Monthly Archives: April 2010

Tonight Could Be Interesting, Folks

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I touched on this briefly this morning, and Jon at Dodger Thoughts just posted a timely and informative pitch count chart, but suffice to say: the Dodger pitching staff is in shambles for tonight, as it currently stands.

Think about it: the Dodgers have 12 men on the pitching staff currently – so 11, behind tonight’s starter Vicente Padilla. Five of them are completely unavailable tonight (assuming that unlike with Charlie Haeger, Joe Torre won’t risk Chad Billingsley or Clayton Kershaw in between starts):

Definitely unavailable (5):
Hiroki Kuroda (started Thurs.)
Chad Billingsley (started Wed.)
Clayton Kershaw (started Tues.)
Jonathan Broxton (pitched three days in a row)
Ramon Ortiz (pitched three days in a row)

Almost certainly unavailable (2):
George Sherrill (pitched two days in a row, and poorly)
Charlie Haeger (Saturday’s starter)

Available tonight (4):
Ramon Troncoso (probable closer)
Russ Ortiz
Carlos Monasterios
Jeff Weaver

So among your four-man, all-righty bullpen, that’s one good pitcher who was still your 4th or 5th best option entering the season (Troncoso), 2 non-roster veterans, and a Rule 5 pick – and that’s keeping in mind that Weaver pitched last night and on six of the previous nine days, and that Russ Ortiz is Russ Ortiz.

What this means, if Padilla can’t put together a decent and lengthy start tonight, is a possible disaster. Sure, Jon jokingly included James Loney on his pitch count chart, but how far away are we from actually seeing that? Unfortunately, even if they wanted to bring in help from AAA, the pickings are sparse from there as well. James McDonald, Scott Elbert, and Josh Lindblom started in each of the last three games, so you’d assume they’re not available tonight (or even for tomorrow, should Haeger forgo his start to help tonight). Brent Leach pitched two innings last night, as well.  Plus, Hong-Chih Kuo started his rehab stint last night, and there’s no news on Ronald Belisario, so consider them out too. So if they’re bringing someone up, we’re looking at… Luis Ayala? Travis Schlichting? Justin Miller? Jon Link? Hey, why not Nick Green – he pitched two scoreless innings last year! Some of those guys would need to be put on the 40-man roster, though that’s not a huge issue since either Cory Wade or Brad Ausmus could be put on the 60-day DL.

The point is, keep a close eye on the game tonight. If Padilla’s not up for the challenge, you might see some interesting faces on the mound.

By the way, this could have partially been avoided, you know. I don’t want to cry over spilled milk too much… so I’ll let commenter matt do it for me:

This seams like a good time to have Eric Stults around…

Sigh… yes. Yes it does. Not like we could have predicted this though, right?

Feels Like We’ve Been Here Before

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An Andre Ethier walkoff? Well, that’s out of the ordinary. Also, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Matt Kemp has homers in 4 of the last 5 games. That’s, uh, sorta good.

More on this game later, but just something I need to point out for tonight’s game. Since Jonathan Broxton came in to get the win last night, exactly what I feared the other day has come true:

Yet Ramon Ortiz came in and was predictably horrible, allowing three runs on three hits (including a Mark Reynolds blast) and a walk. As you can see, this has spawned the birth of the “Ortiz DFA-O-Meter” to the top right, as they battle to see which one gets dumped first. So what was once a blowout became a situation in which the top two relievers (Ramon Troncoso and Jonathan Broxton) had to contribute 2.1 innings.

That may not seem like a big deal today, but we saw this exact thing happen last week. Just wait until one of the next two games when it’s a tight situation, and now one might not be available, simply because Ramon Ortiz can’t hold a 7-run lead. So then you’re left with counting on George Sherrill again, and we’ve seen how that turns out.

So now Broxton has pitched three days in a row (as has Ramon Ortiz) and is almost certainly not available tonight, and even Sherrill has pitched two days in a row (walking two and giving up a hit and a run in just 0.1 inning last night). So that means your closer tonight is… Ramon Troncoso? Which is fine, I suppose, but that makes the bullpen group in front of him terrifying at best, because you’re down to Russ Ortiz, Jeff Weaver, and Carlos Monasterios. But hey, at least it’s Vicente Padilla starting, so there’s absolutely no chance the starter will only last 4.1 innings. Hooray?

Frankly, I’d be surprised if we don’t see a pitching move made before the game starts, because someone has to be around to help after the extra inning games and bullpen ineptitude.

Who Needs to Buy A Toaster For This?

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Here’s the latest unneccessary baseball product:

Toast, that venerable staple of breakfast foods, has long been due for a makeover. Well friends, that time has come.

The delicate geniuses at Pangea Brands have come up with a way of combining your love of baseball with your love of toast. This coming May, Pangea will introduce their ProToast, a toaster that burns your favorite team’s logo into your toasted bread. The toasters are set to feature teams from the four major sports leagues, and will retail for $34.99…a relatively small price to pay if you’re a diehard fan.

That’s, right for just $34.99… you can stare at the Dodger logo burned into your toast. I’m not sure I see the point, though. If you want to look at toast with a Dodger logo on it, look no further than the bullpen, amirite? When are they going to make a toaster that will show this:

No, I don’t know why he ended up with no arms – not that he’s doing a whole hell of a lot with two arms right now. The perils of Photoshopping surreptitiously while at the office, I suppose. I’m still debating how best to show the “Ortiz-DFA-O-Meter”. They’re in a dead tie right now, but two needles seems like it’d look awkward.

Back Surgery for Brad Ausmus

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Jon at Dodger Thoughts passes along the news:

Brad Ausmus’ 41st birthday today comes with some bad news. The Dodgers have announced that Ausmus will have surgery Thursday to address a herniated disc, keeping him on the disabled list until at least “late this summer,” the team said. Ausmus is expected to retire after this season.

At the risk of sounding callous, this isn’t exactly the most horrible news in the world, is it? We love Ausmus as a sort of player-coach, but the emphasis is squarely on “coach” in that equation, since he’s not contributing all that much in the field. If you can get back a 40-man spot, give A.J. Ellis the backup job that he deserves at this point, and still keep Ausmus in the locker room (since you assume that he’s not the type to cut off all contact with the club) for advice to pitchers and catchers, is that really all that terrible?

That said, Ausmus has been nothing but class, so it’d be sad to see his long career end with one April game. Should he be physically able to, it’d be great to see him make it back for September action, before retiring to (hopefully) replace Rich Honeycutt as pitching coach. Or, maybe even slide in as bench coach once Torre departs?

That’s How Many Homers It Takes To Overcome An Ortiz

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There was pretty much no chance in hell that this year’s home opener was going to top last year’s…

Wow. Just, wow. Where do you even start? I’m not kidding when I say the fact that Chad Billingsley’s fantastic eleven strikeout performance (including six of his last seven betters) may only be about the fifth best thing that happened today. Seriously, things just do not come together better than this. How about the fact that any Opening Day under blue skies at Dodger Stadium is pretty much the best day of anyone’s life? The record-setting 57,000+ crowd? Vin Scully’s moving first pitch and commentary? The offensive explosion against the hated Giants, including Orlando Hudson’s cycle - a Dodger Stadium first?  And Andre Ethier’s two homers?

…but this came pretty close. Okay, no one hit for the cycle, but the four-homer outburst (as Vin noted, the Dodgers hit three homers on the six-game road trip and four in the first six innings today) against another division rival sure got the crowd going. And if you had to ask the crowd, “which Dodgers would you want to see hit homers?”, wouldn’t Manny, Kemp, and Ethier almost certainly be the top 3? Talk about crowd pleasing – no offense to Casey Blake, of course.

Can we also mention Blake DeWitt for a second? If you’ve been reading this blog at all, you’ve heard me rail on how pointless wins are time and time again. Well, batting average isn’t quite as bad as wins, but it’s up there… and DeWitt is proving why. Thanks to three walks today, DeWitt had a tidy 0-0 afternoon. He may only be hitting .267, but his OBP is up to .522. Dig that again: .522.

Unfortunately, it’s not all good news, because something simply must be done about the bullpen. Clayton Kershaw was effective if not efficient in allowing 2 ER over 5.1 innings, and Jeff Weaver finished up the 6th for him. When Ethier homered in the bottom of the 6th, we were looking at a 9-2 laugher. Yet Ramon Ortiz came in and was predictably horrible, allowing three runs on three hits (including a Mark Reynolds blast) and a walk. As you can see, this has spawned the birth of the “Ortiz DFA-O-Meter” to the top right, as they battle to see which one gets dumped first. So what was once a blowout became a situation in which the top two relievers (Ramon Troncoso and Jonathan Broxton) had to contribute 2.1 innings.

That may not seem like a big deal today, but we saw this exact thing happen last week. Just wait until one of the next two games when it’s a tight situation, and now one might not be available, simply because Ramon Ortiz can’t hold a 7-run lead. So then you’re left with counting on George Sherrill again, and we’ve seen how that turns out. I know Ronald Belisario and Hong-Chih Kuo are due back any day now but… we just can’t put up with these two much longer.

Besides, as Chad from MOKM rightfully asked, where was Carlos Monasterios? He hasn’t pitched in nearly a week – since April 8. I can’t think of any better situation for a Rule 5 pick than with a 7-run lead, and it’s not like the Ortizes are doing any better.

Finally, behold the magic of Twitter. Eagle-eyed fan ED_in_DE pointed out to me that during Ethier’s 6th inning home run… he was using Matt Kemp’s bat. I went back and looked at the tape, and I’ll be damned: he’s absolutely right.

What gives with that? I wonder if it’s the same bat that Kemp used to hit his own homer earlier in the game.