“It got to the point where I didn’t even want to pitch because I didn’t want to do bad,” said the 32-year-old lefthander. “I would think about what everybody must be thinking — that ‘we spent all this money on this guy and he stinks.’”
Cecil, who is starting the third year of a $30.5 million, four-year contract, was 1-1 with a 6.89 earned run average in 40 appearances last season. He was never right from the beginning as his conditioning program was set back a month by a flurry of tragedies.
Eventually, Cecil got enough work to be on the Cardinals’ opening-day roster, but he suffered a left shoulder strain on opening day in New York and was out for six weeks.