JUPITER, Fla. — Last week, on an otherwise sunny day here, a Cardinals fan began to share his thoughts on Nolan Gorman. The dude was sure down on him. The strikeouts, the batting average, the fan was ready to move on.

It’s interesting how moods shift. A year ago at this time, Gorman was the next big thing, the club’s top minor leaguer, this newfangled prospect built with modern hitting technology who, fittingly, was the first player ever drafted who was born in the 21st century. But now, to that fan — and, as seen on social media, many other fans — Gorman had lost some luster.

So, I’ll just say it.

He was 22!

Gorman was only 22 last year. Did I think he’d have a higher OPS than .721? Yes. But I don’t get the idea of “moving on” from Gorman. In fact, he’s still 22! He turns 23 on May 10.

Can you possibly have your cake and eat it, too — as in, can new top prospect Jordan Walker become a great player and Gorman become a great player?

The way Gorman approaches at-bats, he probably will forever have a lot of strikeouts and a low batting average. But he’s going to mash — he hit 30 combined homers last year in Class AAA (16) and the majors (14).

And check out this stat: Weighted on-base average (wOBA) is well-respected in baseball circles. It’s like on-base percentage, except a player is rewarded for getting on more bases at one time (in other words, homers, triples and doubles are weighted higher than singles and walks).

So the expected wOBA stat is based on each player’s batted-ball data. Last season, MVP Paul Goldschmidt had an expected wOBA of .367. Nolan Arenado’s was .339. Nolan Gorman’s? It was .341!

“That means he hit the ball, but it just happened to be at a lot of guys,” teammate Tommy Edman said.

And in 2023, with the shift now nixed, lefty hitters like Gorman won’t be hitting into a defense that looks like a dime package.

I’m not sitting here saying that Gorman will be better than his Nolan namesake. I’m simply saying that Gorman should be better this season.

Of course, that’s when he plays.

Brendan Donovan, with his new Gold Glove, will likely start many games at second base. But Gorman can be the lefty-hitting designated hitter against right-handed pitchers. Is this guaranteed? Of course not — Gorman will have to produce in Florida first.

“I’ve been using a lot of Blast and Rapsodo (technology) — and watching a lot of video,” Gorman said while walking to his car after a workout in Jupiter. “A lot of video. For the most part, it’s just been — feel and video and making sure that the feel is real.”

Wait, what does that mean, “the feel is real?”

“Like, the feel that I have when I swing, that it matches up with what it should look like in the video,” he said. “Blast has kept me making sure I’m on the right track. Attack angles, vertical bat angles, stuff like that. Swing speed, got to keep that up as much as possible.”

His 2022 average exit velocity (89.2 mph) was sandwiched on the leaderboard with the likes of Francisco Lindor, Andrew Benintendi and DJ Lemahieu. And his barrel percentage on batted balls? Best on the Cardinals at 14.4%. Of course, other Cardinals had more at-bats and, thus, more batted balls. But for consideration, Lars Nootbaar came in second (12.1%), followed by Albert Pujols (12%), Goldschmidt (11.6%) and Tyler O’Neill (11.3%). So it’s encouraging stuff.

“He’s an ultra-talented player,” Edman said. “And it’s not like he struggled the whole year. He came out of the gate super-hot — showed what he can do, like, right away. And obviously everybody has slow stretches. So I think just the fact that it ended on one of those stretches probably left a bad taste in people’s minds. But I think if you look back at when he first got called up, he was just crushing everything. So I think there’s definitely no reason to sour on him. He’s still got all the talent in the world. I think he’s going be a great hitter for us.”

Asked his positional preference, Gorman said he’d prefer to be at second base than designated hitter. He wants to help the club as much as possible, and he’s confident in his growth with the glove. We’ll see how often he wears gloves other than batting gloves. But from the batter’s box, Gorman — along with Nootbaar, Donovan and switch-hitters Edman and Dylan Carlson — could provide quite a bit of left-handed offense (the Cards were seventh in the NL in slugging percentage while batting lefty, while third in slugging percentage while batting righty).

“Gorman is still very young; he’s still making adjustments,” said John Mozeliak, the Cardinals president of baseball operations. “But there’s so much upside and so much excitement around him, especially internally, that it’s just like — give him a chance. Go out and play right and do your thing. Now, do you have to make adjustments and be learning as you go? Of course. But he is someone that loves the game of baseball. He focuses on the game of baseball. I think maybe the greatest compliment you can give a player is — he’s truly a student of the game.”