To me, the simple answer is no. While the Cardinals could have spun it to their fan base that part of the gigantic contract would have been for services rendered, I think the Cards did the right thing.
While Pujols finished the year playing significantly better than how he started it, for the third year in a row his batting average (.327-.312-.299), home runs (47-42-37) and RBIs (135-118-99) declined. Ten years at an average of $25.4M/year is too much for one player, no matter how old he is or how much he has accomplished. Even if Pujols has 4-5 more top level season, the Cardinals were wise to not break the bank to keep him. They come out of this looking OK because they offered him huge money and he still left.
So how is not signing Pujols a good thing for St. Louis? Losing Albert hurts, no doubt about it, but they won the World Series basically without him. Yes, he clubbed three home runs in one game and doubled to start one of the Game 6 rallies, but other than those, plus being walked, what other memorable thing did he do? His stat line for the series was 6 for 25…a .240 average with the aforementioned three home runs and five walks. (In his defense, he did hit .350 in the Divisional Series versus the Phillies and .478 in the National League Championship Series against the Brewers.)
A year ago the Cardinals exercised a final one year, $16M option on Pujols’ contract. Right now, $16M will be coming off their books, and if they had signed him for approximately $25M/yr, like the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim did, that would have removed an additional $9M from their coffers.
St. Louis is a baseball town, with fans that will continue to attend games regardless of who is playing first base for the Cardinals. With their current pitching, hitting and division, the Cardinals are still poised to make numerous playoff runs. Who knows? Maybe they’ll sign Prince Fielder.
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