[BleacherBum593]

From today's Post Dispatch -

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/spo...A?OpenDocument - Suppan feels unloved
By Derrick Goold / ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH</A>

"The Cardinals appear to be exhausting every other resource imaginable for starting pitching to not jump into the fray for Soup," said the righthander's agent, Scott Leventhal. "The writing is on the wall. Based on that, we don't consider St. Louis one of the markets we're looking at. We've set our sights elsewhere. We haven't counted them out entirely. We have not closed the door. But realistically speaking, it seems they've set their sights on every other thing."

The Cardinals have worked on a new contract for pitcher Jorge Sosa, who was acquired at the trade deadline but did not pitch well enough to be active in the postseason. If a deal cannot be struck, the Cardinals will avoid arbitration by letting Sosa become a free agent.

"I can tell you this, despite what some people have thought, we've made some very substantial offers and we still have some things we want to do," Jocketty said. "We've been very close on (several) of the guys. There are players shooting high with this market (who) have become too expensive for us."

Suppan, who early this offseason got a three-year offer in the $18 million to $20 million range from the Cardinals, appears to be one.