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Well folks, the time has come upon us to undertake the time honored tradition of separating the wizards from the wonks, the shrewd from the silly, the men from the boys…this is the official 2026 TCN St Louis Cardinals Top Prospect Voting Thread!!
We are a little earlier than usual this year, but it’s been a dreary end to the season and I think we all need to dream a little bit on the next generation of Cardinal stars. 14NyQuisT and I will be tag teaming this effort as we will do our best to stay on a schedule…Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday starting on Thursday, October 9th, will be the end times for voting. I will be handling the Tuesday and Thursday tallies, while 14NyQuisT will be doing Sundays. I’ll set the time to close out the voting as noon Central Time each date. This should give folks time to check in and make their picks. I will post a full schedule in the next post for reference.
Last year’s rankings, for clarity’s sake:
1. Quinn Mathews, LHP
2. JJ Wetherholt, IF
3. Tink Hence, RHP
4. Jimmy Crooks, C
5. Michael McGreevy, RHP
6. Thomas Saggese, IF
7. Cooper Hjerpe, LHP
8. Chase Davis, OF
9. Leonardo Bernal, C
10. Chen-Wei Lin, RHP
11. Gordon Graceffo, RHP
12. Tekoah Roby, RHP
13. Sem Robberse, RHP
14. Max Rajcic, RHP
15. Ian Bedell, RHP
16. Matt Svanson, RHP
17. Matt Koperniak, OF
18. Zack Showalter, RHP
19. Cesar Prieto, IF
20. Darlin Saladin, RHP
21. Brian Holiday, RHP
22. Luis Gastelum, RHP
23. Won Bin Cho, OF
24. Jonathan Mejia, IF
25. Sammy Hernandez, C
26. Travis Honeyman, OF
27. Ixan Henderson, LHP
28. Gerardo (Juan) Salas, RHP
29. Yairo Padilla, IF
30. Andre Granillo, RHP
31. Raniel Rodriguez, C
32. Zach Levenson, OF
33. Pete Hansen, LHP
34. Ian Petrutz, OF
35. Ryan Loutos, RHP
36. Andrew Dutkanych IV, RHP
37. Brycen Mautz, LHP
38. Keiverson Ramirez, RHP
39. Ryan Campos, C
40. Hancel Rincon, RHP
41. Jeremy Rivas, IF
42. Nathan Church, OF
43. Joshua Baez, OF
44. Mike Antico, OF
45. Alex Cornwell, LHP
46. Braden Davis, LHP
47. Nelfry Ynfante, RHP
48. Jack Ralston, RHP
49. Edwin Nunez, RHP
50. Leonel Sequera, RHP
51. Michael Watson, LHP
52. Inohan Paniagua, RHP
53. Dakota Harris, IF
54. Bryan Torres, IF/OF
55. Jack Findlay, LHP
56. Jose Davila, RHP
57. Jon Jon Gazdar, IF
58. Adari Grant, IF
59. Drew Rom, LHP
60. Josh Kross, C
61. Branneli Franco, RHP
62. Tre Richardson, IF
63. Angel Cuenca, RHP
64. Alec Willis, RHP
65. Yordelin Pena, OF
66. Trey Paige, IF
67. Facundo Velasquez, OF
68. Jose Suarez, OF
69. Johnfrank Salazar, IF
70. Nolan Sparks, RHP
71. Osvaldo Berrios, RHP
72. Mason Burns, RHPIneligible players from last year’s list: Michael McGreevy, Gordon Graceffo, Matt Svanson.
Guys who made MLB debuts who remain rookie eligible: Nathan Church, Andre Granillo, Jimmy Crooks, Cesar Prieto
Guys who are no longer in the system: Ryan Loutos, Adari Grant, Angel Cuenca
Rules on the votes where will vote for more than 1 player (I’ll refresh this when we get there):
We will vote past #10 on a weighted ballot system. Each set of votes will give “points” to each prospect in descending order of the group we are voting on (if we are voting for 3, the top vote gets 3, second gets 2, last gets 1). As a practical example for votes #31-33:
Player A gets 5 votes at #31, 3 at 32 and 2 at 33 (23 pts)
Player B gets 4 votes at #31, 4 votes at 32 and 2 votes at 33 (22 pts)
Player C gets 1 vote at 31, 1 at 32 and 2 at 33 (7 pts)
Player D gets 0 votes at 31, 2 at 32, 3 at 33 (7 pts)In this example, A is #31 because they got the most points. B is #32 because they got 2nd most. C is #33 because although C and D tied in points, C got more votes at the higher spot. D goes back into the hopper for the next round.
Voting Schedule
Oct 9 #1
Oct 12 #2
Oct 14 #3
Oct 16 #4
Oct 19 #5
Oct 21 #6
Oct 23 #7
Oct 26 #8
Oct 28 #9
Oct 30 #10Nov 2 #11-12
Nov 4 #13-14
Nov 6 #15-16
Nov 9 #17-18
Nov 11 #19-20Nov 13 #21-22
Nov 16 #23-24
Nov 18 #25-26
Nov 20 #27-28
Nov 23 #29-30Nov 25 #31-33
Nov 27 #34-36
Nov 30 #37-39
Dec 2 #40-42
Dec 4 #43-46
Dec 7 #47-50Dec 11 HM (vote for 5, additive list)
Voting is now open for the TCN 2026 Community #1 Prospect. Voting will end at noon CT/1 PM ET on Thursday, October 9th.
#1. JJ Wetherholt
I still need to finish off my full list, but the first few spots I have laid out already at least.
At this point Wetherholt is the only reasonable number 1 pick. He did great at every level and moved through them quickly. He’s rated number 9 overall in the country by Fangraphs. He does almost everything at an incredibly high level except his defense is maybe just a hair above average.
#1. Wetherholt
For those that have done this for many years now, how do you feel the current Cardinals prospects compare to your rankings from prior years? How would you feel this group compares to the rest of the league?
This has tremendous potential to be our first unanimous #1 pick in the storied history of The Cardinal Nation Top Prospect vote. I certainly will follow suit by tabbing Johnathan David Wetherholt at the very top of this year’s vote. As a quick aside, with the names “Jonathan David”, why is he called “JJ” instead of “JD”? Personally, it’s close, but I think “JD Wetherholt” sounds better than “JJ Wetherholt”. Same with ex-Cardinal, JD Drew. JD Drew rolls off the tongue much smoother than JJ Drew.
Anyway, I think with Stlcard25 and NyQuist steering the ship this year, we’re in pretty darn capable hands with absolutely no chances of sinking down deep into the murky depths. And also a tip of the cap to the esteemed Osuagec for firing off the opening salvo and ushering in this year’s vote.
#1. Wetherholt I think he’ll be one of the #1s that will actually work out well. I hope WetherBolt will be around a long time in STL and as usual we’ll all be expecting the most out of him. This guy will deliver.
I will go with Wetherholt at #1 also.
That being said, he’s not a lock to be a difference maker. What we need him to be is a third baseman capable of batting mid or upper part of the lineup. A second baseman who hits 7th would be a let down. He could be either or even neither.
Now the list gets thinner and iffier.
1. JJ Wetherholt for me as well. Like ATM, I have to put some time in to rank the bottom 40 yet! I think our pitchers, especially from Springfield are a marked improvement from last year at this time. There was a lot of unknowns with the young pitching staff that is somewhat clearer now. All in all, I feel better about our prospects this year than last.
#1 for me is JJ Wetherholt as well. He feels like the safest top prospect in a while. He should hit close to .300, hit lots of doubles with 15-20 HRs and play decent defense at 2B. That’s a good regular. There’s more in the tank, of course. Sometimes these good contact guys turn up more power and you’ve got a star on your hands. It would be great to get that from JJ.
Wetherholt is the conventional pick, so I’ll be different and keep last year’s number one there for 2026. Besides we’ve seen the Cardinals overhyped hitting prospects before. I just don’t want to get my hopes too high on Wetherholt too quickly.
1. Quinn Mathews, LHP
If they can’t hit our pitching we win more games. He’s one of three pitchers in the top five on my list. He could be an anchor for the next few years and one the Cardinals really haven’t had in a long while.
We still have over 24 hours to vote. The #1 choice is pretty well set, but I wanted to bump this to make sure that everyone who wants to participate can!!
We came within an eyelash of having our first unanimous #1 selection. When JJ sees that there was not total affirmation on his behalf, it could adversely effect his confidence. This one’s on you, TexasCard.
Thanks PA. We can change my vote to make it unanimous. He has tremendous potential to be a cornerstone for a few years.
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