Cardinals starter Lance Lynn has Tommy John surgery

Cardinals starter Lance Lynn has had Tommy John surgery and will miss the 2016 season, Jon Heyman tweets.

I'd love to get to the point where I no longer have to say this explicitly, but just to be clear: I don't like it when anyone gets injured, and neither should you. I want the Pirates to beat the Cardinals, but ideally, I'd like them to win because they're just better, not because someone got hurt.

Lynn's injury does, however, significantly change the Cardinals' outlook for next season. Never mind that the Pirates have fared well against Lynn over the years -- he's a big part of their rotation. Whereas before the Cardinals could have pursued a starting pitcher as a luxury item but certainly didn't have to, now they almost certainly need one this winter. Lynn is out, John Lackey is a free agent, Carlos Martinez recently had an injury (although I don't know whether it will affect him next season), and top prospect Alex Reyes recently got suspended.

That leaves Adam Wainwright and Jaime Garcia, who haven't exactly proven themselves to be bulletproof in recent years, along with Michael Wacha. The Cardinals' depth options, like Tyler Lyons, Tim Cooney and Marco Gonzales, aren't bad, but the team is now without a bunch of the starting pitching that was so important to their 2015 season. Add in the very significant potential loss of Jason Heyward, and all of a sudden the Cardinals have real holes. Their offseason just got a lot more interesting.