A Second Look At Keeping Pujols

There have been two major signings since my last post about the economies of keeping Albert Pujols on the Cardinals in 2012 and beyond. Carpenter and the Cardinals agreed to a 2-year extension worth a total of about $21M and Lance Berkman resigned for one year and $12M. I also realized that I had been severely underestimating the salary that our CF-turned-2b makes. Schumaker is on a 2 year $4.7M contract. Let's enter in those salaries for 2012 and see where we are.

Holliday $17M ($120M over 7 years)
Molina $7M - assumes they pick up the team option for this amount
Wainwright $9M - just exercised his option + 2013 at $12M
Lohse $10.25M ($41M over 4 years)
Westbrook $8M ($16M over 2 years)
Garcia $7M ($27M over 4 years)
Berkman $12M
Carpenter $10M ($21 over 2 years)

That's $80.25M over 8 players not named Pujols.

Now let's pay our rookies and 2nd year players.
Craig $450k
Jay $450k
Freese $450k
Descalso $450k
Boggs $450k
Motte $450k
Salas $450k
Rzepzkyski $450k

That $3.6M is still going a long way. The Cardinals now have 16 players out of 25 with a total salary of $83.85M.

Factor in McClellan, Schumaker and a backup C. I thought that would run us about $4M. I think that Skip will almost get that alone. So let's bump it up to $6M for those 3 guys. (TOTAL = $89.85M for 19 players).

The 6 remaining spots are:
1B
SS
RP
RP
IF
OF

The veteran in the bullpen is McClellan. Probably need a little experience out there. Still think that will run about $5M. Is it time for Tyler Greene to move from AAAA to the Big Leagues? If so, he is cheap at about $450k. Sanchez comes back to the pen at his rookie salary ($450k). Nick Punto again as your backup infielder? He can't be making more than $1M, right? Some journeyman OF to spell CF when Jay needs a break might set the club back about $3M. So to fill all of those spots with basically a hope and a prayer will cost just about $10M. That leaves just about $20M left to fill 1B (again, assuming the salary level for the team is increased to only $120M).

The Cardinals are moving forward with their plans and forcing Albert a bit. "Albert, if you really like it here, here's what you can get". "We don't have any more money and we have a good supporting cast for you" - I see Mo saying this to Albert and his agent. Interesting how it is all unfolding. If Albert stays, be ready for lots of young players again in 2012. If Albert leaves, some of these holes can be plugged up with some other veteran talent.