Bernie: A Closer Look At Tommy Edman, The Cardinals and The Trade That Sent Him To The Dodgers.

It will be fun to watch Tommy Edman play in his first World Series when the 2024 fall classic begins Friday night in Los Angeles. Dodgers and Yankees. Huge stars, huge treasuries, huge media markets, huge hype.

Oh, and Jack Flaherty is set to start Game 1 for the LA. This will give some Cardinals fans an opportunity to revise history and pretend they wanted to see St. Louis keep Jack Flaherty – when in fact, none of them felt that way in the summer of 2023. But this fakery only applies if Flaherty aces the Yankees. If Jack endures a vicious flogging Friday, then the phonies among us will revert back to their usual stance of, “I never liked that guy anyway.” 

It’s harmless.

I’m much more interested in Edman, and I’ll get to him a little later. He doesn’t fit into the predictably lazy narrative that’s taken shape in the run-up to first pitch. You know, it goes something like this: We’re seeing two store-bought teams who paid their way into the postseason and will now try to close the deal on the purchase of a World Series trophy. Baseball has turned into a rich-man rumble. No beggars allowed.

The highest level of the sport is the domain of teams that are willing to use their financial power to crush smaller-market franchises under the weight of gold-plated Brinks trucks. In terms of the combined 40-man payroll of the two teams, this is the most expensive matchup in World Series history.

The Yankees ranked second in 40-man payroll, and the Dodgers were third. Combined, the two industry titans invested a total of nearly $667 million in player talent in 2024. Baseball’s middle class has a sliver of a chance to win it all. Baseball’s low-payroll entities might as well move down to Triple A, because the big prize is out of their reach.

Yeah, well, a few things about this:

1. This is just New York’s second World Series appearance in the last 16 seasons. The Yanks won the World Series in 2009, then went 15 consecutive seasons without getting into the final round before this year. If it’s so easy to pay an exorbitant price for a VIP pass into the World Series, then why have the Yankees been missing for so long.

2. The Dodgers can match or even exceed the Yankees in revenue flow and wanton aggressiveness – but Dodger blue hasn’t won a World Series in a full and normal season since 1988. That’s several decades.

3. Having the financial muscle is a clear advantage, but it isn’t everything. If this exclusive baseball club is open to only the wealthiest of membership applicants, then please explain this: starting with the 2002 postseason, 14 different major-league franchises have won the World Series … and 21 of the 30 teams have come away with at least one league pennant.

How can a club be considered ultra exclusive when 70 percent of the current MLB teams have gotten in over the last 23 seasons?

4. In the last 23 postseasons, this will be only the second World Series to feature two top-five payroll teams. The other time was the Dodgers (No. 3) and Red Sox (No. 1) in 2018.

5. Over the previous seven postseasons prior to 2024, seven of the 14 World Series duelists have been ranked in the bottom half of the MLB payroll rankings. That’s 50 percent! And the seven lower-half payroll teams that advanced to the World Series had an average payroll ranking of 21st.

Now, back to Edman …

Edman was traded to the Dodgers in a three-team arrangement that delivered starting pitcher Erick Fedde and platoon bat Tommy Pham to St. Louis. The Cardinals were only 2 and ½ games out of a wild-card spot on the day of the trade, so the desire to improve the team was commendable.

Following wrist surgery and multiple setbacks, Edman didn’t play a single inning for the Cardinals in 2024 and was unable to make his Dodger debut until Aug. 19. But he’s made a significant impact as one of the Dodgers’ leading men in their charge to the World Series. Los Angeles fought off the Padres in a tense, five-game division round series, then dismissed the Mets in a six-game NLCS.

Edman was relatively quiet (.235 average) against San Diego, but went off on the Mets for a .407 average, .393 onbase percentage and .630 slugging percentage in 27 at-bats. Edman put the New Yorkers down with 11 RBIs in the NLCS and was voted series MVP.

For the postseason, Edman’s 12 RBIs put him in a tie with Mookie Betts and are one more than Shohei Ohtani’s 11. Wow.

After the Dodgers completed the deal for Edman, third base coach Dino Ebel got a call from a gentleman you’ve probably heard of: Albert Pujols. And Pujols didn’t hold back in giving his assessment of the move.

“He said you’re going to love this guy because he’s a baseball player,” Ebel told the Los Angeles Times. “He can hit from both sides of the plate, he’s shown some power, he can play short, second and center field.

“He’s fundamentally sound, he makes the routine play, he knows how to run the bases, he can bunt, he can hit-and-run, and he’s got the talent to be on a championship-caliber team and to win a World Series.”

We should be delighted for Edman, who goes about his business with joy and passion. He’s a tough competitor. He doesn’t back off. He’s eager to take on any challenge his team puts on him. Want him to play five or six different positions during a season? No problem. He’s got this. After his last 1 and ½ seasons with the Cardinals, the change must be nice for Edman.

I don’t blame any Cardinal fan for feeling jolts of anger and pangs of frustration after seeing another player leave the STL organization to find more personal (and team) success in a new environment.

But I have no desire to take out a membership in the Redbird chapter of the second-guesser association. Not in Edman’s case. There are plenty of reasons to heap valid criticisms on the St. Louis front office, but this isn’t one of them. The Cardinals did the right thing. As noted earlier, the Cards had an opportunity to make the playoffs at the time of the transaction, and it’s bogus to deny that.

The postseason got out of reach because of an offense that averaged a puny 3.3 runs per game with a .234 average while losing 12 of 17 games in during a frozen state that began Aug. 1. Edman wouldn’t have made a difference, and Fedde is in place for 2025 — or he can be flipped in a trade (possibly) for a good return as the Cardinals begin a rebuilding phase.

Edman wasn’t ready to play by early August, and his belated surgery and long-term absence ruined the plan to have him aligned as the starter in center field. It was the first thing that went wrong for the team in a season that ended too soon – as in, no postseason for the second consecutive year.

The Cardinals paid a large share of his $7 million salary for 2024. Edman will receive a guaranteed $9.5 million in 2025, and can become a free agent after next season.

The Cardinals have an abundance of middle infielders and-or utility types. Those guys are already here, and others will follow. The list includes Masyn Winn, Brendan Donovan, Nolan Gorman, Thomas Saggese, and J.J. Wetherholt, the seventh overall selection in the 2024 draft.

Victor Scott II will get the chance to win the starting job in center field. There is value in the defensive work provided by Michael Siani – a superb center fielder (and baserunner) who can play at any of the three outfield spots. And Chase Davis, only 21, sparked offensively this past season in his second year of pro ball. He’s been used in center in the minors.

Any honest (and realistic) assessment would conclude this: Edman’s time in St. Louis was coming to a close, as the roster churn continues.

Edman was 22 percent above league average offensively as a rookie in 2018, but from 2019 through 2023 his offense tailed off and was five percent below league average over the three seasons.

In his last four active seasons in St. Louis, Edman was 10 percent below league average when facing right-handed pitching. That trend was unlikely to reverse in a lasting way; during the regular season, Edman had a .181 average and .523 OPS for the Dodgers against righties.

An annoying aspect of Edman’s move to Los Angeles is the local overreaction to his amazing NLCS. Everything – good or bad – is magnified and blown up during the postseason. I’m happy for Edman. Everybody should be happy for Edman. But that’s about it. It’s totally fine to mention all of the STL players who have found success in their new homes, but Edman’s case is no reason to bash the Cardinals.

Observers see Edman beating up the Mets for six games, and automatically assume he’d do something similar here … for months at a time during the regular season. As always, large samples are more meaningful and revealing than small samples.

I’m amused (but not surprised) by the selective memories out there. Edman was a hitting machine against the Mets, and that surely presented a dramatic contrast to the dormant offense that the Cardinals dragged into the postseason from 2019 through 2022.

But I see no reason to revise history on that front, either. Edman was part of those Cardinal teams. He had an excellent series against the Braves in the 2019 NLDS … and then … nothing. Or not much.

In the matchup against the Braves, Edman batted .316 with a .381 OBP and .579 slug in five games. He had three doubles, a triple, scored three runs and drove in two. He had two hits, two RBIs and scored three runs in the winner-take-all Game 5, helping to lead St. Louis to a 13-1 blowout. But after that, Edman went 7 for 39 (.180) in his final 10 postseason games as a Cardinal.

Add it all up, and Edman had a career .224/.274/.310 slash line in 15 postseason games for the Redbirds. He’s in a better spot now, and that’s enough. He gives Cardinals fans a reason to root for the Dodgers in this World Series.

As the Cardinals pivot to the future, Edman wouldn’t have been part of the next wave. So I’ll decline to pretend otherwise.

Thanks for reading …

–Bernie

A 2023 inductee into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame, Bernie has provided informed opinions and perspective on St. Louis sports through his columns, radio shows and podcasts since 1985.

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Stats used in my baseball columns are sourced from FanGraphs, Baseball Reference, Statcast, StatHead, Baseball Savant, Baseball Prospectus, Brooks Baseball Net, and Sports Info Solutions unless otherwise noted.