Oh, Albert!

As an avid Cardinals fan I am less than optimistic about the 2004 season and beyond. As much as I love Busch Stadium, I am excited about the new one they are building. I looks like it could be pretty nice. The only down side to the stadium project, and it is quite a down side, is that the owners will be able to use this as an excuse.

Fan: Why can't we sign any real free agents?

Owner: We have to spend most of our money right now on the stadium.

Fan: Why are you raising ticket prices so much?

Owner: Well the state didn't give us enough financing for the new stadium.

Fan: Why aren't we staying competitive with Houston and Cincinnati and Chicago?

Owner: We won't be able to free up enough money until the new stadium is paid for.

Fan: (muddled whimper of despair)

Owner: (maniacal laugh)

I can only hope that our new stadium doesn't end up with a crappy new name. I can just see it now: The brand new "Paul Allen is going to find a new and more exciting way to screw your and your family by raising cable prices because he paid a gagillion dollars to name it Charter Stadium Stadium." Gussie Busch would be rolling in his grave.

Well this all brings us to our newest concern facing the Cardinals, Albert Pujols' arbitration. I don't know where to start. I will save my rant on the evils of the arbitration system in baseball some other time though. I was hoping that when people though of the Cardinals they would think of the Gas House Gang, Stan The Man, the Wizard, and Albert Pujols. Things now are not looking so well on that front.

We all knew that it would cost the Cardinals a lot of money to pay Albert now that he is arbitration eligible. Mr. Pujols has seen a string of players come through the Cardinals farm system get traded away, from Placido Polanco to J.D. Drew to Eli Marrero. He has also recently seen the Cardinals seemingly let some of their role players just walk away for no good reason. It seems that he was just as surprised as I was when the Cardinals did not resign Eduardo Perez after he became our best bench player. Now Pujols is afraid that down the road the Cardinals would treat him the same way.

Now, I wish that I could speak for the organization, but as a fan I hope they are with me on this one. Albert is different than those other guys. J.D. and Eli had their injury struggles. Everyone has waited for them to reach their full potentials, but we can only wait so long. Eduardo hopefully will get a chance to show his stuff everyday for the hapless Devil Rays. Placido was a tough one to let go, but under the circumstances we did get the best third baseman in the game in return.

Albert however is different than them. He is the real deal. Now things do happen. Players do get hurt. Players like Don Mattingly or more recently Nomar Garciaparra seem to flatten out after injuries that stifled what could have been hall of fame careers. (Note: I am not closing the book yet on Nomar, but Boston almost did this off-season.)

Regardless, the Cardinals, Albert Pujols, and the fans have all bonded. We are a family. Albert, and his agent, and the Cardinals organization need to recognize that. The organization seemed to be doing their part by offering a 5 year, $55 million contract. Albert however turned it down, stating that he would not offer the Cardinals a "hometown discount" for his services because he does not trust them from a business perspective.

Maybe they deserve not to be trusted. Maybe baseball organizations as a whole deserve that fate, but I always hoped that maybe we were a little better than the average organization. But, of course, the Cardinals do not play their games in New York, or Los Angeles, or Chicago, or some other big city. They play in St. Louis. We obviously do not have as much money as those organizations, and we apparently have less because of the new stadium.

If a contract cannot be worked out between the Cardinals and Albert Pujols, and we end up in arbitration, I only hope that sometime over the next three years, before Pujols can become a free agent, that we can work things out.

Albert, we love you here. We love what you have done on the field. We love having you in St. Louis. We love hearing about how well you take care of your son.

To the Cardinals, I hope you can work things out. I hope the new stadium is the greatest thing to happen to St. Louis since 1904. I hope we see a world series in St. Louis soon. I sincerely hope that Albert Pujols and all the Cardinals can regain your trust as an organization.

And I only hope that somebody reads this.