Soriano on the DL, Green leaves the DL
Soriano’s been placed on the 15-day DL with shoulder “fatigue”. The move is retroactive to July 20th, the day after he last appeared in a game, which means he’s eligible to come off it next week. Supposedly he’s been feeling better when throwing, but it can’t be that good if they threw him on the DL.
Green’s back. That’s a drop in quality, obviously, from a healthy Soriano, but from the out-of-whack one, it’s not that big of a deal. Green’s a perfectly adequate reliever in the M’s pen, and with Putz and Sherrill both pitching well and Lowe just shredding opposing batters, there’s no need to throw him to the wolves as he comes off the DL.
Comments
17 Responses to “Soriano on the DL, Green leaves the DL”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
ANYONE is better than Mateo. So bring on Mr. Green! Maybe Grover won’t make him go a few weeks inbetween outings. Mateo needs to be on that every two week thing imho. We really need to see what this team can do with Soriano AND Lowe at their best.
This latest injury leads me to believe maybe Soriano IS destined to be a career reliever. I’ve been arguing he should be a starter, but perhaps his arm really is too fragile for it. I hope I’m wrong.
Regarding Lowe, he’s absolutely nasty, but there’s no need for him, Putz AND Soriano in the pen together longterm, at least not when our rotation sucks. I’m all for giving Lowe a shot in the rotation next year.
Green _is_ perfectly adequate, and the situation may require Hargrove to actually, you know, conserve his relievers.
And also back off the DL—USS Mariner. Kudsos for your manful struggles to get the fans their daily jones connection. Now you see why I have no personal interest in maintaining a blog: tech-rot. Sorry to see that you must have missed the RAMROD, too. Maybe next near.
Oh, and it would be fascinating to see a list of those top 30 site bloggers, by post volume %. Since we’re stats oriented here, natch.
2: I don’t know why you’d want Soriano as a starter, anyways. There are other options in the minors (though nothing too exciting at the moment) and Soriano has been fantastic in a setup role. Relievers are easier to find than starters, but when you have a reliever who has had two fantastic seasons like Soriano has now had, why remove him from it?
People want Soriano for a starter because if he could do what he does over six or seven innings he’d win us a ton of games. I don’t think he can, but if he could he’d be a top of a rotation guy.
Also, sup, DK, you’re a long way from SomethingAwful.
I volunteered at RAMROD, rather than riding it. Next year.
Takes awhile to build up for the big ride, yeah. Weather wasn’t too bad this year. You’ll like it when you do it fersure.
Here’s what I’m thinking. Anybody know what Soriano’s middle name is?
—
Bavasi’s been in attendance for the full game in Tacoma the last 2 nights, Jim Na was with him last night. Seemed to be keeping a close eye on Cruceta tonight; last night he spent the night bs-ing and barely glanced up to watch the game.
#5 is dead on.
He’s a great reliever, so what’s wrong with leaving him where he shines? Not all great relievers make good starters and vice versa.
Hey there Bender, you on SA? Don’t recognize the name. Yeah, I read this place off and on, and never really ever got around to making an account for comments. As soon as I did, the server went kaboom!
I can understand why some people would get excited at the prospect of Soriano being able to do what he’s done in the pen as a starter, but I seriously doubt it would translate. If he were to start, he’d surely have to tone his fastball down a bit, so he could spread his endurance out over 6-7 innings. At this point, he’s really just got two pitches that are of any use, though they are both quite good. As a starter, he’d start finding himself in trouble with only two pitches to go to. I’m sure he has another tucked away that he rarely uses, but I’m sure it would hardly be effective. Really, relievers are starters that either couldn’t cut it in the rotation (Gagne, Dempster), those that are too old to start but still a purpose as a long man or LOOGY (Mulholland, Fassero), or that are much more effective coming out of a short role, whether due to being able to dial it up more for the short spurts, or only having 1-2 really successful pitches (Rivera, Soriano).
Soriano has three pitches. Come on now.
I agree Soriano should stay in the pen. His mechanics aren’t very good (he throws with his arm, putting a lot of strain on his elbow and shoulder) and would be unable to stay in the rotation for long.
How about this for a question of the day? How many innings will it be before Lowe allows an earned run?
He’s got three pitches, but I can only see two that would really be successful when going through lineups as a starter.
Johan Santana was a great reliever too. That’s not a reason to leave him in the pen. There may, however, be other reasons to leave Soriano in the pen — such as his mechanics. I’m not enough of a judge of pitching mechanics to have an opinion on that.
Santana was very lackluster out of the pen in 2001 and 2002. 2003 and 2004 was when he started looking more like the Santana of now, but even then, he was split about halfway between relief appearances and starts.
My point, obviously, is that a great starter is much more valuable than a great reliever. Roger Clemens might have made a great reliever. The fact that a guy does a great job in the less demanding — and less valuable — job is not an argument for leaving him there.
There may be very good arguments — starting with his health — for leaving Soriano in the bullpen. Though I would point out that being in the bullpen hasn’t kept him healthy this year.