The St. Louis Cardinals are hanging around in the playoff race at 47-40, and they’ve got a 24-year-old outfielder to thank for a lot of that. Jordan Walker is having the kind of season that makes you forget the growing pains.
On Sunday, Walker crushed his 20th home run of the year in a 6-4 loss to the Chicago Cubs. That blast made him just the second Cardinal ever to reach 20 homers and 10 stolen bases in the first 87 games of a season. The other guy? Albert Pujols back in 2009, according to MLB.com’s Sarah Langs. Not bad company for a kid who was hitting .215 as recently as last season.
Walker drove in all four of St. Louis’s runs on Sunday. He hit a three-run homer in the first inning and added a sacrifice fly later. The team still lost, but they’ve won five of seven lately, so the vibe isn’t doom and gloom. They head to Milwaukee next, and Walker’s bat is the engine.
His season line so far: .292 average, 20 homers, 67 RBIs, 11 steals. He leads the Cardinals in every one of those categories. It’s a massive leap from 2025, when he hit .215 with six homers and 41 RBIs. Back then, people were wondering if the top prospect hype was ever going to materialize. Turns out it just took a minute.
Walker was the No. 1 prospect in the Cardinals system in 2023 and the fourth-best in all of baseball. But his first three MLB seasons were a grind. He struggled to adjust, got sent down a couple times, and looked like he might be one of those guys who never quite puts it together at the plate. Now? He looks like the guy everyone thought he’d be.
The Cardinals have him under team control for years, which is huge for a franchise that’s trying to rebuild without fully bottoming out. If Walker keeps hitting like this, that rebuild could get sped up way faster than anyone expected. And for a team that’s still in the hunt at the trade deadline, that’s about as good as news gets.
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