If the St. Louis Cardinals want to make a new appearance for the 2025 season, the contribution of terminator Ryan Helsley is absolutely indispensable, but to this day, the Cardinals have not negotiated a contract extension with him, which makes Helsley a little disappointed.

Since Helsley has five years of major league experience, he will be eligible as a free agent after this season, which also puts him in the postseason along with Erick Fedde and Steven Matz, who also entered the free market after this year's season, as players who could be traded.

However, so far, these three people, including Nolan Arenado, are still in the Cardinals.

Helsley believes that the Cardinals' failure to talk to him about a contract extension is likely a sign that the team wants to trade him out, but Helsley stressed that he would love to stay at St. Louis, but also said that "if only one party wants to sign a contract extension, it won't work."

Even if the Cardinals haven't found a suitable buyer yet, it doesn't mean they want to keep Helsley, after all, if the Cardinals are not in the playoffs before the midseason trade deadline, Helsley will have to be traded, and I believe that there will be a team to pay for it.

The reason why the Cardinals want to use Helsley and others as trade chips is, of course, absolutely related to the club's readiness to reduce salary expenses. Based on Helsley's $8.2 million signing with the Cardinals to avoid salary arbitration, the pitcher, who has played 152 games in the past three years and ended 120 of them with a 1.82 RBA, 82 rescues, a 0.95 base per innings per inning, and a K/9 value of 12.1, will be worth a lot more after he gets free agent status.

Take Tanner Scott, who is still in the free market, for example, in the past three years, he has "only" 54 rescues and a self-responsibility rate of 2.72, and his average annual salary is estimated to be $15 million, both of them are 30 years old, in fact, their birthdays are only 4 days apart, which means that the more stable Helsley should be worth more, and if the contract is renewed, it will have to pay a certain price, and this may be the reason why the Cardinals want to sell highs.