Cardinals and Pujols fail to reach new contract
Posted in Free Agents on February 16th, 2011 by Thomas SchmeltzCardinals slugger Albert Pujols gave his team until Wednesday at 12:00 p.m. to come up with a new contract offer.
According to ESPN.com, the Cardinals failed to meet that deadline.
The news that a new contract was not reached, gives most people reason to believe that the All-Star first basemen will test the free-agent market after this upcoming season, and will most likely seek to become one of baseball’s highest paid players.
The story says:
“A source close to the negotiations told ESPN’s Karl Ravech the biggest issue is not the number of years, but the amount of money the Cardinals offered. St. Louis’ offer would place Pujols in baseball’s top 10 in salary, but not in the top five in average annual salary, the source said.
The two sides have not exchanged contract proposals in about four days, sources told ESPN The Magazine’s Buster Olney, who first reported that talks had broken off.
“We felt very good about the offer we made,” general manager John Mozeliak said.
Sources have previously told Olney that Pujols, who has the right to veto any trade, will not accept any trade going forward.”
Albert Pujols at the plate. (Photo by: www.torontoupdate.com)
Pujols, a nine-time All-star and three-time National League Most Valuable Player, has been a star in baseball since breaking into the league 10 years ago.
He is the only play in major league history to hit 30 or more home runs in each of his first 10 seasons.
The article goes on to clarify the fact that just because the contract negotiations have been halted for now, doesn’t mean that Pujols will not re-sign with the Cardinals the upcoming offseason.
Pujols gave the Cardinals 12:00 p.m. deadline so that his contract negotiations do not cause a distraction to him or his teammates this season.
A quote from Pujols’ agent Dan Lozano confirms this:
“The expiration of today’s deadline does not eliminate the possibility of Albert returning to the Cardinals in 2012, but simply delays negotiations until the conclusion of the Cardinals’ season,” Lozano said.”
