whan that alberte with his swinges soote
the droghte of dyngers hath perced to the roote
and buryed every pycher in swich leyne drives
of which vertue engendered is the centiquid
whan colbyrus with his smoothe homrunnes
inspired in every ladie a swoon and a fluttre
ye tripel, dubbel, singel, and ye acryobatick caches
hath been solden to ye masses with flaire and grace;
thanne longen battres to goon on hytting strekes
and middel infelders to avoide the errores.
on ferne rode tryppes, yea, in sondry stadia,
from every outfeld coriner, they wende,
to batte befor the mang their ende,
befor him that hath them batten in
whan they woot erewise been lobstyres.
so, i hear we are going to see more of PJ walters. as of press time, no word on whether he's going to the rotation or the bullpen, or whether he is replacing blake hawksworth or brad penny (who has turned tail side up - seriously, the p-d is reporting that typical recovery time is seven weeks). whose roster spot he's replacing and what role he's taking are in fact separate questions, since either kyle mcclellan or mitch boggs could theoretically stretch out for a starting job by the next time penny's spot comes up again.
for my money, i'd rather see PJ start than relieve, if brad is going out. he has better stuff for a long role, while boggs and kyle can dial their stuff up in a short appearance. walters "dials up" to 90 or 91 maybe.
my suspicion is, though, that he'll come in as a reliever. the cards will be very short this afternoon (game time 1:15 CDT) if they must rely on franklin and miller to get them through a kyle lohse start. motte, mcclellan, and boggs all pitched 20+ pitches, diner closed out the game, and the hawk is still twingy in his groin. historically, when they were bringing someone in to cover a spot start, they usually waited till a day or so before the start, while walters' call up was announced almost at the end of last night's game. i suspect that means that they're putting the hawk on the DL, although a further possibility is that peej is a loaner for a couple days and ottavino will come up by monday or tuesday to cover penny's start. possibilities on possibilities.
i realize as i write this that, by the time this is actually read, the decision will be out. ah well, there's my thought process, right or wrong.
he's had a fine season in a small (19.7 inning) sample. he has a 2.44 FIP, a 54.8% GB rate, a 10.53 K/9, and a 1.37 BB/9. insofar as this is not just a small sample size problem, all of his numbers are improvements over last year. unfortunately, it's almost certainly a small sample size problem. the MLE calculator likes him for a 2.69 FIP for this year, a big departure from his MLE for his career of 4.73 and his actual ML performance last year of 7.91 (in a smaller sample size that his season to date at memphis. my suspicion is that he's going to be closer to 4.73 than 2.69, but i personally like PJ and remain irrationally optimistic about his prospects. i would not be surprised if he's improved substantially this season and could at least be as good as blake hawksworth - who is neither as good as he seemed last year nor as bad as he's looked this year.
fwiw, while the gap between hawksworth's season performances in 2009 and 2010 has been huge by both ERA and FIP, his xFIP for last season and this are 4.59 and 4.64 respectively. my suspicion is that the xFIP is a fairly good depiction of what the hawk's true talent is, which is as a fairly interchangeable part at the back of the bullpen. PJ is probably much the same.
in idle news around the league, anyone who is in the market for a not-very-good 2b can get one - kaz matsui is hanging out there on waivers. rumor is the rockies want to grab him. the mets are shopping luis castillo for the 29th time, apparently hoping that dayton moore or maybe ed wade is in the market to spend way too much money on him.
also, apparently the giants are thinking about replacing our dear wellemeyer with a minor league free agent by the name of eric hacker in the rotation; that's right, he may lose his job to the san francisco equivalent of evan maclane.