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After a winter that included his marriage, and courtship by more teams than he ever expected, lefthanded starting pitcher Mark Mulder elected to re-sign with the Cardinals for two years with a team option for a third, the Post-Dispatch learned Wednesday.
The 29-year-old lefty, who will spend the first half of the season rehabbing a surgically repaired shoulder, chose to return to the Cardinals over two aggressive suitors, the Cleveland Indians and Texas Rangers.
Mulder made the decision Wednesday, just a few days after general manager Walt Jocketty visited Arizona to meet in person with Mulder’s agent.
It was during these conversations that the Cardinals upped their initial offer to a contract that guarantees Mulder $13 million. The contract includes a team option for a third season, the salary of which will be determined by the incentives he reaches in 2008. The contract could pay him $11.5 million-$12 million for 2008, when he is a full season removed from surgery.
The Cardinals also announced the signing of righthanded pitcher Ryan Franklin to a one-year major-league contract, and outfielder Rick Ankiel and infielder Jolbert Cabrera to minor-league deals. Ankiel and Cabrera have been invited to the Cardinals' major-league camp this spring.
Franklin, 33, pitched 20 games for Cincinnati and 46 for Philadelphia as a reliever in 2006, going a combined 6-7 with a 4.57 earned-run average. He previously pitched five full seasons in Seattle -- three as a full-time starter -- and is 41-57 with a 4.35 ERA in the majors.
Mulder won 22 games over the previous two seasons with the Cardinals, but 2006 was first a riddle and then riddled by injury. In September, after two starts in an unsuccessful return from the disabled list, Mulder had surgery to repair impingement in his shoulder and tearing in his rotator cuff.
Mulder has begun throwing, but his agent has told teams to expect 20 to 25 starts from him in the coming season.
The Cardinals’ view has been that Mulder would return to the rotation by midseason.
Both Cleveland and Texas beat the Cardinals’ to a two-year offer, and the Rangers offered another bonus -- Mulder’s relationship with their new manager, Ron Washington, from their days in Oakland. Texas and the Cardinals emerged as finalists from a group that once included 15 teams.
The Cardinals had what Mulder’s agent Gregg Clifton called "continuity of care" to boost their offer. Manager Tony La Russa and Clifton also said Mulder expressed to them a feeling of "unfinished business" in St. Louis because injury erased his second season and, his agent said, may have been a mitigating circumstance in his 16-8 summer of 2005, his first with the Cardinals.
The signing of Mulder gives the Cardinals three returning starters to their staff -- Chris Carpenter, Anthony Reyes and Mulder -- and newly signed starter Kip Wells. With the potential addition of Adam Wainwright to the rotation, the Cardinals will have to cover for Mulder’s absence through the first half of the season.
pitchers and catchers will report in the next 5 weeks....Hallelujah!!
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