What's the most $$ Cardinals would pay to move Arenado ?

[renostl]

20 million they will have to eat

Seems about right.
The money is scheduled to be gone. That to me is makes it more about
what they save. They save a little over $20 million if your guess is correct.
Like a expense getting cut in half and then the bill goes away.

[Carp4Cy]

Not enough to enhance his trade value. Getting him out of the lineup has great value in its own. It allows some flexibility for a roster deep with infielders.

No it doesn't. We don't have someone who can produce at Nolan's '22 levels which is what we need. And Gorman/Saggese et al still don't have the defense of Nolan even today.

Sign Suarez or find another outside option for 3b longterm, then we can trade him.

Suarez is gone. You apparently have not bought into letting the young guys play.

He's a FA in 2 months. Entirely young/homegrown teams don't win many pennants. And we are going to have a (bleep) ton of dry powder to sign a real MOTO bat. It needs to be spent over the winter.

They are not spending any big money till after the labor contract is settled.

He's not young. Give him 2 years high AAV with an option. we can afford 2026 and 2027 will be Moot if we lose the season to a lockout. There's not a big downside here.