JUPITER, Fla. • As he prepared this winter for what he hopes will be a defining increase of workload in the near future, new Cardinals starter Mike Leake looked to the past.
“I’m talking 50 years ago, 30 years ago when players had their second jobs and took time off and didn’t bust butt in the offseason,” Leake said. “They busted butt once they got to spring. That’s kind of what I’m experimenting with — trying to go back to that age-old, where two months is plenty of time to get (an arm) ready for seven, eight months of a season.