ST. LOUIS (KMOX) - With the official end of the of the 2021 MLB calendar year, the first step of the offseason is the release of players with expiring contracts. The St. Louis Cardinals have seven of them.
All of the seven players are pitchers: Right-hander Luis García and left-handers Jon Lester, Andrew Miller, Kwang Hyun Kim, J.A. Happ, Wade LeBlanc and T.J. McFarland.
The last decision St. Louis can make with them, before they're open to be signed by other teams, is to make each player a qualifying offer. That would be a one-year deal worth $18.4 million, which has to be offered within five days after the conclusion of the World Series.
The Cardinals aren't expected to make that offer to any of the players, seeing as none would be worth that kind of salary. But, some of them could be back in a Cardinals uniform next season.
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It's been reported that St. Louis doesn't have an interest in re-signing Miller or Kim. But Lester, García, LeBlanc, McFarland and Happ all made quite the impression in their half seasons as Cardinals. They bolstered a struggling and injury-torn pitching staff to help clinch a postseason spot, mainly thanks to a franchise-record 17-game winning streak.
St. Louis has a possible starting rotation in 2022 of Jack Flaherty, Adam Wainwright, Miles Mikolas, Dakota Hudson and then a large number of possibilites for the fifth starter's spot (Ryan Helsley, Jordan Hicks, Matthew Liberatore, Johan Oviedo, Zach Thompson and Jake Woodford). But if we learned anything this year, it's that you can never have too much pitching.
If Lester and Happ enjoyed the late run, they would continue to be veteran voices to help an up-and-coming pitching core.
Garcia looked to be like the team's best option as closer late in the year, and LeBlanc and McFarland were some of the Cardinals most-reliable arms in the middle innings, before handing it off to the electric stuff of Genesis Cabrera and Giovanny Gallegoes.
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St. Louis is also expected to not pick up the 2022 team options on infielder Matt Carpenter and pitcher Carlos Martinez. So that would be two more free agents from the 2021 roster.
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