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Thursday, May 26, 2005 |
The Power Outage
A few words regarding Fire Jim Tracy's analysis of the season to date:
But those of us who were optimistic about the coming season (including, obviously, DePodesta himself), severely underestimated regression in the pitching corps. Key parts of the bullpen, Carrara and Alvarez, appear to be compromised. Jeff Weaver is again, either 1) hurt or 2) lost forever. We have no fifth starter at all. None. To call Scott Erickson or DJ Houlton a fifth starter is to give them credit for circumstances beyond their control. They just happen to breathe. Lowe and Penny appear to be fine complimentary parts in a solid rotation, but neither is consistent enough to hold up the rotation on his own. Odalis Perez is hurt, and even if he comes back, every start of his taken by a Houlton or Carlyle is an automatic L—and those add up at some point, particularly when that makes the third black hole in a five-man rotation.My preseason dread regarding Derek Lowe has thus far been unwarranted, but I still sense a kind of desperation in DePodesta's offseason maneuverings, an offseason in which severe underestimation factored into several things, and not just the pitching. The Dodgers' DER, fourth-worst in the NL, can't be hung on the post of third base, at least to the extent that I can find; Mike Edwards and Jose Valentin have RAA2 values of -2, which is pretty impressive, all things considered.
But I have to disagree, somewhat, with this:
DePodesta’s first response to this crisis, recalling Buddy Carlyle, was not the sign of a proactive GM who recognizes a problem. It was the sign of someone who thinks the pitching staff is unlucky. The pitching staff is not unlucky. They aren’t regressing below the mean—they are regressing to their mean.In turn:
- Lowe is actually doing a pretty good job.
- Weaver's injured, and as usual, the Dodgers are lying about it.
- Penny and his 3.79 ERA aren't actually doing that badly.
- OP -- the main trouble -- is on the DL with another shoulder injury, a concern before the season started.
- Nobody thought much of Erickson before the season started, so that's hardly news.
On Edwin Jackson:
If you’re going to bring up Edwin Jackson, just bring him up. Don’t bring him up and send him down. Call him up and say “You’re going to start every five days regardless of how you pitch. You can give up back-to-back home runs to Tike Redman and Jack Wilson. Just learn how to pitch.” Putting off Jackson’s development is only going to retard our chances in 2006. Stop with the Carlyle nonsense.Jackson isn't ready for the majors, period. He's blowing games, and while, yes, he has been pitching in the thin air at Vegas, he also sports a 6.59 ERA against AAA hitting.
It is absurd that Buddy Carlyle is on this team right now. The Braves and Angels, both in the last week, have pulled 21 and 22 year old pitchers up to the major league level who are contributing successfully. This suggests not only aggressiveness in their will to win, but a confidence in their young players and in their system.Not only that, but the Angels brought up the 29-year-old Joel Peralta yesterday, who struck out four in two and a third perfect innings. Could it be that the Dodgers' system isn't producing so much as a single usable relief pitcher? As Bryan Smith pointed out a few days ago, the system hasn't produced a single actual Dodger; there may be a reason for that. I begin to wonder whether the Las Vegas altitude is too much of a negative for the team. Everything's bad on this team -- pitching, defense, and offense -- and a lot of it can be attributed to age and injuries. The latter couldn't have been foreseen. The former could, to some degree, but I'm not willing to hang DePodesta just yet over it. But this marks at least the second year I've said "wait and see" about the farm, and not a single productive piece has come from it. It's time for those great, Baseball America-approved draftees to start playing like real major leaguers in a Dodger uniform.
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