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January is generally a slow time for baseball news. There is the Hall of Fame announcement, where Mike Piazza and Ken Griffey, Jr. were voted in while Mark McGwire and Jim Edmonds saw their time on the Hall of Fame ballot end without a positive result. This January appears to be a little different. There are a ton of quality free agents out there, and it remains to be seen whether they Cardinals might get involved. First, the biggest news in the Cardinals world happened off the field.
Chris Correa Indicted
Former Cardinals Scouting Director Chris Correa was indicted and entered a guilty plea for hacking into the Houston Astros computers-Correa was promoted to scouting director after Dan Kantrovitz took a job with the Oakland Athletics last year. He had been with the Cardinals organization for some time, but only got to preside over one draft after the Cardinals fired him in July following the hacking news.
Fallout from the Correa guilty plea-Ben followed up with information from the hearing including MLB's statement on the matter, which definitely took a wait and see approach.
Justin Upton
With the outfield market developing slowly, could the Cardinals make a move on Justin Upton?-Upton might be open to a one-year deal. Yoenis Cespedes and Chris Davis are out there as well. The Cardinals could swoop in and land a big-time producer in the outfield if the market dips low enough.
Brayan Pena's Incredible Story
Brayan Pena's journey from Cuba at 16 is amazing-Perhaps even more amazing is that he was able to go back after 16 years and see his grandmother again. The link includes a roundup of other news concerning the Cardinals and MLB as a whole.
Evalutating Cardinals Contracts
The Cardinals have given contract extensions to many players-John's post takes a look at all of them, including Matt Carpenter, Yadier Molina, Jaime Garcia, and Adam Wainwright. The team has generally made pretty good decisions over the years, but it looks like there are a couple that might backfire on them.