Why we need another Starting Pitcher

Trading him for an Arroyo or Meche is dumb, their salaries dwarf Juancho’s. For GMJ on the other hand, maybe. I honestly believe that O’Sully will be the opening day 5th starter. He’s had 5th guy success at every stop, even if that does mean that he got pushed quickly last year cause of NA’s death.

I think we forget that about these minor league pitchers. O’Sully and Bell should have been in AA all of last year, maybe getting a taste of AAA. Ortega should have been in AAA all year. They would have gotten the work and tutelage they needed to be prepared for the next rung of the ladder. Then, tragedy. Adenhart’s death pushed all of these kids up into a position they weren’t completely ready for. Reckling proved his front end stuff by continuing to be very good. These other guys however are NOT front end guys. As such I don’t expect them to perform well when they get pushed up out of neccesity rather than accomplishment.

And to O’Sully and Bell’s credit, their first couple starts were not bad, they gave us 5 or 6 innings and held the opposing team at bay. At the same time saving wear and tear on the bullpen.

5th Starter making league minimum depth chart:
NaPalmer
Sean-O
TacoBell
Tony-O
Reckling

Rivera is very good defensively and has a solid bat. GMJ however…. wow. I understand it’s hard to play every few days and in different oufield positions. This guy though, is just sad to watch. He takes bad routes, over-runs fly balls, drops things that are in his glove, tries to be torii and just looks lost, etc… He is not what you call a “good defender.” I cant see taking rivera out of the OF. He is too good and our replacements are too bad.

Anyway, none of the options excite me for a trade. None of them bring much more than what we can expect from our own in house options. I expect Pamer or SOS will be #5 come April and both will do average jobs. I expect we will trade a catcher soon though. Wilson is out of options and carrying 3 catchers doesnt seem like part of the plan so we might as well get something for the guy.
 
Palmer though, maybe the guy figured it out coming out of the pen. Maybe he can keep up that relief era from now on (we can dream right?). If not, if there is some reason why he can rock it for 3 innings and kill us when he pitches 7, we have a good long man out of the pen and SOS gets his shot. If he stinks, we make a deal at the trade deadline to get someone.

to start season. Evaluate them and assess the trade market at deadline. we have no need, barring injury, to take on a so so guy for 4 or 6 mil when we can decide if we have an ace and if not get one at deadline.

Rivera is not as good defensively as his stats suggest. His routes are OK at best, he has no range, and doesn’t dive for anything, Boston last year immediately comes to mind. He does have an absolute cannon for an arm though. Evans is much better than Rivera defensively and GMJ would even be better than Rivera. I will say this though, he’s better than Bobby Abreu, that guy is GOD AWFUL in RF. I’m very disappointed he’s not our DH.

Rivera slumped HARD at the end of the year and was utterly useless in the playoffs. I have no problem trading him for a solid #3-#5 starter who would give us what we need for this year and next year if needed.

A year from now, after Bell, O’Sullivan, Ortega, Reckling and Walden have all had a full year in AAA, I’d be 100% confident in going with an in-house option for the 5th spot. But for now, they aren’t ready to succeed and neither is Matt Palmer.

Also, no trading Rivera. That’s just not right at all. :-D Yay sentimentality! It’s all I’ve got left with this team for now! (I kid, I kid, though you get the idea so I hope.)

everyone on HH…please think of two seasons.

1. 2002. The Angels win it all on Washburn, Ramon Ortiz and some rookie named John Lackey.

2. The 2009 Yankees. Win it all on Pettite, Burnett and CC.

Point being: TOTALLY OKAY TO NOT HAVE FIVE SOLID STARTERS. Get over it. Who the fuck cares who our fifth starter is. Its 1 out of every five games. 162 divided by five is 32. We can lose all 32 of those games and still have a killer record.

If we make it there, fine. We’re in great shape with Kaz, Santana, Weaver and Saunders. What I am saying is that by rolling out a pitcher who’s pretty much guaranteed to give up 6 runs in 4 innings of work every 5 days, we may not even get a chance at the World Series. I mean giving up 32 games a year is ALOT.

Not to mention to tax it’s going to put on our bullpen when they have to cover 6 innings in one game. That throws them off for the rest of the week and makes certain relievers unavailable.

We could get so much in return for Rivera, Evans and Pettit deserve an opportunity, Bell, Ortega, Reckling, Walden and SOS could use one more year of seasoning. This just makes so much sense to me.

But I definitely understand the other side of the argument, I mean that is a lot of depth. It’s just that a good majority of it is either not ready or may never be ready. I look forward to the day when Reckling and Walden are in the rotation, but I’m just not so confident in the futures of SOS, Bell and Ortega.

I’m good with what we have. SOS or NaPalm will step up and be better than any FA we could get for a 5th starter. And hell no on the trades. Other teams always seem to want to fleece us.

Though, on a side note, Seattle is seemingly putting together a pretty good looking team. As long as Bradley doesn’t implode. Let’s hope he does.

I’m not 2 happy.

But hey,
magic worked in 02…so why not in 2010