If there's one word the St. Louis Cardinals attempted to hammer home over the past season, it's "runway." Jordan Walker and Nolan Gorman received runway to see if they could succeed as major league players. Matthew Liberatore earned runway to see if he could stick in the Cardinals rotation. Victor Scott had runway to see if he could be the Cardinals' everyday center fielder.
Some of these questions were answered in the affirmative and others in the negative, and still more remain up in the air. In 2026, the Cardinals will roll out the runway once again — except instead of the players, it will be the man in charge of assembling the roster whom the team will provide extensive leeway as the Cardinals look to get back on track from everything that went awry during John Mozeliak's final years directing the club.