Tony La Russa Blames Players Union for Albert Pujols' Contract Demands

With Albert Pujols' Wednesday deadline to finish a contract extension approaching and it looking more and more like the star will report to camp without a deal beyond 2011, Cardinals manager Tony La Russa is looking for someone to blame.

He's firmly settled on the Major League Baseball Players' Association, telling the St. Louis Post Dispatch that "Pujols' representatives are getting beat up by the union. 'Set the bar. Set the bar.'"

Someone brings this up with every big contract negotation. "The union will make him sign for the biggest contract out there," people say. Sometimes the players do (CC Sabathia, Jayson Werth) and sometimes they don't (Cliff Lee), but it's awfully hard to prove that it's the Union that forces players to accept more money. In this case, La Russa seems to be ignoring quite a bit to make this claim.

Pujols is indisputably the best player in baseball right now, and he has been since at least 2008. He's probably been the best player for longer than that, but from 2003-07 Alex Rodriguez was at least in the conversation. It's A-Rod's 10-year, $275 million deal that's currently setting the market here; he'd been one of the league's best players up to that point in his career and he was in his early 30s.

It was an insane contract to give a 32-year old, but that's not Pujols' fault. Pujols is both a year younger and performing at a higher level than A-Rod was when he signed that deal. Why shouldn't he want more money?

If the Cardinals aren't offering Pujols what he wants, there's no reason for him to rush things right now. He can apply pressure to them with his artificial deadline (What? Like he won't accept a 10-year, $300 million deal on Thursday?) and hope to throw the Cardinals into panic mode.

By the same token, there's no reason for the Cardinals to panic at this point. They know the deadline is artificial and they know that there are maybe four other teams that can afford Pujols at something like his asking price at the moment (we'll say Angels, Cubs, Yankees and Red Sox, given the difficulties the Dodger and Mets are having at the moment) without even considering whether those teams would actually pursue him. They have until after the World Series to do something, no matter what Pujols says on Feb. 15.

Also remember that, unlike A-Rod, this is Pujols' only shot at a mega-contract. He signed an 8-year, $111 million deal before his first arbitration-eligible season that never saw his salary rise above $14.6 million before the $16 million he's due this year. He's way, way underpaid by today's standards -- besides last year, he's been worth roughly 8-9 wins a year, which means that his true value is more than double what he's being paid.

There's no reason for him to not try and milk this for all it's worth, but given the market and the relative lack of destinations for him, there's also no reason for the Cardinals to write him a blank check without trying to negotiate him down a bit.

This is the sort of situation that has seemed destined for a stalemate for quite a while, and there just doesn't seem to be any reason to think the MLBPA will have that much influence on the outcome.