St. Louis Cardinals: Pre-Lockout Roster Moves
The MLB deadline to tender/non-tender contracts came & went with the deadline being Tuesday night. The St. Louis Cardinals tendered contracts to seven of the eight players who were arbitration-eligible.
Of those seven, were pitchers Jack Flaherty, Dakota Hudson, Jordan Hicks, Alex Reyes and Giovanny Gallegos and Gold Glove outfielders Harrison Bader & Tyler O’Neill.
Those players are allowed to negotiate their salaries for the upcoming 2022 season, (with a deadline of January 14) to accept or the salary will be determined via an arbitration panel. At which time they decide on either the team or player’s offer as the set salary for year.
While this is the first time that Gallegos, Hudson & O’Neill have been up for arbitration, it is the second time for Flaherty, Bader, Hicks & Reyes.
Last season, Flaherty won his arbitration case when it went to a hearing as the Cardinals countered his $3.9M offer with one worth $3M, and the panel sided with the player. Despite missing time due to injury last year, Jack is projected to get around $5M in this arbitration process with the others being somewhere in the $1M-$4M range.
The lone Cardinal to not get tendered a contract was 27-year old utility player Jose Rondon. He was offered and signed a deal with the club prior to the 2021 season and went on to play in 63 games for St. Louis with a slashline of .263/.322/.413.
If no team signs him this off-season, there is always a chance that the Cardinals could offer a similar deal to last year’s.
However, with infielders Brendan Donovan & Juan Yepez being added to the team’s 40 man roster, the signing of SS Anderson Tejada to a minor league deal last month, and the potential of signing a bench player via free agency, a return of Rondon seems unlikely.