Cardinals extend their miles Mikolas

12:55: The contract does not crush Mikolas' salary for 2019, but extends from 2020 to 233, according to Ken Rosenthal of The Atheticon Twitter). This will give the Cardinals control of Mikolas throughout his 34-year season.

12:50: Jon Heyman from the MLB network tweets that his new contract guarantees Mikolas $ 68 million over four years. This agreement is identical to the four-year pact signed by the hero in series Nathan Eovaldi with the Red Sox earlier this winter. The case, Heyman added, can reach a total of $ 70 million in value.

12h45: Cardinals and right-handed Miles Mikolas have accepted the terms of a contract extension, reports Derrick Goold of St. Louis Post-Dispatch (via Twitter). Both parties had expressed a common interest in concluding such an agreement in January. Mikolas is represented by Octagon.

A year ago, Cardinals fans were not sure what to think of Mikolas, the team's first addition to the rotation last winter. At the time, Mikolas was a 29-year-old who was never established in the Majors, but who was firmly in the MLB radar with a brilliant three-year run for the Yomiuri Giants of Nippon Professional Baseball. The addition of Mikolas on a two-year contract worth $ 15.5 million sparked a lot of skepticism.

Mikolas, however, proved that his skeptics were categorically wrong. In 32 starts for St. Louis, he totaled 200 runs on 2/3, with a blank of 2.83, 6.5 K / 9, 1.3 BB / 9, 0.72 HR / 9 and a rate of ground ball of 49.3%. Among the qualified beginners of the MLB, only Patrick Corbin and Jacob deGrom induced on throws out of the strike zone, with a value above the brilliant mark of 36.6% of Mikolas. Statcast ranked Mikolas at the 92nd and 90th percentiles, respectively, in terms of the speed of exit from the opponent and hard contact allowed on the entire league. In addition, no baseball pitcher scored BB / 9 better than Mikolas, whose 3.28 FIP and 3.67 x FIP largely supported the idea that he was a high quality starter.

Mikolas does not need to reproduce last season's figures up to the decimal point to justify the organization's considerable expense – the value he provided was worth more than 17 millions of dollars last season – but it will have to be installed in a sustainable way. rotation for the next few years in order to respect the commitment made. There is little reason to doubt his ability to do so, however; As previously stated, virtually all measures agreed that Mikolas was a legitimate leaver in the major leagues, and he ended the year as hard as he began – if not more.

Engaging Mikolas now gives them a certain long-term solidity in a rotation that was likely to lose not only Mikolas but also Michael Wacha and Adam Wainwright at the end of the season. Between these imminent departures, lingering concerns around Carlos MartinezThe shoulder and the persistent lack of sustainability on the part of the company wunderkind Alex Reyes, the Cardinals had a deceptively uncertain long-term perspective regarding the launch of the launchers. Mikolas will now team up with Jack Flaherty in the rotation of St. Louis for years to come, and the organization certainly hopes that a combination of Martinez, Reyes and Dakota Hudson can work to supplement the starting staff in the near future.

With this agreement in place, Cardinals now have more than $ 101 million committed to their staff list by 2020 (assuming equal pay distribution) – although this number declines substantially in 2021 when Yadier Molina, Matt Carpenter and Brett Cecil get out of books. The deal is not expected to affect St. Louis's payroll for 2019, which is currently close to $ 162 million, a slight increase from $ 159.7 million in the first day of operation. franchise record of last year.