Cardinals Rotation Usage Tells Plenty Moving Forward

One thing that is true about the St. Louis Cardinals is the fact that they protect their starting pitchers.

This trend really took form last year thanks in large part to Steven Matz. The Cardinals rolled with a rotation featuring Sonny Gray, Miles Mikolas, Matthew Liberatore, Andre Pallante and Erick Fedde with Matz out of the bullpen. Well, at least to start the season, the Cardinals used Matz in a bit of a hybrid role. Matz mainly came out of the bullpen, but was stretched out and would make spot starts when there were limited off days for the organization.

St. Louis attempts to keep the number of days between starts consistent for its starters and sometimes that means getting creative, as we saw with Matz. The Cardinals were fortunate to kick off the 2026 season with plenty of off days. The Cardinals began the season on Thursday, March 26. Since then, the Cardinals actually haven't played on a Thursday. They had off days on Thursday April 2, April 9, April 16 and April 23. They will play on a Thursday for the first time since Opening Day on April 30. When you have a schedule like that, it's somewhat easy to stay consistent with off days for hurlers, barring injuries.

The Cardinals Are Making A Rotation Change This Week

Feb 16, 2026; Jupiter, FL, USA; St. Louis Cardinals pitcher Hunter Dobbins (40) warms up with a football during spring training workouts at Roger Dean Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Reinhold Matay-Imagn Images | Reinhold Matay-Imagn Images

Things are getting a bit more difficult now, though. The Cardinals are in the middle of a stretch of 17 straight days with a game. The Cardinals' next off day is May 11 and then the next one after that is May 18 and then May 28.

In response, the Cardinals are set to activate second-year hurler Hunter Dobbins to make his team debut on Thursday against the Pittsburgh Pirates. After what we saw last year with the Cardinals and Matz, this is a sign that the club is following a similar trend. Again, St. Louis tries to be consistent with the number of days off for each starter in order to try to minimize injuries and keep everyone fresh. With 17 straight days of games, the timing for Dobbins' promotion aligns with this viewpoint of keeping the hurlers fresh.

The one question for the club right now is how will they handle the rotation after this stretch of 17 games ends? Will the Cardinals stick with a six-man rotation consistently? Or, will the Cardinals have one of the hurlers play the former Matz role and bounce between the bullpen and rotation as needed. Obviously, Dobbins would be a candidate for that role seeing how he's the sixth hurler added to the mix. Arguably, Kyle Leahy should be a candidate too, if the club goes that route.

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