Locked On Cardinals - Daily Podcast On The St. Louis Cardinals - Helsey And The Cardinals Avoid Arbitration But No Deal For Donovan And Nootbaar

Episode Date: January 10, 2025

- Arbitration Time - Ryan Helsley - Brendan Donovan - Lars Nootbaar - Nolan Arenado - Waiver Claim Follow & Subscribe on all Podcast platforms… 🎧 https://link.chtbl.com/LOSTLCardinals?sid=YouTube Locked On MLB League-Wide: Every Team, Prospects & More 🎧 https://linktr.ee/LockedOnMLB Follow on Twitter/X: @JDSPORTSRADIO Follow the show on Twitter/X: @LO_Cardinals Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors! Rocket Money Cancel your unwanted subscriptions and reach your financial goals faster with Rocket Money. Go to RocketMoney.com/lockedon today. Gametime Download the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONMLB for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Download Gametime today. What time is it? Gametime. FanDuel From big upsets to game-winning drives, the NFL Playoffs are better with FanDuel new customers can bet FIVE DOLLARS and get TWO HUNDRED BUCKS in BONUS BETS - GUARANTEED - Win or Lose. Visit FANDUEL.COM to get started. Make this playoff season unforgettable with FanDuel, an official sportsbook partner of the NFL. FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) #ForTheLou #stlcards #mlb #lockedoncardinals Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Ryan Helsley and others have signed for 2025, but which players do the Cardinals not come to terms with that left some people shaking their heads. This is Locked on Cardinals. You are Locked on Cardinals. Your daily St. Louis Cardinals podcast, part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day.

Hey there, Cardinals. I'm J.D. Haffern and I'm your host for Lockdown Cardinals. Part of the Lockdown Podcast Network covering your team every day. You can follow me on Twitter X at Jaddy Sports. radio. You can also follow the podcast at L.O. underscore Cardinals. We want to thank those of you who make Lockdown Cardinals your first listen every day. We're free and available wherever you get your podcast. We're on YouTube as well. If you haven't, come on by, like, subscribe, comment, and hit that notification button so you know when the new episodes are posted. This is a show serving Cardinal

Nation and giving the best fans in baseball, all of the info about the birds on the bat. Today's episode being brought to you by FanDuel from big upsets to game when he drives. The NFL playoffs are better with FanDuel. New customers can bet five. dollars and get 200 bucks in bonus bets guaranteed win or lose. Visit fando.com to get started. All right, happy Friday, 2, 1 and all Snowmageddon Park due going on right now, rolling through the city once again today, not as bad as it was before, but there's just, you know, it's more snow, it's more salt, it's more shoveling,

it's more dirty cars, not much fun. If you are someone who enjoys making snowmen or going sledding, then I'm sure you're pleased about what's going on today. But if not, grab a hot cocoa, a coffee or whatever, and let's get into the latest news and notes with St. Louis Cardinals, who finally gave us something to talk about outside of the Nolan Aranaado rumors. We will talk about Nato a little bit later on in today's episode. but let's start with the exciting world of arbitration.

Woohoo! The Cardinals had six arbitration eligible players this year. From the pitching staff, you had NL reliever of the year, Ryan Halsley, now starting pitcher Andre Palante, lefty setup man, Joe Joe Romero. And you also had lefty reliever John King

from the position players of a super utility man, Vernon Donovan and outfielder Lars Newpar. Now, for those of you who are not familiar with, this arbitration process, okay? Let me quickly explain it just, you know, for people who may not know, because then everybody knows this stuff because it's kind of boring, to be honest. But players who have three or more years of major league service, but less than six years of major league service,

become eligible for salary arbitration if they do not already have a contract for the next season. Now, if the club and player have not agreed on a salary by a deadline, which was Thursday, the club and player must, salary figures for the upcoming season. Now, after these figures are exchanged, a hearing is then scheduled, scheduled. Typically, it's in February as one they'll take place. If no one year or multi-year settlement can be reached by the hearing date, the case is brought before a panel of arbitrators. After hearing arguments from both sides, the panel then selects either the salary figure of either the player or the club, but they don't like find a happy medium. It's one or the

other. And that's what the player salary will be for the upcoming season. So it sounds simple enough, but these hearings have been known to cause some bad blood between teams. It's not just the Cardinals, it's other people, you know, around Major League Baseball. Nobody really likes this thing. It kind of reminds me of the old show, Are You Hot? I don't know if you remember this at all, but it stands out my mind it's what it reminds me about it had a 80s legend Lorenzo lamas supermodel and star of one of the greatest music videos of all time Stacy's mom uh Rachel hunter was on that show and basically what they would do is they would take a like people would come up on stage and they would take a laser pointer and they would sit there and dissect the people on stage they would tell them exactly like

you got a little fat over here on your on your hip or your right breast saggs a little bit or for a guy you know, your nose is stupid or your hair lines going, but they would point out all of the horrible things that they feel is wrong with that particular person, all these flaws, which is essentially what kind of these hearings are when it comes to arbitration. The teams are supposed to point out all the different flaws as to why they shouldn't pay that particular player what they want. That's how it works.

And people's feelings get hurt. It causes a little bit of tension. And then one side wins or loses. And then you're supposed to just, you know, when it's all said and done, then you're supposed to just like, okay, forget about what we all just said about you. Come play for us. Let's say we need you. We need you to help win ball games.

So don't worry about what we just said and all these things that we said that were bad about you. You know, just because we told you in so many different ways why you suck. Don't worry about that. Just let's come. Let's go play ball now. You know, it's it's stupid. It's a terrible way. to go about this stuff.

And it famously, as far as the Cardinals go, remember, it started that riff between the club and Tyler O'Neill. That was a big deal a few years back. And you saw how that relationship just deteriorated overtime after that. It's a crappy process. And I wish they could find a better way to do it. But it is what it is right now. It's what we got to work with.

So of the six players this year, the team was able to come to terms with three of them. The biggest names of the three was that they signed closer, Ryan Helsley to a deal, which is great, right? Helsley, where am I out here? Okay, here it is. Helsley, rumored to be someone they wanted to trade early on the offseason, obviously, but they've backtracked since then decided they'd rather hang on to him and see what his value might be at the trade deadline this season.

Or if things go well, maybe they talk extension at some point. But from what we've heard, the Cardinals don't appear to be trying to move him at this particular time. Now, Healsley was a guy that actually went through this process back in 2022. And I remember the interviews where you could tell it wasn't a fun experience for him. I mean, he didn't like it so much. He understood it. And he was like, yeah, I mean, it's part of the business, but it still sucks. But I'm glad they were able to avoid this this time around. We knew Helsley was going to get a significant bump in pay as he should following his award-woning season where he set a new franchise record for saves with 49. According to sources, Healsley and the Cardinals reached a one-year deal for 2025 that will raise his salary. $4.4 million over last year's salary.

He was making $3.8. He's going up to 8.2. Now, according to Spot Rack, that ranks him as the 17th highest AAV for believers in the game. Edwin Diaz is number one at $20.4 million. But 8.2 is not, you know, I'm not saying it's cheap by any means, but it's definitely a bargain. It's definitely a bargain for what the result you got from Ryan Helsley last year. Former Cardinal Andrew Kittridge just inked a one-year deal with $10 million with the Orioles. Jordan Hicks makes $11 million with the Giants.

Ryan Presley from the Astros is at $15 million. So if Elsley stays healthy and productive, he's going to get the bigger bump and pay on his next contract, whether that's with the Cardinals or whether that is someplace else. but he's locked in, got him. Don't have to worry about that until you get closer to the trade deadline. That's probably the next time we'll start thinking about any sort of move with Ryan Halsley. The Cardinals also created 2025 deals with Jojo Romero and John King. Romero signed for 2.26 million, which is a big bump for him up from 860 grand last year.

It was pretty darn good, although he led the team in blown saves. He did have 30 holds last season. And as for King, he was. went from a little over a million dollars to 1.6 million after a solid season. In my eyes, an unexpected season from John King, where he made a career high of 56 appearances and had an ERA of 2.85. He kind of took over that role from Andre Palante. Remember they needed somebody to get ground balls, and Palante was the guy that was able to do that against left-handers when he was in the bullpen. And then John King, after Palante went

to the rotation, King came up, became that guy, and was pretty good at it. you know, well-deserved for everyone. But Donovan, Newpar, and Palante did not come to an agreement before Thursday's deadline. We're going to discuss the ramifications of that. Why this happened, why they were unable to come to an agreement on these deals. We'll talk about it next on Locked on Cardinals. Now, I love going to live events. You know this.

If you're an everydayer, this is not news to you. I love going to obviously sporting events, but concerts, theater. comedy. A lot of good comedians hitting the road here in 2025, which I'm excited to go out and see. But there's nothing like going to a live event for me. I love everything about it. And when I need tickets to go to an event, the Game Time app is where I go because I know it's the easiest way to find the seats that I want. And believe it or not, Game Time is actually going to make this experience even easier for you. You can get tickets to your favorite events with their new feature game time picks, really helping you out here. This feature, it just filters out all the

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redeem the code locked on MLB that's LOCKE E WN MLB for $20 off download game time today what time is it game time thank you again for making a locked on carlid's your first listen every day leave your comments on YouTube in the comments section obviously or you can also hit me up on Twitter X anytime you want your feedback always welcome and encouraged. Fred and Donovan. Fred and Donovan has been one of the most dependable and solid players for the Cardinals over the last three seasons.

Now, outside of that elbow injury in 2023, which ruined basically the second half of the season for him, although he was playing through it until the team was far enough out of contention where they were like, all right, well, let's shut you down and make sure that you're back and ready to go for next season. But he was playing through it, if you remember, he couldn't throw a ball, but he was deaching. But he's been a guy that you can. can really rely on day in and day out at almost any position that you need him at.

He's been wonderful. He's one of the most cardinally cardinal that they've actually got, you know, he's not considered fast. He's not considered, you know, powerful, but just a steady guy in the clubhouse. The fans love him. He's always hustling. He's got those beautiful locks coming out of his hat and helmet. He's a great defender.

The bat is consistent. He just, he does his job. There he is right there. Like who wouldn't love that face if you're watching on YouTube? He just seems like a perfect glue guy at 28 years old that the Cardinals would want to, they would want to build around to go along with this youth movement of Jordan Walker, Mason, Wynn, Norman, Thomas and Jacey, Victor Scott, Yvonne Herrera, Pedro Pahez. Like, you've got all these young guys and you're going to need a little bit of veterans involved there as well.

And, you know, especially if Nolan Aronado gets traded. and Donovan just seems kind of be the, seems to be the guy that you want to keep around. Last year he led the club and batting average at 278. OBP at 342 was OPS was 759. He was second and slugging at 417. Then he did all of this while also bouncing around different positions last year. Obviously, spent a lot of time in left field,

but he was also with second. He was at third. You know, you could almost everywhere but catcher and pitcher. Britta Donovan can probably get you by. You know, Sinter Fiore would be a tough one. But, you know, he was up for the NL Utility Gold Glove Award again this year, won that as a rookie in 2022. So it's a little disappointing to myself and a fan to hear that they weren't able to come

to an agreement on a deal before this deadline on Thursday. Now, it doesn't mean it's not all doom and gloom and it means that they're screwed and they won't come to some sort of agreement and work things out. But yesterday things got a lot. a little confusing. If you were on Twitter and you were following along with, you know, beat reporters for the Cardinals, John Denton, obviously somebody who covers the team for MLB.com. We talk about them a lot here on the, on the show. tweeted out that the Cardinals are handling Donovan very much the way they did Tommy Edmund last year, a source told MLB.com. Edmund signed a two years 16 and a half million dollar extension to avoid arbitration. Later, he tweets that sources said the team was close on a multi-year deal, but then update that saying that talks were minimal and then later added that the Cardinals had little interest in signing Donovan to a multi-year deal. And it got a lot of us going, uh, what happened? What gives? Why would they not want to do this?

Are the Cardinals just being cheap? Because from the outside looking in, that's exactly what it feels like for most fans who were none too thrilled. If you were on any of the timelines yesterday where people were bringing this up, none too thrilled about this at all yesterday. A lot of people just calling, you know, the Cardinals penny pinchers and, you know, get new ownership, sell the, like there's all sorts of backlash going on about this. And I get it. I get why you would be upset about this. According to the athletics, Katie Wu, she tried to explain why things are a little more difficult. with the Brennan Donovan situation, and New Bar and Palante,

but specifically with Brennan Donovan, she said that the Cardinals are trying to balance a payroll reduction, and they've got this roster uncertainty going on with Nolan Aronado. All right, they remain active in their attempts to try to trade him and the 74 million remaining on his deal, but talks have been mostly quiet since mid-December. As the likelihood of Aronado remaining in St. Louis grows, president of baseball operations, John Moseilock,

must find other ways to trim payroll. That made the arbitration process even more difficult this season. She says the impending front office turnover likely also impacts any extension plans. With Moseilocks set step down after the 2025 season and Heim Bloom slated to take over the organization, the likelihood of extending any player before 2026 is slim. So now you're sitting here and you've got Britt and Donovan, who would like to be a cardinal, I would assume. I don't think he wants to go anywhere. The cardinals clearly are like, yeah, no, we're.

do dig you, but we've got all this crap going on. We're still trying to get rid of our Nato. We're still worried about what things are going to look like until that happens. And what happens if it doesn't happen? Then we've got to pivot into a different direction. We've got to talk about trading starting pitchers instead. And now we've got to talk about cut and payroll in certain other areas. So all of this with Nato is holding things up.

Like it's kind of holding the team hostage in a way. And it sucks. And it sucks because I told you when that Houston Astros deal fell through and Nato vetoed it, it was going to put the cardinals in a bad spot. You can go back and listen. I was like, this feels like it's going to be a problem because it seemed like everybody except Arnaudu was going to get what they wanted out of this and didn't happen. And now we're stuck. Now we're stuck.

Lars Newport, in my opinion, is a step below the necessity level that Britain's. Donovan is for this team. When he's on the field, Newpar's fine. All right. Obviously, we dig Newpar. Jeff Jones from B&D.com points out that the batted ball data continues to be elite. The OPS Plus shows he's above average hitter in every year of his career.

But as you know and I know, the injuries are the real issue with Lars Newpar. He hasn't played in more than 117 games in a single season yet in his career. projected numbers in a healthy season. Yeah, you like what you see there, but we never get them because it's never on the field long enough for us to see that stuff happen, you know? He hasn't been able to be on the field enough to prove that he can be out there for the amount of games it takes

to see those numbers come to fruition. Now, one positive about the Newt Bar situation, Derek Gold's story at STL Today.com, got a quote from Newt saying, I don't take it personal. It's part of the business, and you know that going in, which would you expect anything less from Lars Dupar in a response? Like, that's just the kind of guy he is. And it's one of the reasons why people like him and want him around. You know, that's who he is. And hopefully, hopefully he can be out there for 145 games or more this upcoming season and be the guy many thought he would be. But history tells you that that that. That's not likely that he's probably going to come in around 110 to 115 games. That's just been the reality of it over the last three seasons. Now with Palante, the reason this got a little complicated is obviously because he went

from bullpen to starting rotation. All right, you know, he had a great second half. But can you trust that moving forward? Who knows? And I'm sure that's the argument that's being made by the Cardinals. where's this track record of success as a starter to warrant more money. You know, they would like to see him prove it a little bit more. And it's one of my question marks going into the season as if they end up having to deal away any of their starting pitchers.

And Palante is somebody who feels like even if they don't, he's in the rotation. He would be that five guy. That, I mean, are we sure? We're like, you're like, no, he'll be fine. Are we sure about that? I don't know. there's no track record to prove that what happened at the end of last year will continue moving forward. There is a track record of a lack of success in his career at certain points,

but we haven't seen the success consistently from Andre Palante yet. We hope it happens. We're not rooting against him by any means. I hope he's fantastic and gets his race. Denton says he's projected to make $1.8 million this year. So there you have it. That's really what happened with the arbitration stuff. As far as these three guys that they didn't come to an agreement with,

if anybody is going to get an extension of any sort, whether it's a two-year deal or more, it should be Brendan Donovan in my eyes. But with Newton-Polante, if I'm the Cardinals, I'm probably just going to wait and see what the arbitration process says. I just think Donnie does more for you and deserves it much more over the other two at this point in their careers. But what are your thoughts on this?

Agree? Cardinals just being cheap? Or do you understand the process of all of this and think this is just the way it should be? And we'll get through it or, you know, what are your opinions on all of this? Let me know in the comments section. We'll do some fan feedback and talk about it in an upcoming episode. We are going to talk about Aronado. There was a little bit of news about Nolan Aronado.

And the Cardinals were also able to claim a reliever off waivers. Get your champagne ready for this big name. We'll talk about it next on Lockdown Cardinals. For a big upset, Sue, game winning drives. The NFL playoffs are better with Fandil because right now new customers. Get $5 and get $200 in bonus bets guarantee. That's $200 in bonus bets, win or lose. The Fandle app gives you everything you need for live vets.

Same game parlays and a whole lot more. Now we got the wild card matchups getting ready to. go off tomorrow. Chargers still favored by a field goal in Houston. Are we trusting the bolts that much? I got a I got some friends who were Chargers fans. And I'm like, they're talking a big game right now. They're like, don't don't sleep on us. We're better than you think.

So I can see why that they would be favority. Houston. Houston's had a tough go over the last, you know, quarter of the season. Ravens, nine and a half of the Steelers right now, Buffalo, eight and a half over the Broncos, Eagles at four and a half against my Packers. And you've got the Bucks favored at three at home against the commanders, Vikings favored by two and a half against the Rams, which was supposed to take place in L.A. But the devastating fires in California there have forced the league to move the game to Arizona

where the Cardinals play instead. So home field advantage out the window for the Rams now. So that's a, that's a weird one. Make it more fun by visiting fandlew.com and join today. Get started with $200 in bonus That's Vandal.com. Make this playoff season unforgettable with Vandal, an official sportsbook partner of the NFL. Thank you again for making a locked on Cardinals. Your first listen today for your second list. And I encourage you to find locked on MLB. Our host Sully brings you a daily blend of humor in baseball and get you all the updates possible on what's going on this offseason with every team around Major League Baseball. Find Locked on MLB on YouTube or wherever

you listen to podcasts. So Nolan Arnata is still a Cardinal. some people are happy about that. Some people are like, I'm to the point where I'm like, I just wanted to be done. I just wanted to be done. But reports are he might be more open-minded and expanding the teams he'll go to

to facilitate a deal, which is good news. John Morosi reported that if something doesn't get done with the Red Sox that the Mariners and Tigers are also options. The socks still make the most sense to me for Nolan Aronado in my eyes. It's a good team, good tradition,

obviously, his buddy Trevor story is there. I think it makes a lot of sense for Nolan Arnado to be a proponent of a move to the Boston Red Sox. And if I can be selfish, they do owe us one for absolutely robbing Mo blind in the Tyler O'Neill deal this last year. But, but we're waiting. We're waiting. And the reason we're waiting, not so much because of Nolan or because of the Cardinals, but because of Alex friggin' fragman. He hasn't signed yet.

As of this moment, where's my phone? Let me check my phone. Did Alex Fragman sign anywhere yet? Anything. Anything. No. Alex Bragman is still out there, which, if he would just sign somewhere,

would help clarify what teams are left that need a third basement. And then we can go from there. Then they can say like, all right, now, okay, Bregman's off the table. What do we need to do to get an auto? And we can move forward. So Alex, because I know you're watching, can you get your crap together and sign already

so we can move the F on with our lives? We beg you. The Cardinals did make a Blockbuster waiver claim yesterday. You guys ready for this one? Blockbuster. Everyone say hello to left-handed reliever. Bailey Horn. Yes, Bailey Horn.

It was previously, actually, if you're watching on YouTube, it's a picture of them in the Red Sox organization, but previously with the Detroit Tigers last. He's 26 years old, it's going to be 27 pretty soon, I think, made his MLB debut with the Red Sox last June 29th, and went one-on-one with a 6.50 ERA

and 18 innings over 18 appearances. He was released by the Red Sox on November 22nd, claimed by the Tigers. A month later, got D.F. aide designated for assignment. He's an Auburn University product. Fifth round pick in 2020 by the White Sox? I thought it was the Cubs. I thought I was the Cubs. Says White Sacks here, but I think it's Cubs. He pitched in the minor leagues. Maybe he's not. Maybe he's a former, I don't know. I should have looked this up even more specifically for you. He was just kind of, hold up. Let's look it up. We'll do this together. Bailey Horn. Yeah, he got him in a Cubs hat here. I'm thinking he's been no white Sox and Cubs he was with both okay all right see I'm learning just like you. All right. So there you go. 2020 draft by the White Sox pitched in the minor leagues for four seasons 15 and 12 with the 4.26 ERA in 12 in 12.

In 129 games, 15 of them starts from 21 to 24 271 strikeouts and 21st and a third minor league innings. you like that number. That's pretty good. throws a four seamer, 95. He's got a sweeper, though, which is the main pitch that he threw in the major leagues. Baseball Savon had that as his number one thrown pitch by a long shot. Also has a cutter in a curb. Still has a pair of minor league option years remaining, making him a flexible bullpen piece. So he can come up.

He can go down to the Cardinals, and whether it's the short term or long term needs. again, Cubs, Farmhand, fourth organization in the past 12 months, getting passed around more than Joy Taylor and Fox. If you don't know what that story is about, go ahead, just Google Joy Taylor right now, and you'll know what I'm speaking of. Anyway, he goes immediately onto the Cardinals 40-man roster, which gives them 39 players on the 40-man on one vacant spot left available.

So there you go. That is the latest going on with the Cardinal. So thoughts, comments on everything. How do you feel about Aronado? Are you going to go out and get a Bailey Horn jersey in the next couple of days? I don't know. You tell me what's going on with you guys. Let me know down below.

Good luck with the snow today. I hope everybody is safe. And barring any breaking news over the weekend, we'll be back on Monday with a fresh new episode. I appreciate you guys. Thank you for making Lock on Cardles, your first listen every day. If you haven't already, please give us a follow on Twitter X at L0 underscore Cardinals and a JD Sports Radio. Any small news will always be retweeting and posting stuff there, whatever. But if something huge breaks, obviously, we'll crank out another episode and at least get you a YouTube short or something like that.

So always available to you. Please like, subscribe on YouTube, help our channel and love for the Cardinals grow. You guys are the best fans in baseball for a reason. And we will see you next time on Locked on Cardinals. Don't hurt your back out shoveling today. Be smart.