This article is a result of a bunch of data queries I wrote to explore the idea you are about to read about. So it will be a little dense with data, hopefully not too much so. I purposely scheduled it for the holiday weekend, thinking people might be looking for something a little more in-depth and perhaps have a bit more time to ruminate on it. The original article got so long that I had to split it, otherwise it would have rivaled Oedipus Rex in length. This first part sets the stage for what kind of stars (and how many) does a good team need.
The St. Louis Cardinals have some work to do to be competitive in 2026
