- Like with Detroit and Todd Jones, the Indians have stumbled into a nice arrangement with Joe Borowski. He's not their best reliever yet still the closer, but with strict save situation usage, he's not overexposed. The Indians probably don't see their current arrangement as a problem.
- For those of you that worry about big workload jumps, Fausto Carmona pitched 173.2 IP in 2005, 102.1 IP in 2006, and then 215 IP plus the playoffs last year. The usual caveats about the dangers of blanket statements apply here.
- Raise your hand if you knew that Miguel Batista won 16 games last year.
- If Brandon Morrow is being converted back into a starter, won't he almost certainly need time in the minors? The Mariners are more aggressive than most teams in promoting their prospects, but Morrow has all of one (1!) minor league start above Rookie ball, in addition to his major league relief work last year. If he really begins the year as the M's 4th or 5th starter, you can file this away in the Bad Idea department. Meanwhile, he's a projections nightmare.
- LOL at the Mariners offering arbitration for Horacio Ramirez. It was bad enough to hear the post-facto justifications/slanders for that awful trade last year for Rafael Soriano. It's a helluva lot worse to commit future dollars to Ramirez. Have they not heard of the concept of "sunk costs"?
- George Sherrill's numbers against righties were pretty good last year - they'd be well-served to let him throw more innings.
- Kevin Gregg's low save projection is a function of how poor the team will be, and not a reflection necessarily on his ability. This is going to be one truly awful team.
- Take a look at the Marlins' depth chart, and their projected starting rotation. It's an awful mess. Scott Olsen regressed badly, Josh Johnson is out for the season, and who knows what they're going to get out of Anibal Sanchez. The confidence level that they'll do the right thing with Andrew Miller or any of the other prospects acquired from Detroit is pretty low. Look at Rick Vanden Hurk - it's really irresponsible of the Marlins that he pitched 80+ innings at the major league level in 2007, after having 16.2 IP of High-A ball experience prior to the season.
- The biggest travesty of the Lastings Milledge deal is that Omar Minaya didn't get somebody to trade a pitcher or pitching prospect to him. He's now burned his most tradeable commodity without address the Mets' most glaring need.
- Chad Cordero's K:BB is not trending too well. You might consider putting him on your at-risk of closers. The Nats also have plenty of viable alternatives in the bullpen, led by Jon Rauch and Luis Ayala.
- Expect a little more decline from Trevor Hoffman this season - the way he finished up the year, compounded with the procedure done on his elbow is another to raise a warning flag.
- I got a good chuckle from our note that the Pirates are now looking to try trade Matt Morris. That trade by former GM David Littlefield might have cost him his job, judging from the reaction league-wide to it.
- In an otherwise train wreck of a season, Brandon McCarthy somehow managed to drop his HR/9 rate from 1.81 to 0.80, despite a 0.66 G/F. That's a pretty difficult fete to accomplish, let alone while pitching in Texas.
- Red Flag Alert - Kevin Millwood's strikeouts dropped sharply and walks turned up considerably while throwing far fewer innings last year.
- The Brewers had to at least be aware of the allegations regarding Eric Gagne, right? They only gave him a one-year deal, but there has to be some buyer's remorse here.
- Curt Schilling's strikeout rate dropped sharply last year - no doubt as a result of the shoulder problems he had. There's some collapse potential here.
- On the flip side, it's hard to reign in the projection for Clay Buchholz. On the numbers alone, he could project for a sub-3.00 ERA, but he has so little experience at the upper levels of the minors, let alone the majors, that there has to be just a little backsliding, no? Final projection just gives him 22 starts, going 9-5, 3.18 ERA, 117:47 K:BB in 116 innings.
- While the Reds probably still have a trade in them, Matt Belisle has a spot guaranteed in the rotation right now by default. He hasn't done really anything to merit it, but the Reds don't have much in the way of replacement level talent that's major league ready. One trade and an early promotion of Johnny Cueto could change that.
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