Will Leitch, Sports on Earth: "The Cardinals are a lousy fielding team, a lousy baserunning team and a lousy … well, just a lousy fundamental team. I know that fundamentals aren't in vogue, but when you watch the Cards play every day, they are sloppy and lackadaisical and all together ugly. They lose games because of mental lapses . . . and dumb errors and odd managerial decisions. They find new ways, seemingly every night, to lose. There is talent here, particularly in that rotation. If the Cardinals could tighten up their sloppy play, they could still make a run in this division. But when's the last time you saw a team suddenly turn from this error-prone to fundamentally sound midseason? The Cards bear little resemblance to their solid, reliable teams of the past. And as talented as they are, they don't have enough talent to overcome their daily brainfarts. No team is at a more pivotal moment right now than the Cardinals. The Brewers and Reds are still building; the Pirates have a ton of young talent; the Cubs are still the Cubs. What are the Cards? What's the plan? What are they, exactly? That question is far from being answered, and until it is, this team looks like what it record says it is: Mediocre."