Ankiel signs, could make $1 mil
The Cardinals avoided what could have been one of the most intriguing arbitration cases in baseball by signing outfielder Rick Ankiel to a one-year, $900,000 deal.
Once a pitching phenom, Ankiel will come to spring training this season with a chance to be the Cardinals’ every day center fielder.
Most of Ankiel’s major-league service time was a lefthanded starter, causing a conundrum for his value because he applied for arbitration as a slugger. Ankiel, 28, returned to the majors this season and hit 11 home runs and drove in 39 RBIs in 172 at-bats. From the day he showed up to the end of the season, Ankiel led the team in homers and RBIs, while flashing a cannon arm in right field.
The power display in the big leagues was a continuation of his performance in Class AAA Memphis. In Triple-A for his first time as a position player, Ankiel finished tied for second in the Pacific Coast League with 32 home runs, though he had at least 40 fewer at-bats than the other leaders.
Ankiel also drove in 89 runs and slugged .568.
The day after Ankiel’s career night — seven RBIs and two home runs against Pittsburgh — a newspaper report linked Ankiel to receiving a shipment of human growth hormone. The commissioner’s office later ruled no punishment would be levied, but Ankiel slipped into a slump, going 16 games without a home run and contributing two RBIs in the skid.
Ankiel was originally drafted in the second round of the 1997 draft, was a national player of the year as a high school pitcher and was twice the organization’s pitcher of the year before injuries and erratic control led him to retire as a pitcher.
In 2005’s spring training, he picked up a bat and a glove to try his skills as an outfielder.
Ankiel’s agent, Scott Boras, said that Ankiel’s arbitration case was “interesting” and that extrapolated his numbers over an entire season to see a 30-homer, 100-RBI player. “What is a contribution like that worth to a team?” Boras asked, rhetorically.
The new contract was submitted Friday, the day teams and players are required to exchange salary figures for coming arbitration hearings.
Ankiel will receive a $25,000 bonus for every 50 plate appearances of more than 350. If he has 500 plate appearancesĀ – and as a starting outfielder, he likely would — he’ll make $1 million.
Catcher Yadier Molina and pitcher Todd Wellemeyer are the only Cardinals remaining on the roster who have not agreed to a salary. Both have applied for arbitration but a deal can be struck before their hearings.
dgoold@post-dispatch.com 314-340-8285
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Derrick Goold said he was going to Mizzou for capital-J journalism, but after growing up in the Time Zone Baseball Forgot he was really drawn to MU sitting between two major-league cities. Goold joined the Post-Dispatch in 2001 after working for The Times-Picayune and Rocky Mountain News, covering sports from LSU to NHL and every level of baseball in between.
[...] would ask for $3-4 mil, especially after Boras projected Rick’s #’s into a 30 HR/ 100 RBI season. Ankiel Signs, Could Make $1 Million by Derrick Goold - St Louis Post Dispatch __________________ "Build it and they will [...]
[...] today to exchange numbers for upcoming arbitration hearings. The Cardinals signed Rick Ankiel to a one-year deal shortly before the deadline, and that left Molina and pitcher Todd Wellemeyer as the only arbitration-eligible players not yet [...]
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