Why Oli Marmol is growing on me as the manager of the Cardinals

For a team in transition as big salaries fall off over the next three years, he's a good fit.

Do you think Oli Marmol thought he was going to be the manager of the St. Louis Cardinals when the 2021 season ended?

Granted, bench coaches are basically setup pieces for potential fired managers, but Marmol couldn’t have thought the team was going to fire Mike Shildt after the season the Cardinals put together following the return to normalcy after a very odd pandemic-shortened season. It’s the benefit of doubt that fans and sometimes writers can’t afford to lend a new manager, which affected my initial critique of Marmol’s managing skills.

You can tell me they learn those leadership abilities at the lower levels, but the minor leagues are a different planet, pressure wise, from coaching very young players who may or may not make it to the show someday. Marmol was thrown into the job like Kamala Harris was tossed into a Presidential campaign--with only a few months to prepare and most people already thinking you’d either suck at it or were half a robot. Some things take time to gauge. While the Democratic candidate failed, the baseball manager still has a chance to return to better ground.

Marmol was thrust into the job, but he did have the majority of an offseason to prepare. Then again, most of that winter before the 2022 season was spent on the mysterious conditions of Shildt’s departure instead of his arrival. It takes some getting used to, even for a guy who was already in the team’s organization for a long time. He carried a similarly successful minor league managing record like his predecessor and crafted an impressive debut season.

And then the wheels fell off.

The team went from a 91-win team to a 71-win team, extending the painful feeling of reaching the 2022 playoffs without a single postseason win into a currently living dwelling of also ran status. 2023 went in the other direction, and the following year wasn’t enough of an improvement. A 12-win improvement only forced the impending initiative to overhaul the team’s talent evaluation system. Marmol went from the new guy who looked like a talking head puppet being installed by John Mozeliak and Bill DeWitt Jr-the details of Shildt’s pushback fueled this point of view-to a guy who could be easily shelved before he could even begin to build his own team.

But the Cardinals extended him before the 2024 season, taking away the potential firing bullet from the team if things went very sour. The note of confidence translated to a chance to manage the unpredictable 2025 bunch, an underdog logo that Marmol is proudly wearing as spring training unfolds. More so than his rushed 2022 arrival, he looks more at peace and ease with the role and that includes wheeling and dealing some comedy with local radio stations.

Could you imagine Tony La Russa sitting down and reading off the text screen from The Morning After, a list of sentences that bends the corner from sports to porn in a matter of segments? No way. Don’t take that last sentence at TMA; I like that show a lot and also understand it’s not for any sports manager. But there was Marmol last week, reading one that roasted him for a June 6 game decision, which got a hearty chuckle from the radio crew and the manager himself. In a time where playoff baseball may not be on the forecast, you need that kind of candid fun from the skipper.

This is going to be more Marmol’s team than the one he took over with each passing season. Players like Masyn Winn, Jordan Walker, Nolan Gorman, Alec Burleson, Ivan Herrera, and Victor Scott II are all Oli managerial era starters who will begin a new ascent this summer. Nolan Arenado and Willson Contreras are in there along with Miles Mikolas, but the rotation and bullpen will begin to be shaped under a different leader’s watch.

Slowly but surely, Marmol is growing on me. It’ll be a big factor to see what kind of manager he is under a new President of Baseball Operations. Bill DeWitt III may be speaking more often in public events and on radio appearances, but one can hope that baseball decisions fall to a man named Chaim. Mr. Bloom will get a fresh slate on Marmol, or at least a new kind of working relationship. Bloom has worked with current P.O.B.O. John Mozeliak for the past few years, so he definitely knows Marmol and has evaluated his performance with the team from a certain point of view.

But a manager and the guy who oversees the baseball operations of a youth-infused, bad contract-less reformation will build their own lingo, shorthand, and more importantly, trust. Marmol could be a different guy under Bloom, unless the 2025 season somehow gets worse or diverts back to 2023 mode.

Instead of asking for his departure, I’m fine with shedding Mozeliak after this year and getting the answer to the ultimate question that has been on my mind and most likely several other minds since Nov. 2022: What kind of manager exactly is Oli Marmol?

He has the fire that is shown in ejections. He looks after his teammates, and they love him back. He has shown the candid nature that a city needs in a manager of a team they are asked to love again. Marmol has the directness with the media that has improved each of the past three seasons. 2025 is #4 and hopefully, Oli gets 2026 to set his feet.

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Unless the team makes a new hire or changes their ways, seeing what Oli Marmol has in store with a team that is becoming more his will be an intriguing storyline to follow this season.