones of their franchises. The Diamondbacks already traded Eugenio Suarez to the Mariners at the deadline.
Boston had Alex Bregman, and while he's expected to opt out, he's outside of the A's price range. That would leave the New York Mets, but their two options—Brett Baty and Mark Vientos—may be used as Pete Alonso insurance if the first baseman doesn't re-sign with the club.
That would seemingly leave third base open for the internal options to squabble over, while the A's could focus their attention onto Donovan.
What Would a Trade Take?
First things first, there's no guarantee that Donovan will be available this winter. That said, St. Louis Cardinals On SI thinks that it would be worth considering if you're the club, especially if they don't see themselves winning a World Series in the next few years. MLB.com's John Denton also predicted that top prospect JJ Wetherholt starts the season as the team's second baseman.
The first piece that could be attractive to St. Louis in a deal would be right-hander Joey Estes. While his numbers aren't pretty from this past season, that's partially because he's a fly ball pitcher that had been aided by pitching at the Oakland Coliseum in 2024 when he held a 5.01 cumulative ERA and showed a lot of promise in spurts. It was also his rookie campaign.
This season he wasn't able to locate his pitches, though that shouldn't be something that lingers as he is more of a control pitcher. Estes tends to pitch with emotion, and he struggled in the first-ever MLB game in Sacramento (against the Cubs), and then in the snow in Colorado. It's hard to put too much stock into struggling in those two specific outings.
He held a 3.26 ERA in Oakland last year across 66 1/3 innings of work. He's a solid pitcher with a bulldog mentality, but he may be of little use to the A's in the more hitter-friendly Sutter Health Park.
St. Louis on the other hand is a much more pitcher-friendly venue, and he would do well there. Busch Stadium ranks 29th in home run factors, ahead of just Pittsburgh, which is an in-division ballpark.
The A's could also look to move JJ Bleday, who is a league average bat for his career and may be a change of scenery candidate the A's look to move this winter. He's set to enter arbitration next season and topped out at 20 homers in 2024. He also showed a glimpse of his potential last year, and it could be unlocked with a new franchise.
If we were to look for a third piece to this trade, it could depend on what the Cardinals are after. The A's could throw in former first rounder Daniel Susac, a catcher that spent the 2025 campaign in Triple-A Las Vegas. They could also include a pitcher outside of their top prospects.
It depends on what St. Louis is after, and whether they're looking for big-league ready guys or players that could be ready in a few years. They could also choose to center the deal around younger prospects that may not be ready until at least 2027. The A's have an improved farm system, and plenty of players to choose from.
Jason has been covering the A’s at various sites for over a decade, and was the original host of the Locked on A’s podcast. He also covers the Stanford Cardinal as they attempt to rebuild numerous programs to prominence.
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