By Rob Rains

John Mozeliak’s off-season list of to-do items got a major change at the top on Monday with the news that Tony La Russa is retiring as the Cardinals’ manager.

In addition to all of the other tasks ahead of him the Cardinals’ general manager  now will have to devote time to finding a successor to La Russa, who leaves three days after the Cardinals won their 11th world championship in franchise history. La Russa had been the team’s manager for the past 16 seasons and it had been widely anticipated that he would be back again in 2012.

That changed with Monday’s announcement. Mozeliak said the team has formed a search committee and will begin working on finding a new manager on Monday afternoon.

And it’s not as if there are not other important jobs ahead of Mozeliak in the coming weeks as well. In order, these are the other primary tasks Mozeliak must address in the coming weeks:

Decisions on options:All major-league teams have a midnight Monday  deadline for deciding whether or not to exercise the options on a player’s contract for 2012. The Cardinals have four players in that category – Yadier Molina, Rafael Furcal, Octavio Dotel and Arthur Rhodes.

Cardinals General Manager John Mozeliak has a lot of work to do this winter

The Cardinals will announce Monday that they have picked up Molina’s  $7 million option. The others, however, require a little thought; not because the Cardinals would not like all three players back, but because of the business decision of how much money the team can afford to pay them.

Furcal’s option is for $12 million, and the Cardinals almost certainly will decline the option and then try to bring him back at about one-fourth or one-third of that amount. As well as he played defensively the last two months of the season, and in the playoffs, he did hit just .255 as a Cardinal in the regular season and was worse in the postseason, hitting only .195 (15-of-77) with six extra-base hits and one stolen base and was dropped out of the leadoff spot for game seven of the World Series.

The 42-year-old Rhodes has a $4 million option on his contract, but there is uncertainty about whether that option actually was voided when he was released by Texas, which would make him an automatic free agent. Dotel, who will be 38 next year, has a $3.5 million option with a $750,000 buyout. It seems probable that the team will not pick up that option, then try to negotiate a new contract for a lesser amount.

Albert Pujols. (Photo by Bill Greenblatt)

The Pujols negotiations: The Cardinals exclusive window to negotiate with Pujols will expire at 11 p.m. Central time Wednesday, and he and his agent Dan Lozano can begin talking with other clubs, and sign with anybody, one minute later.

As close as Pujols is to finally being able to talk to those other clubs, it seems highly unlikely that he would re-sign with the Cardinals before getting that opportunity to see what the market could bring elsewhere. What will be interesting to see is if the team actually makes him an official offer to take with him onto the free-agent market, and if that offer differs from what they were willing to pay him before the 2011 season began.

Free-agent arbitration decisions: Mozeliak and the Cardinals have until Nov. 23 to offer arbitration for their Type A and Type B free-agent players. Teams must offer arbitration in order to receive draft pick compensation if those players sign with another team. There is still a chance that the compensation system will be altered in the new collective bargaining agreement, but as of now it is expected to stay the same for next year.

Pujols is a type A free agent, which means if he signs elsewhere, the Cardinals would receive either a first or second-round pick in next June’s amateur draft, depending on whether the signing team finished among the top 15 teams in the overall standings this year. Teams that are in the bottom 15 are protected from losing their first-round pick.

According to the Elias rankings, Dotel also is a Type A free agent and Furcal and pitcher Edwin Jackson are Type B free agents. The Cardinals could receive a second-round pick if another club signs them.

The other Cardinals eligible for free agency, but who would not bring a draft pick in return for signing elsewhere, are backup catcher Gerald Laird and infielder Nick Punto. Outfielder Corey Patterson, who was not on the postseason roster, also is eligible for free agency.

Players have until Dec. 7 to accept or reject the club’s arbitration offer.

Tendering contracts for 2012:  The deadline for offering players with less than six years of service time a contract for next year is Dec. 12. The Cardinals have four players in this category – Jason Motte, Kyle McClellan, Skip Schumaker and Ryan Theriot. Motte will certainly be back, McClellan is less likely (perhaps depending on Dotel’s status). The decision with Schumaker and Theriot will be tricky.

Both likely would enter next year competing for playing time at second base, and how much money the team will budget for that position could depend not only on Pujols’ contract but also on what the team decides to do with Furcal or another shortstop. The team also is high on second base prospect Kolten Wong, the top pick in this year’s draft, and some people in the organization believe he could be only a year or so away from the majors – which again could affect how much money they want to pay Schumaker, Theriot or both.

Pursuing free agents: The Cardinals like other teams can begin talking to other free agents as early as 11:01 p.m. Wednesday night. It is not likely they will pursue players on the top end of the list, but most interesting to see will be their level of interest in a couple of starting pitchers who have expressed interest in coming to St. Louis in the past.

Left-hander Mark Buehrle and right-hander Roy Oswalt, a close friend of Lance Berkman’s, would fit in perfectly at the back end of the Cardinals rotation if they would be willing to sign for what the club could offer. The way the club used both Jake Westbrook and Kyle Lohse in the postseason could mean that they will try to trade one or both of those pitchers this winter and pursue free agents or trade options in their place. Most people in the organization also believe that top prospect Shelby Miller is less than a year away from being ready to pitch in St. Louis.

Rob Rains, B.J. Rains, and Chris Geisz are on "The Sports Zone Radio Show" weekdays 1-3 on Sports Radio 1380AM.

Coaching staff changes: Mozeliak said at Monday’s news conference that whoever is hired as the new manager will have “some autonomy” in naming his coaching staff.

Dave Duncan does have a contract for next season, but will have to weigh his decision to return not only on La Russa’s retirement but on his wife’s heath. She underwent surgery for a brain tumor in August, prompting Duncan to leave the club for several weeks before returning on the final day of the season.Assistant hitting coach Mike Aldrete also is believed to be a candidate for the job of hitting coach with the Oakland Athletics.

Losing the month of October for off-season planning purposes will put a little crunch on all of the work Mozeliak has to accomplish – pitchers and catchers will report to Jupiter, Fla., for spring training 105 days from Monday.

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Freese and La Russa popular

David Freese had a monster three weeks in the playoffs and that brought him a lot of new followers on Twitter, jumping from just below  25,000 when the October run began to more than 66,000 as of Sunday… Freese will appear on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno from Los Angeles on Monday night while La Russa will be sitting next to David Letterman on his show in New York… Budweiser has named one of its Clydesdales after La Russa. The horse was born earlier this year and is expected to be one of the lead horses on the famous hitch within a few years, according to an Anheuser-Busch press release.

"Wild Cards" By Rob Rains is available at Amazon.com or through Triumph Books website: TriumphBooks.com.