ST. LOUIS -- With only eight games left in the regular season and having been eliminated from playoff contention the night before, the Cardinals decided to place right-hander Sonny Gray on the 15-day injured list Saturday due to right forearm tendinitis, effectively ending his season.

The team emphasized that the move was largely precautionary and that an MRI taken on Gray’s arm Friday showed no structural damage that might suggest a long-term setback.

“Just not worth the risk to roll him out there,” manager Oliver Marmol said. “He’s pitched through some soreness. An MRI came back clean, but there’s still a level of fatigue there that’s not worth it.”

The team filled Gray’s roster spot with reliever Kyle Leahy from Triple-A Memphis on Saturday, but Michael McGreevy will take what would have been Gray’s final start of 2024 on Tuesday against the Rockies.

The move allows the team to evaluate the rookie McGreevy for a possible rotation spot in 2025. He has allowed just one run over 10 innings in his first two appearances -- both wins -- as a Major Leaguer.

Gray, who signed a three-year, $75 million contract with the Cardinals last offseason, leads the team in ERA (3.84), wins (13), strikeouts (203) and WHIP (1.09). He said he would have continued to pitch through the forearm soreness if the team remained in the hunt for a playoff spot. He first reported the soreness after his Sept. 12 start against the Reds.

“I feel OK today, this week, but as we talked about it and when we took a realistic look at where we’re at in the season and the amount of games we had left, what was going to be the smarter thing to do. … I guess we decided to not make the last start and just go on the IL and have another arm come up and finish this thing out,” Gray said.

The Cardinals put fellow veteran Lance Lynn on the IL just three days earlier in a similarly precautionary move.

“It’s nothing that I’m overly concerned about, especially after getting MRIs and whatnot,” Gray said. “I think it was just taking an evaluation of where we’re at, but I think everyone probably has had some forearm tendinitis if they’ve pitched for a while.”