Lance Berkman Ponders Retirement And Other MLBullets

The latest from around the League where Josh Beckett apparently just has to "try"...

• St. Louis Cardinals' first baseman Lance Berkman could be facing a retirement decision after a potentially serious knee injury. The 36-year-old has contemplated retirement before, after struggling a couple years ago. But he came to St. Louis, where everyone's career is magically extended, and found a rebirth last year. He's been hitting well this year, too, but has been regularly nicked up. He says if the knee injury proves to be a torn ACL or something similarly serious, he's not sure if he'll be coming back. "If I've re-torn my ACL or something like that, I'd certainly get it fixed but you don't know how psychologically you're going to come back from something like that," Berkman said. "I'm not talking from the standpoint of being scared of hurting it again. I'm talking about doing everything it takes to come back and play again at an elite level. I think that's a legitimate question I'm going to have to answer if, in fact, it turns out to be something more serious than we hope that it is." If Berkman goes down for good, the Cardinals will replace him long-term with big-time prospect Matt Adams.

• The Blue Jays are apparently quite serious about moving on from Adam Lind, whom they recently optioned to AAA. After sending him down to AAA, the team also reportedly placed him on outright waivers, which would allow them to remove him from the 40-man roster if he clears waivers (and obviously would allow other teams to claim him for nothing, if they were willing to take on his salary). Lind makes $5 million this and next year, and has a series of team options thereafter that guarantee him another $3.5 million.
• The infirmary ward was active this weekend, with a number of notable injuries: Emilio Bonafacio sprained his thumb and hit the DL, Brandon McCarthy sprained his right shoulder and hit the DL, Mark Ellis had emergency surgery on his leg and will miss six weeks, Danny Duffy was told he'd indeed have to have Tommy John surgery, and the Cardinals had to put both Allen Craig (hamstring) and Kyle McClellan (elbow) on the DL.
• Phillies GM Ruben Amaro has defended his organization's treatment of Ryan Howard with cortisone shots last year to help him continue playing through a foot injury. Three weeks later, Howard tore his achilles, and he's still trying to come back from that injury. According to Amaro, the cortisone shots had no impact on the subsequent achilles injury.
• Vance Worley has bone chips in his pitching elbow, which will need to be removed by way of surgery. Worley says that can wait until after the season, though, and, until then, he'll just need to "man up."
• Aroldis Chapman, whose numbers continue to boggle the mind, is now officially the Reds' closer, replacing an ineffective Sean Marshall.
• Tim Lincecum left his start yesterday early after being bowled over while covering home plate on a wild pitch. Lincecum is reportedly OK, but ... is he? On the year, Lincecum sports a 6.04 ERA and 1.59 WHIP through nine starts, in which his velocity has been down. Then again, he's striking out 10 per 9, his FIP is 2.93, and he's faced a rather unlucky .353 BABIP. He probably is OK.

Brett Taylor is the Lead Writer at Bleacher Nation, and a Contributor here at Bleed Cubbie Blue.