Cardinals’ Hot Start Isn’t Changing 2026 Strategy

The St. Louis Cardinals have been great so far this season, but don't expect to see an organizational shift.

Aug 28, 2022; Boston, Massachusetts, USA; Chaim Bloom, Chief Baseball Officer of the Boston Red Sox on the field before the game between the Boston Red Sox and the Tampa Bay Rays at Fenway Park. Mandatory Credit: Winslow Townson-Imagn Images | Winslow Townson-Imagn Images

With the first full month of the 2026 Major League Baseball now behind us, it's no secret that the St. Louis Cardinals have been one of the most surprising stories in the league so far this season.

St. Louis just beat the Los Angeles Dodgers in a three-game series and now has a 20-14 record on the season through 34 games. In comparison, the Dodgers are 21-13 on the season. Also, the Cardinals are just two games behind the Chicago Cubs for first place in the National League Central. The Cardinals have been very good, despite all of the trades of the offseason and the youth of the roster.

It's been a near-perfect start to the season for the club. Jordan Walker and JJ Wetherholt look like long-term, cornerstone pieces. Michael McGreevy looks like a legit, front-of-the-rotation arm. Masyn Winn started slow, but he looks potentially better overall than he did in 2025 when he won a Gold Glove Award. Riley O'Brien has been elite out of the Cardinals' bullpen and the list goes on. This young club has come to play in 2026.

Right now, the Cardinals are six games above .500 on May 4. St. Louis still has 128 games left to go, so obviously a lot could happen. Unsurprisingly, with the Cardinals coming out hot out of the gate, it has left some fans wondering how the club will view the campaign if this stretch continues. The Cardinals clearly are in rebuilding mode, as shown by the trades to send Brendan Donovan, Nolan Arenado, Sonny Gray and Willson Contreras out of town. Will the Cardinals place a pause on a rebuild and push all of their chips to the center of the table if they are playing well this summer? Or stay the course? Cardinals president of baseball operations Chaim Bloom joined the "Dealin' the Cards" podcast and made it clear that the vision of the club's strategy hasn't shifted at this point.

The Cardinals Aren't Changing Course

Aug 28, 2022; Boston, Massachusetts, USA; Chaim Bloom, Chief Baseball Officer of the Boston Red Sox on the field before the game between the Boston Red Sox and the Tampa Bay Rays at Fenway Park. Mandatory Credit: Winslow Townson-Imagn Images | Winslow Townson-Imagn Images

"The game does not like when you yo-yo from one approach to another," Bloom said. "It doesn't like when you try to cheat it. So, we need to stick with that. Just because it's popular, doesn't mean that you should want to do it more if it is a little bit of a side road off of what you said you would do. Again, we cannot take shortcuts with this.

"You want to have these tough decisions on either side. If you're talking about moving on from somebody, like Brendan Donovan, and that type of deal, it means you've got a player who's really valuable to the rest of the industry that you can get some really good talent for. If you're talking about maybe resisting the temptation to do something that's going to get a lot of applause on Twitter in the moment, but might not be in your long-term interest, well that means you have a cool opportunity in front of you."

The Cardinals just took down the Dodgers and have won 6 of their last 7 games. Does that mean it's time to scrap the plans for a rebuild and go all in? Chaim Bloom explained in our conversation why something like that would be a bad idea...

Full episode: https://t.co/mWTyJXav2w pic.twitter.com/vvW28JQZHL

— Dealin' the Cards (@DealinTheCards) May 3, 2026

This is arguably the right way to handle the club. In a perfect world, the Cardinals just keep winning games. But this was supposed to be the first season of a reset under Bloom. If you change course and trade prospects away or other things of that nature to bring in a star, then the club would fall back into the same cycle.

This doesn't mean the club can't make some noise this season. The goal is to see these young guys play. They have done so and they have delivered. Bloom's comments don't mean the club doesn't want to win. They are insinuating the club isn't going to add some massive piece this season.