6-4-2 — an Angels/Dodgers double play blog: Final Tuneup: Angels 11, Padres 3

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Sunday, March 30, 2008

Final Tuneup: Angels 11, Padres 3

I sat down last night after a bit of a chardonnay buzz and tried to write a meaningful recap of last night's Angels/Padres scrimmage, but gave it up for hopeless after I reconsidered the comments my last post on that subject generated. Even in victory, there was something to taint it (the quadruple-A pitchers San Diego ran out there in particular), but I realized that's just one half of the spring training coin.

The other side was the understanding that this is what good teams do to bad pitchers, and without a doubt, neither of Randy Wolf nor Shawn Estes are major-league ready anymore. That didn't stop the Pads from adding Wolf to the 25-man roster, though, and I can't imagine that's any way to start the season.

Fifth pitcher discussions, though, tend to be pretty meaningless, because they can often be skipped. That's not the case with the Pads, and for two reasons:

Wolf won't be a fifth starter, but a fourth one; the actual fifth turns out to be Justin Germano, who hasn't even been league average one year of his major league career (as measured by ERA+).
Second, the Padres open in Houston and don't get a day off until Thursday, April 10; assuming they hold to their slated rotation of Peavy-Young-Maddux-Wolf-Germano, San Diego will send Germano, Peavy, and Young at the Dodgers this coming weekend. That's one almost guaranteed win and a pretty even shot considering Chris Young's lifetime 4.05, 1-1 record at Dodger Stadium. (Yes, small sample size alert: 26.2 IP at the Ravine.)

Randy Wolf left the game pretty badly scarred, getting touched up for five runs, all of which were earned. It's part and parcel of his 2007, one in which he had to make sizeable adjustments to his mechanics to overcome the side effects of 2005 Tommy John surgery. As recently as May of last year, when he posted a 3.41 ERA and six quality starts of his first 11, he looked like he might have overcome it. Then came the rest of his abbreviated season, 7.12 ERA and a 3-3 record. As with another low-cost, high-upside scrap heap signing, the oft-injured Mark Prior, Wolf is slightly more likely to succeed in San Diego's pitcher friendlier confines than with their previous employers' parks. Both Wolf and Prior represent reclamation projects. There's nothing wrong with those, but when you start the season with one in the rotation, it should raise big red flags.

That is, it's not clear how much of this signing represents a desperation bid by the Pads to get one last crack at a division they could have won had they cracked the 90-win barrier last year. This doesn't much look like a team that can do that (their outfield, in particular, remains a problem, as does offense generally). Nevertheless, there are some bright spots, as we saw with INF Callix Crabbe, who led the team in spring training hits. Stolen from the Brewers as a Rule 5 draftee, he may make a useful major league player this year.

Shawn Estes was equally incompetent as Randy Wolf, and the Angels knocked him around, too. Really, the only San Diego pitcher unscored on was Adam Bass, a former Diamondbacks product who appears to have jumped teams this year.

Quinlan smacked Estes around, showing his situational lefty-handling isn't gone, and while Casey Kotchman didn't do too much at the plate (he grounded out in the middle of Terry Smith talking about how he needed opportunities to hit left-handed pitching), he did manage to drive in a run. Reggie Willits got on base three times in five falls, scoring a pair of runs and generally being his pesky self. Brandon Wood managed to score a run after reaching on Randy Wolf's error, and scored when Wolf uncorked a wild pitch later that frame in Juan Rivera's at-bat. In all, a good outing for the Angels, who weren't up against much competition, and did what they needed to under those circumstances.

Time for the regular season.

Box/recap

Labels: angels, padres, recaps, spring training