St. Louis Cardinals End of Season Press Conference Wrap-Up

Cardinals GM John Mozeliak and manager Mike Matheny met with the media this afternoon to recap the disappointing NLDS elimination to the Cubs, and discuss the plans heading into the offseason.

Here are some of the key highlights from the press conference:

• Yadier Molina had thumb surgery this afternoon and will be out 8-12 weeks with no baseball activities, but should be ready to go by the start of Spring Training.
• The Cardinals will offer contracts to all of the coaching staff to return in 2016.
• The biggest question heading into this offseason is whether or not the a Cardinals will re-sign Jason Heyward. And indeed, Mozeliak will be trying to make that happen.

• As for other injury/health news, Carlos Martinez, Matt Holliday and Randal Grichuk should be healthy and have a normal offseason before Spring Training.
• No decisions have been made as of yet on what to do with upcoming free agents John Lackey and Jaime Garcia.
• Michael Wacha and Carlos Martinez shouldn’t be under limitations or restrictions for next season.
• Key position battles to keep an eye of for next season: a first base competition between Matt Adams and Stephen Piscotty, and a flexible starting rotation and bullpen that could be affected the emergence of Tim Cooney, Alex Reyes, and Marco Gonzales.

And that’s all she wrote. The 2015 100-win, NL Central Championship season came to a very quick end for the Cardinals with a loss in the division series to their rival Cubs, and now they already start to look forward to next season. It should be an interesting and busy hot stove season for the Cardinals as they will look to make some major improvements if they want to stay atop in the powerhouse NL Central with the Pirates and Cubs.

Jason Heyward, John Lackey, and Jaime Garcia are the top free agents to watch for this club going forward. As for next season, if this team can avoid the big injury bug, the Cardinals still look to be in good shape to get to their sixth consecutive postseason.

Next: Cubs Eliminate Cardinals from Postseason with 6-4 Victory

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