Rosternomics
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Cardinals STL

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GM: John Mozeliak (since 2008)

2015 roster — every player, value & surplus

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+17.2
WAB — wins above budget
+9.1
TAB — roster Talent above budget
100–62 (0.617)
record · made playoffs
+9M
surplus $M (value/$)
44.1
roster fWAR
$129.9M
payroll
PlayerAgeServiceGfWARSalary $MSurplus $M
Jason Heyward 25 arb 154 5.6 7.8 +9.7
Matt Carpenter 29 arb 154 5.3 3.8 +12.9
John Lackey 36 FA-elig 33 3.5 0.5 +10.5
Carlos Martinez 23 pre-arb 32 3.4 0.5 +10.1
Lance Lynn 28 arb 31 3.0 7.0 +2.5
Randal Grichuk 23 pre-arb 103 3.0 0.5 +8.9
Jaime García 28 FA-elig 20 2.7 9.2 -0.9
Kolten Wong 24 pre-arb 150 2.5 0.5 +7.4
Michael Wacha 23 pre-arb 30 2.4 0.5 +7.1
Yadier Molina 32 FA-elig 136 2.4 15.0 -7.5
Jhonny Peralta 33 FA-elig 155 2.1 15.0 -8.5
Trevor Rosenthal 25 arb 68 2.0 0.5 +5.7
Tommy Pham 27 pre-arb 52 1.6 0.2 +4.7
Stephen Piscotty 24 – 63 1.4 0.2 +4.1
Kevin Siegrist 25 pre-arb 81 1.3 0.5 +3.6
Matt Holliday 35 FA-elig 73 0.9 17.0 -14.2
Adam Wainwright 33 FA-elig 7 0.7 19.5 -17.2
Brandon Moss↔ CLE 31 FA-elig 51 0.6 2.3 -0.2
Tim Cooney 24 pre-arb 6 0.6 0.1 +1.8
Miguel Socolovich 28 pre-arb 28 0.4 0.3 +0.9
Jordan Walden 27 arb 12 0.4 2.7 -1.5
Tyler Lyons 27 pre-arb 17 0.3 0.2 +0.7
Greg Garcia 25 pre-arb 49 0.3 0.2 +0.6
Seth Maness 26 pre-arb 77 0.2 0.5 +0.1
Randy Choate 39 FA-elig 71 0.1 3.0 -2.6
Jonathan Broxton↔ MIL 31 FA-elig 26 0.1 3.5 -3.2
Cody Stanley 26 pre-arb 9 0.1 0.1 +0.2
Matt Belisle 35 FA-elig 34 0.1 3.5 -3.2
Carlos Villanueva 31 FA-elig 35 0.1 2.0 -1.8
Sam Tuivailala 22 pre-arb 14 0.1 0.1 +0.0
Matt Adams 26 arb 60 0.0 0.5 -0.4
Travis Tartamella 27 – 3 0.0 0.0 +0.1
Nick Greenwood 27 pre-arb 1 0.0 0.0 -0.0
Marcus Hatley 27 – 2 -0.0 0.0 -0.0
Dean Anna 28 pre-arb 1 -0.0 0.0 -0.1
Mark Reynolds 31 FA-elig 140 -0.1 2.0 -2.2
Marco Gonzales 23 pre-arb 1 -0.1 0.0 -0.3
Steve Cishek↔ MIA 29 arb 27 -0.1 3.0 -3.4
Xavier Scruggs 27 pre-arb 17 -0.1 0.0 -0.4
Ed Easley 29 – 4 -0.2 0.1 -0.7
Dan Johnson 35 arb 12 -0.2 0.1 -0.7
Peter Bourjos 28 arb 117 -0.2 1.6 -2.4
Jon Jay 30 arb 79 -0.3 4.1 -5.0
Mitch Harris 29 pre-arb 26 -0.3 0.1 -1.1
Pete Kozma 27 arb 76 -0.5 0.5 -2.1
Tony Cruz 28 arb 69 -0.7 0.8 -2.8

WAR = FanGraphs (fWAR). Green = produced more value than paid (bargain); red = paid more than produced. Service: pre-arb (<3 yr) / arb (3–6) / FA-eligible (6+). Click headers to sort.

History: front-office performance & develop-vs-buy (1985–2024)

Trade ledger (realized WAR, all-time)

Best acquisitions
PlayerYearWAR for STL
Adam Wainwright200352.6
Ozzie Smith198148.0
Paul Goldschmidt201821.3
Mark McGwire199719.7
Nolan Arenado202118.3
Édgar Rentería199817.4
Carlos Martínez201316.0
José Oquendo198515.3
Ones that got away
PlayerYear tradedWAR elsewhere
Andy Van Slyke198731.1
Lance Johnson198817.3
Keith Hernandez198316.5
David Peralta201414.5
Mike LaValliere198712.9
Jack Wilson200011.0
Marco Gonzales201710.1
Coco Crisp20029.9
Rosternomics — quantifying front-office skill, attribution-clean. Follow @rosternomics on X. Decision-makers on record back to 1933; resource-controlled metrics (WAR & payroll) cover 1985–2026.
Data: FanGraphs (WAR), Baseball-Reference & the Chadwick Bureau register (rosters, IDs), the Lahman Database, Baseball America prospect rankings (via The Baseball Cube), and public payroll records. Transaction and trade data was obtained free of charge from and is copyrighted by Retrosheet. Executive birth/death data via Wikidata (CC0); bios are original. Emoji graphics by OpenMoji (CC BY-SA 4.0).
All figures are franchise-level outcomes credited to the decision-maker in the acquisition year — not solely attributable to one executive.