Opinion

Outfielder Jim Edmonds has announced his retirement from baseball after 17 major league seasons. The 40-year-old signed a minor-league deal with the Cardinals with an invite to training camp, but he felt that the progress he was making from offseason Achilles surgery was not where he wanted to be at this point in time.

St. Louis team doctors told Edmonds the injury was so severe that he would not be medically cleared to play, and he could hurt himself even more.

As pitchers and catchers are filing into camp, the New York Yankees have several issues to attend to this spring, one of the foremost being the competition between the veteran offseason pickup Russell Martin and the top catching prospect in the game today, Jesus Montero.

After 17 seasons, Jim Edmonds decided to call it a career. Edmonds, 40, agreed to a Minor League contract with the St. Louis Cardinals, but his Achilles tendon injury wouldn't allow him to go any further with his career.

There's already been a bevy of articles on Bleacher Report talking about all the Pujols rumors, but most of these are just "it would be so great for the Cubs to get Pujols" rah-rah pieces.

I thought it might be interesting to break down the Cubs current 2012 salary commitments and what that means for how much money they'll have to spend to try and bring Pujols, Prince Fielder or any of the other big free agents out there.

A few caveats:

After hearing the Red Sox pitchers talk about it, you wouldn't know the catcher position remains one of the biggest question marks on a retooled squad heading into the 2011 season.

As Spring Training gets underway and people in Boston are left to daydream of warmth and baseball, the Sox hurlers have spent their time heaping praise on expected starter Jarrod Saltalamacchia, rewarding him with the highest possible compliment to give a Beantown backstop.

They're comparing him to Jason Varitek.

February and March are ideal months to visit Clearwater, Florida.  It is not too hot, not too cold, and even better, the Phillies are there for spring training.

The list to follow is an excellent guide to both Phillies spring training and the Clearwater area in general.  Whether or not you have ever been to Clearwater before, you should find this information very useful, or at the very least, entertaining.

However, be forewarned: spring training in Clearwater can be addictive and may turn into a lifelong habit. 

Gene Autry, the silver screen cowboy legend and the gentleman responsible for bringing the Angels franchise to life, adored his team.

In the 1950s, Autry was a minority owner of a minor league baseball team called the Hollywood Stars. In 1960, when Major League Baseball expressed its desire to add an expansion team to the Los Angeles area, Gene sought to acquire radio broadcast rights to the team’s games.

Baseball executives were so impressed by this that they encouraged Autry to become the owner of the franchise rather than a broadcast partner.

Cut Miguel Cabrera.  Trade Miguel Cabrera.  Send him to rehab without knowing anything about the entire scope of his situation.  These are the things I'm hearing.

Here's what I'm saying.  We know very little about the magnitude of Cabrera's problem.  And we may never fully know everything, but we need to let more time pass to learn about the situation. 

Miguel Cabrera should not be playing baseball in 2011. Let's be clear about that right away. The fact that we are even discussing this is sad.

Cabrera has a problem—a really, really serious problem. If he does not get this figured out and straightened out, it won't matter how many home runs he hits or how many runs he drives in. It won't matter because Cabrera the man will be dead.

With Andy Pettitte newly retired, the New York Yankees have considerable problems with their starting rotation. They’ll enter spring training with a projected rotation of CC Sabathia, Phil Hughes, AJ Burnett and probably veteran Freddy Garcia and youngster Ivan Nova. After Sabathia, the other hurlers all have enormous question marks as the club looks ahead to the 2011 season.