Barring anything extreme happening in the next four days, Kyle McClellan and Brian Barton will both be on the team on opening day.  Juan Gonzales will not be on the team.  Cliff Polittle and Chris Perez were reassigned to minor league camp this morning.  Hugo Castellanos hasn't been reassigned yet, but will not make the team.

The only remaining questions are the final infield spot -- if Brendan Ryan is healthy enough it will go to him, otherwise D'Angelo Jiminez -- and the final bullpen spot which will go to either Kelvin Jiminez or Anthony Reyes.

Per Rosenthal:

Scott Rolen is on the verge of escaping St. Louis manager Tony La Russa. Troy Glaus is on the verge of escaping the artificial turf in Toronto.

The Cardinals and Blue Jays are closing in on an exchange of their third basemen, major-league sources say, but both former All-Stars must pass physicals before a deal is completed.

Those physicals are no small issue since Rolen is coming off surgery on his right shoulder and Glaus surgery on his left foot.

While both players have agreed to waive their no-trade clauses, the differences in their contracts also might need to be resolved, most likely through a cash payment from the Cardinals to the Blue Jays.

Update [2008-1-12 14:31:1 by lboros]: well, here's another leg for the la-russa-runs-the-club theory to stand on . . . . glaus is clearly a better hitter than rolen at this point; he has outhomered and out-rbi'd rolen in each of the last 3 seasons, outslugged and out-OBP'd him in 2 of the last 3:

	ab	hr	rbi	avg	obp	slg
glaus 07	385	20	62	.262	.366	.473
rolen 07	392	8	58	.265	.331	.398
glaus 06	540	38	104	.252	.355	.513
rolen 06	521	22	95	.296	.369	.518
glaus 05	538	37	97	.258	.363	.522
rolen 05	196	5	28	.235	.323	.383

he'd give the cardinals a true 30-hr bat (something rolen hasn't been since 2004), plus he's younger than rolen and is on a shorter contract, which is a good thing when you're discussing over-30 players with health issues.

UZR does not like glaus's glove, but all the other systems (PMR, enhanced ZR, dewan's +/-) have him as an above-average defender --- not quite as good as rolen, but within 5 runs a year or so. not sure why the blue jays would want to make this deal --- maybe glaus' foot problems are serious enough that they expect a precipitous decline --- but it looks like an advantageous move for the cards on every front. even if rolen and la russa were bosom buddies, this would be a good trade.

although i'd rather get back a young player like adam laroche . . . . . .

Update [2008-1-12 14:54:3 by lboros]: i just took a look at glaus's game log from last year. he abruptly stopped hitting in mid-july ---- went .220 / .333 / .384 over his last 44 games and then had season-ending surgery. maybe that's why the blue jays are ready to dump him.

Cards name MLB exec. as assistant GM
ASSOCIATED PRESS
12/03/2007

John Abbamondi left the baseball commissioner's office on Monday and was hired as assistant general manager of the St. Louis Cardinals.

He replaces John Mozeliak, who was promoted to general manager on Oct. 31.

Abbamondi spent the last four seasons working for Major League Baseball in New York, most recently as senior director of labor economics. Abbamondi with teams on salary arbitration, player contracts and negotiations, and revenue sharing.

"We are excited to add someone with a large amount of background and expertise," Mozeliak said. "John brings a lot of experience to the organization, not only in arbitration matters, but also in contract valuation and many other skills that will add greatly to our baseball operations."

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/sports/stories.nsf/cardinals/story/D7A2CDEAA96F7A60862573A6006EE54C ?OpenDocument

AMERICAN LEAGUE AL
 C     Jorge Posada, NYY
1B     Carlos Pena, TB
2B     Placido Polanco, DET
3B     Alex Rodriguez, NYY
SS     Derek Jeter, NYY
OF     Vladimir Guerrero, LAA
OF     Ichiro Suzuki, SEA
OF     Magglio Ordonez, DET
DH     David Ortiz, BOS

NATIONAL LEAGUE NL
C     Russell Martin, LAD
1B     Prince Fielder, MIL
2B     Chase Utley, PHI
3B     David Wright, NYM
SS     Jimmy Rollins, PHI
OF     Carlos Beltran, NYM
OF     Matt Holliday, COL
OF     Carlos Lee, HOU
P     Micah Owings, ARI

But hey, one former Card.  Congratulations to Polanco.  It's hard to be upset about these as opposed to the Gold Gloves, the only players who could really be argued for here are Pujols and Wainwright.  Wainwright had a pretty great offensive year for a pitcher, but Owings was retarded good.  I'd argue that Pujols was a more complete hitter than Fielder (nice sub-.300 average, chubs), but it's not called the silver SLUGGER for naught.

Per the Newark Star Ledger:

"[The Yankees] need a third baseman and a cleanup hitter, but there have already been discussions on those fronts. The Yankees have held internal talks about how much it would take to sign Mike Lowell away from Boston, or whether the Cardinals' Scott Rolen could be had in a trade."

Now, for such a trade to work Rolen would have to waive his no-trade clause.  It's been speculated here and otherwise that he would do so to get away from TLR, but there's no way any of us know that for sure.  He doesn't really strike me as a New York kind of guy, but for the purpose of this diary let's assume he'd  be willing to do so.

The pros and cons, after the jump.

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Per mlbtraderumors.com:

Big news!  The Tigers made an early strike to improve the shortstop position by acquiring Edgar Renteria for youngsters Jair Jurrjens and Gorkys Hernandez.

The Tigers will owe Renteria roughly $6.3MM in '08 and have a good chance of exercising his $11MM option for '09.  They've added a five-win shortstop in Renteria.

Let me preface this by saying I'm not at all opposed to Brendan Ryan being the starting shortstop next season.  And no, I don't expect him to put up numbers as good as he did this season, but even with some regression, he'll be making league minimum and putting up numbers similar to that of this season's FA crop.

Trading for a shortstop could be one thing.  Not Jack Wilson, who Ryan's like to outperform in 08.  But Renteria or Tejada could be good stopgap options.  Even with the organization going young, it's not as though there's a sure hit shortstop prospect they'd be blocking--barring a prospect trade, Ryan's the best this system is going to have to offer for at least the next three years.  And that's if Kozma doesn't turn out to be a bust.  What are the other options?  Tyler Greene?  Juan Lucerne?  AAAA players at best.  I just don't think the organization has the pieces to pull off such a trade, and if they did they should probably be trading for a pitcher anyhow.

But interesting enough to at least make note of, two new names could be entering the 2008 free agent pool.  

Out of the Yomiuri Giants of Japan, Tomohiro Nioka is starting to generate a little buzz.  Fellow Giant Koji Uehara is coming to the MLB this season and there's talk that Nioka might follow suit.  He's 31 years old, and his stats can be found here.
In just over 500 at bats this season Nioka hit .295/.346/.457 with 20 HR.  Signing a foreign player is always a gamble, as there's no way to know for sure how the numbers will translate.  Still, he looks like he'd be worth a look.  I have absolutely no clue what kind of salary this guy would get here, or how many years he'd want.  At 31, he's not a fossil, but may not be keeping in line with our organization's plans to go young.

But another player possibly entering the MLB this year out of Cuba, Alexei Ramirez, is a mere 26 years old.  Ramirez played on the 2004 gold medal team in Athens, and was the star of last year's Cuban World Baseball Classic team that finished second to Japan.  He hit .335 with 20 home runs this season for his Cuban team.  Gaudy numbers, though I believe the Cuban league is comparable to low A ball as far as the level of competition is concerned.  He's primarily a shortstop, but has spent time at center field.  

Maybe it's just the mystery behind these guys that's appealing.  I know that Caesar Izturis sucks, whereas these two players are new and interesting.  I think Ramirez at least would be worth a look by the team.

What does everyone hope for the Cardinals to accomplish this offseason?  Obviously the biggest need is pitching, but perhaps some other upgrades are possible.

Try to keep the moves at least quasi-realistic.  Here's what I'd like to see:

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(Long time reader here, just registered and started posting recently.. first attempt at a diary so bear with me)

I don't normally follow our minor league affiliates too closely, at least not since moving to St. Louis from Memphis, where I regularly attended Redbirds games during the Stubby Clapp era (in doing research for this diary I was pleased to see the Redbirds retired his jersey!), but with all of our recent problems it seems inevitable that someone be given a chance at a major league level.  

Thanks to azruavatar over at Future Redbirds, an excellent little blog for these kinds of purposes.

Poll

Who would you give the call to?

4%

John Rodriguez

5 votes

7%

My dead grandmother

9 votes

4%

No one - our outfield situation can't be improved

5 votes

12%

Rick Ankiel

15 votes

57%

Ryan Ludwick

67 votes

5%

Amaury Marti

6 votes

2%

Nick Stavinoha

3 votes

5%

Joe Mather

6 votes

116 votes | Poll has closed

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