St. Louis Cardinals exercise their remaining options – MLB News
The St. Louis Cardinals made Octavio Dotel and Rafael Furcal free agents after the team did not choose to exercise their remaining contract options for the year. With the new two-year deal that the Cardinals exercised for their starter Chris Carpenter, the
team is now formally done with all of their options.
If the option was exercised, Rafael Furcal would get a 12-million-dollar deal. Add to it the option of Octavio Dotel who might have made 3.5-million-dollars were it to go ahead. But the club decided to go for Yadier Molina who, in 2012 will make 7-million-dollars.
Chris Carpenter’s option was exercised on Adam Wainwright and the latter was replaced. Wainwright, the right-hand starting pitcher for the St. Louis Cardinals got unfit prior to the commencement of the regular season, triggering a huge concern for the team’s
defence.
He underwent the Tommy John surgery on his right arm as he had a huge difficulty hurling and batting in February this year, prompting the St. Louis Cardinals to announce the pitcher was out for the whole year.
With the surgery that he had to go through, it will take him 12 to 15 months to recover. As the surgery was later announced as successful, his 2012 option will be not vested because he was on the disabled list for the whole 2011 season.
The 2009 Gold Glove Award Winner, selected for the All-Star game in 2010, remained the World Series Champion in 2010 and having a 2.97 ERA with 724 strike-outs, as Wainwright was considered the backbone of the Cardinals. However, fate did not favour his
appearance in the season
It is important to recall that previously it was Kyle McClellan, Jaime Garcia and Chris Carpenter that had undergone this surgery performed by George Paletta.
With the all options that the St. Louis Cardinals decided to exercise, especially after retirement of the team manager Tony La Russa, it is interesting to see how the players maintain their form and exhibit the kind of play they had in 2011. As the new team
manager is to be expected soon, all these players will have a new guide to carry the day.
Tags: