Wasn’t his nerve issue not necessarily related to what he was rehabbing at the time?

What was he rehabbing for? SARS? Gout? Scurvy? Mange? Is there anything he hasn’t had?

…Your post nests under HL’s post nicely.

on the “reply” button next to the time/date stamp in order to reply to people. In a post with more comments, your reply could get lost in the shuffle. Thanks.

I like the Joe-L comment. Probably more than one L though

Especially with #2. It seems like a lot of times he gives up his runs in the first two innings and then settles down for 2 or three more… There was a point in last season where you could almost set your watch by it. I like the Joe-L comment as well. Nice.

mcclellan suffered in the bullpen, in part because of overexposure, but also because he ended up making lots and lots of appearances with few rests in between. the rotation can actually be easier on an arm than the bullpen because of longer rest periods and fewer warmups.

the outcome was that mcclellan was very valuable over the beginning of the season and had negative value at the end. the rotation could be a better way to maintain his value if he’s able to pitch there.

as for pineiro, the best way to deal with a mediocre pitcher is just not to pitch him very often, in the rotation, in the bullpen, wherever. if he’s our worst option in the pen, he can be relegated to lost cause games and low-leverage long relief. there are high and low leverage relief appearances. in staffing those appearances, you can judiciously use a bullpen. a start is a start is a start, though.

the last factor in favor of mcclellan in the rotation is that we have enormous depth in middle relief and limited depth in starting pitching.

When we extended Piñiero, I made this comment:

AGE---BB/9---K/9----HR/9---FIP----G:F----P/IP

25----3.48---5.31---1.49---5.44---1.39---16.5

26----3.05---4.95---1.07---4.83---1.36---16.3

27----2.94---4.72---1.38---5.23---1.30---16.5

28----2.25---4.85---1.38---4.45---1.30---15.7

-----------------------------------------------

Ave---2.94---5.31---1.24---4.99---1.34---16.63

25----2.75---7.10---1.34---4.56---1.18---16.0

26----2.66---5.10---1.10---4.63---1.29---15.5

27----3.48---4.73---1.25---5.29---1.61---16.6

28----2.40---5.53---1.29---4.69---1.59---15.8

Ave---2.87---5.54---1.23---4.81---1.39---15.87

The first block of ugly is Suppan’s age 25-28 seasons, after which we signed him for three years; the second is Jo-el’s, although we picked him up at the end of his age 28 season and signed him for two more years. I was favorably comparing them at the time and still think that Piñiero is basically a less wild Jeff Suppan. Even last season, when Jo-el was a disappointment, he was better than Jeff in just about every pitching measure (including efficiency and IP/GS, believe it or not).

The big difference there is that Piñiero’s our #5; Soup’s their #2. I’m comfortable with Piñiero, and McClellan, and Boggs, for that matter as our fifth starter.

is mostly a sinkerball pitcher. usually, the more innings they throw, the better they are because if a sinkerball pitcher’s arm gets too well rested, he will throw too hard, and the pitches won’t sink. When he was with Boston, he was terrible out of the ’pen, worse than he was as a starter last year.

but there is a long way to go before anybody here breathes easy.

You could’ve just called this post: everyone shows up in shape to spring training.

Because until he’s pitching every 5th day for the next couple months. I’m not sold on his health.

I find myself quite excited by this.