photo: Alec Burleson, Brendan Donovan (Brian Walton/The Cardinal Nation)
On Thursday, January 8, the St. Louis Cardinals came to terms with all seven arbitration eligible players. They are Alec Burleson, Brendan Donovan, Nolan Gorman, Matthew Liberatore, Lars Nootbaar, Andrew Pallante and JoJo Romero. As a result, they avoid the hearing process to set their 2026 salaries.
Earlier, the team non-tendered two other eligibles, John King and Jorge Alcala, making them free agents.
The following table provides all relevant details, including 2025 salaries, current service time, 2026 salary estimates per MLB Trade Rumors, filing amounts for player and club if they two sides could not agree (not applicable this year), 2026 actual salaries (with the source identified) and the percentage of year-to-year salary increase for the player.
The players are listed from most to least service time. Romero is in his third and final year of arbitration. Nootbaar, Donovan and Pallante are in year two and the other three are first timers.
| Service | 25-26 | ||||||
| Player | 2025 | (yr.days) | 2026 est. | Plyr file | Club file | 2026 actual | incr. % |
| Romero | $2.26 MM | 5.045 | $4.40 MM | $4.26 MM* | 188% | ||
| Nootbaar | $2.95 MM | 4.076 | $5.70 MM | $5.25 MM# | 178% | ||
| Donovan | $2.85 MM | 4.000 | $5.40 MM | $5.80 MM* | 204% | ||
| Pallante | $2.10 MM | 3.145 | $3.40 MM | $4.00 MM# | 190% | ||
| Gorman | $0.79 MM | 3.114 | $2.90 MM | $2.655 MM% | 336% | ||
| Burleson | $0.78 MM | 3.029 | $3.50 MM | $3.30 MM% | 423% | ||
| Liberatore | $0.78 MM | 2.144 (Super 2) | $2.80 MM | $2.26 MM* | 290% | ||
| Total | $12.51 MM | $28.10 MM | $27.53 MM | ||||
| 259% | |||||||
| Source | * Derrick Goold | average | |||||
| # Robert Murray | |||||||
| % Katie Woo |
As one would expect, the least experienced players received the largest year-to-year percentage increases, since they entered the program for the first time. Burleson was tops at 423%, followed by Gorman at 336%. The lowest percentage increase was Nootbaar at 178% with the average increase across the seven a robust 259%.
It sure beats the inflation rate!
For the team, the cost of keeping the seven grew from $12.5 million in 2025 to $27.5 million in 2026.
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