51ºÚÁÏ

But the bearded brainiac actually has a connection to modern Major League Baseball, thanks to, well, baseball’s forebear of bearded brainiacs, the legendary stat man Bill James.

So, follow me on this. James created the Pythagorean winning percentage (or Pythagorean win-loss record) for MLB teams. It predicts what a team’s record should actually be, based on runs scored and runs allowed. Feel free to skip this sentence, but the Pythagorean W-L formula is: (runs scored %5E 1.83)/[(runs scored %5E 1.83) + (runs allowed %5E 1.83)].

Here’s how it’s utilized. Quite simply, the Padres entered Saturday with an 80-68 record — and an 80-68 Pythagorean W-L. So, manager Mike Shildt’s club and players essentially are who they are. Meanwhile, the White Sox are 57-91 and their Pythagorean W-L record is 66-82, so they’re even worse than the data says they should be.

Which leads us to the Cardinals and manager Oli Marmol. 51ºÚÁÏ entered Saturday at 72-76 — but the Pythagorean W-L was 69-79. Thus, Marmol’s club is actually three games better than it should be, per this particular metric. In fact, the Cards are the seventh-best over-producing team in baseball. And then consider that 51ºÚÁÏ lost its past four games, so the Pythagorean W-L might’ve been even better just a week ago.

Oh, and in 2024, Marmol had the best difference between W-L and Pythagorean W-L in baseball. The Cards went 83-79, which was seven wins better than the 76-86 predicted. Again, the biggest positive gap for all teams in Major League Baseball.

With two flawed rosters, young rosters, redundant rosters and transitioning rosters, Marmol has found a way to overachieve twice (relatively speaking, of course).

Imagine what he’d do with a stacked roster? Oh yeah, we know the answer, because he had one in 2022 and won 93 games.

I know there are still some “Oli Haters� out there. And even he has admitted that he’s still growing as a manager. But I feel he should be the Cardinals manager going forward, 2026 and beyond.

What we don’t know is — does Chaim Bloom have a guy?

Maybe the new president of baseball operations already earmarked a fellow to take over the dugout when Bloom takes over the front office this autumn. Or maybe Bloom is waiting until season’s end to see what potential managers are available. Or, heck, maybe he’s all in on Oli like I am. We’ll see. If not, hopefully he’ll consider Marmol, because as I’ve written multiple times in the past 12 months, I really believe Marmol has the managerial makeup to be a great one in this game.

He’s shown it this season specifically with his superb deployment of his relief pitchers. The Cardinals’ bullpen has a 3.56 ERA. That’s fifth-best in baseball behind only the Royals, Red Sox, Giants and Padres. And the Cardinals traded their top-three relievers at the deadline! In fact, since the deadline passed, 51ºÚÁÏ relievers have a 3.59 ERA. Incredible, right? Credit to Marmol and pitching coach Dusty Blake, for pressing the right button, time and again, with some unproven high-leverage arms.

This brilliant bullpen-ing has helped keep a bad team afloat. As we know, the young Cardinals don’t have many, what you would call, good hitters. Or home run hitters. Yet the Cards were at .500 as recently as last Sunday, even though some of the better bats, be it Alec Burleson or Brendan Donovan or Willson Contreras, have missed numerous games in recent weeks (a lot of times, when people list the Cards’ recent injured hitters, they throw in Nolan Arenado, but considering he’s a .660 OPS guy, it’s not like they’re missing much offensively from the 2025 version of “Nado.�).

And their pitch-to-contact starting pitching has been brutal — the Cards starters have the third-fewest strikeouts, the fifth-lowest ERA and the eighth-lowest WHIP. And in games started by Miles Mikolas, Andre Pallante and Erick Fedde (including some forced Fedde starts near the deadline), the Cardinals’ record is 32-53.

And as 51ºÚÁÏ painfully knows, there isn’t much starting pitching depth in the minor leagues (especially after Tekoah Roby had to get elbow surgery). So Marmol’s options have been limited all season — and still, this club is hovering around .500.

And finally, regarding Marmol, I’ll repeat a sentiment I’ve written before. In my 23 years so far as a professional sportswriter, I’ve gotten to know dozens of managers, coaches and assistants. Marmol stands out, man. The way he thinks — and the way he talks about what he thinks — is next-level. He masterfully understands baseball and people. He cherishes 51ºÚÁÏ Cardinals tradition and history. And he yearns to create more.

The Cards return to town for six final home games this coming week. Maybe it’ll be the last we see of Marmol. But here’s hoping, like Chaim Bloom, his 51ºÚÁÏ story is just getting started.