Paul Goldschmidt is thriving for the St. Louis Cardinals


The cycle for a major league hitter has been well established for decades. He improves rapidly in his early 20s, peaks around 27, holds up for maybe a few years, and then begins a slow decline.

And then there is Paul Goldschmidt.

Goldschmidt was a fine player in the early part of his career with the Arizona Diamondbacks, forming six All-Star teams. His prime, predictably, ranged from age 25, when he led the league in home runs and runs, to age 30.

But when he was traded to the St. Louis Cardinals after the 2018 season, some of his numbers began to drop. While still delivering great value, he stopped making the all-star team.

His batting average stayed close to .300 and his homer is around 30, but he started slipping elsewhere, particularly on walks. His on-base plus slugging percentage, which was almost always above .900 in Arizona, slipped below that number for three straight years.

This season was a different story. Through Wednesday, Goldschmidt led the National League in the trinity of stats, batting average (.332), on-base percent (.412), and slugging percent (.611); The batting average and slugging numbers were career highs. He’s already hit 25 home runs — six fewer than last year’s overall season — and he’s returning to the All-Star Game for the first time in four years.

His OPS was 1.023, another career high, behind only American Leaguers Yordan Álvarez of the Houston Astros and Aaron Judge of the Yankees. Goldschmidt also ranks second to Judge in the WAR version of Baseball Reference for position players. And he did it while playing a Gold Glove-level defense at first base.

All of this happened at the age of 34, a time when most players have begun their decline. It’s been 16 years since a player ended their 34-year season with an OPS as high as Goldschmidt: Manny Ramirez had 1,058 OPS for the Red Sox in 2006. (Mark McGwire’s 1998 70-homer season that produced 1,222 OPS ranked first among players in their 34-year season.) And, remarkably, Goldschmidt’s great 34-year season came at a time when baseball is enforcing far more rigorous performance testing—enhancing drugs.

The big season has accelerated Goldschmidt’s rise up the career rosters, with the first baseman hitting 300 home runs, 1,000 runs and 1,000 RBI this season.

“If you hit the ball as well as he does and you’re hitting for power, hitting average and you’re a well-rounded hitter — and not just hitting .220 with a 30 percent strikeout rate with 30 homers, but actually being a hitter, that is feared in all situations — that’s a big deal,” Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol told The St. Louis Post-Dispatch last month.

Marmol was right: Goldschmidt has a good chance of becoming only the eighth player since 2012 to hit 30 or more homers while hitting .330 or higher.

The only blemish on Goldschmidt’s career season was a recent criticism for refusing the Covid-19 vaccination, preventing him and third baseman Nolan Arenado from playing in a two-game series against Toronto last month. (The Cardinals split the games.) This problem would resurface if St. Louis faced the Blue Jays in the World Series.

While neither team is leading its division, Toronto and St. Louis have been on the move in recent weeks and the Cardinals appear to be a legitimate threat to prevent the Milwaukee Brewers from becoming NL Central champions again.

Goldschmidt, Arenado and second baseman Tommy Edman are second, third and seventh in WAR among positional players; No other team has three players in the top 10. Together they make up 15 WAR.

The Cardinals also have a better run differential than the Brewers, a key stat in which St. Louis ranks fourth among National League teams. And that number could improve after St. Louis ramped up its rotation with deadline-day trades for José Quintana and Jordan Montgomery, two quality left-handed starters.

Even if they didn’t win the division, the Cardinals would be in line for one of the NL’s three wildcard spots in the extended playoff field.

And should Goldschmidt return in the postseason, there’s reason to believe his off-season will continue: He has eight home runs in 21 playoff games.