February 24 2011 Last updated at 01:22 PM ET
When is really bad news not always completely bad news?In the St. Louis camp, the bad news Thursday was, as expected, that starter Adam Wainwright will need Tommy John surgery -- a ligament replacement procedure to fix up his elbow.
The Cardinals' ace won't be pitching at all this season after general manager John Mozeliak confirmed that the team's fears of a season-ending injury had been verified.
Up to this point, the turmoil in Cardinals' camp had been about St. Louis' inability to get first baseman Albert Pujols' name on a long-term contract extension. There was much angst about what would happen in 2012 and beyond.
The good news from the St. Louis point of view is that's been pushed into the past. All of a sudden, the realities of the 2011 season are staring the Cardinals in the face, and for better or worse, their focus has been narrowed to the here and now.
Manager Tony La Russa has often said the first great lesson he learned from his pitching coach, Dave Duncan, was that the most important thing in baseball was to worry about today. Tomorrow will take care of itself soon enough.
And now that's going to have to happen in Jupiter, Fla., the spring training home of the Cardinals.
"We have confirmed that Adam Wainwright will require Tommy John surgery," Mozeliak told the media, "so obviously, he'll be out for the year. Not a real surprise to us, but (it is) certainly a disappointment.
"(Now there is) a finality to this process. As we look to the future now we certainly believe that we have a strong starting rotation on this club. And now we're going to have to try and fill it in terms of a fifth spot."Mozeliak and La Russa both have suggested that they will, at least for the moment, stay within the organization to fill the suddenly open spot in the rotation.
The first move was the insertion of Kyle McClellan into the starters' workout group on Wednesday, and Raul Valdes, Lance Lynn and Ian Snell could also be on the list of about half a dozen candidates that La Russa has in mind as possible replacements.
Veteran right-hander Miguel Batista was all but certain to make the team as part of the bullpen, but he's also had some history as a starter and he could get thrown into the mix.
The Pujols contract situation still exists in exactly the same shape as it had. Only now it's no longer front and center. St. Louis' focus has had to change. And that, at least, is good news for the Cardinals.
John is a National Baseball Writer for AOL FanHouse. He covered the Seattle Mariners from 2000-2009 for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, and seattlepostglobe.org and the Oakland A's for two decades at the Oakland Tribune and The Daily Review (Hayward, CA). He is a multiple Associated Press Sports Editors award winner for his baseball coverage. A member of the Baseball Writers Association of America, he is a Hall of Fame voter.
Steve Phillips has a few ways the Cardinals might salvage their 2011 season:
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