How do you feel about the rotation (as presently constituted)?

[sheetskout]

I think it is about average right now with Gallardo, Parra, Bush, Suppan and McClung. My big concern is that there is no way all those guys stay healthy. We need at least 2 guys as depth. If we could get a couple guys better than Suppan, I think we would be set.

Sooooo true. People also need to remember that Gallardo and Parra are still young and need to build up to a full season's worth of innings. (200+)

[logan82]

sheetskout wrote:

Sooooo true. People also need to remember that Gallardo and Parra are still young and need to build up to a full season's worth of innings. (200+)

Parra should be built up to go around 190+ for next year. 190+ is pretty good for any starter. Gallardo, who knows. He would have been ok for around 200 in 2008 but, no idea what a year off will do.

[RobDeer 45]

I think with the addition of sheets back in the rotation we are looking at a nice rotation. I believe without him we do not have enough fire power to be good. I believe a guy like soup is great to have only if he's your 4 or 5 starter and that's why we have him.

 

What do you think if mc clung was our closer? Interesting.....

[RU Rah Rah]

I got scared today thinking about the chances of the current crop of 5 (Yo, Manny, Bush, Suppan, and McClung) each making basically 32 starts. That seems improbable at best, especially at the back end.

[BrewCrewForever]

If Doug can go get Sheets, Garland or Looper now I will feel a lot better. I like the pen with Hoffman at the back end and McClung as the long man if we get another starter.

[sheetskout]

God I hope we get Sheets.....

[Invader3K]

There should still be enough available payroll to add one mid priced starter. Please do something, Doug.

[bklynbrewcrew]

Melvin cant seriously be thinking of going into the season with this rotation can he? There is more than a good chance that Suppan and McClung will be replacement level or worse and to be counting on Yo and Manny as our numbers 1 and 2 is putting way too much pressure on them.

 

If Melvin doesnt find another quality starter (Sheets) I just dont see how we can compete for a playoff spot.

[Invader3K]

I do think we still really need another starter, but I think people really need to let the Sheets thing go at this point. It's almost February, and I think if he was coming back here, it would have happened by now.

 

There are still some serviceable guys out there...Garland, Wolf, etc. Maybe Melvin can put some inquiries out there.

[Tbadder]

In the paper today (1/23), Mark A. states that there is no money for a starter. I really think we're looking at a 3rd place rotation. At this point I guess I'd be in favor of a salary dump with Cameron if it meant signing Sheets. If that's not possible, then we need to find relievers that can go 3 innings an outing so the pen doesn't turn into Caligua's Rome.

[bklynbrewcrew]

If money is such a problem we shouldnt have signed Hoffman and used that money to put towards Sheets. For all the good that Melvin has done it is shocking to me how he is neglecting the most important part of the team, the starting rotation. If he is counting on Suppan and McClung to comprise 2/5s of our rotation he is being completely negligent. Playoff type teams dont have two potential replacement level starters in their rotation without injuries occuring.

[RU Rah Rah]

Right, exactly. It's not just about the rotation itself but also the bullpen. When you have Suppan and McClung going 5 2/3 innings on consecutive nights, the bullpen is going to get worn down in a hurry. And that's going to impact their ability to finish off games for Yo, Manny, and Bush.

 

The apparent complacency about the rotation really surprises me. There's just no way that those five guys are going to make a combined 162 starts.

[strawbossisevil]

Bklyn, it's probably because Sheets didn't want to come back, and the fact that we didn't want him back. The relationship there has soured. No matter how much wishing or complaining we might do, that will not change. So we probably got the best pitcher we could get with the money we had.

 

Truth of the matter is, if everyone stays healthy this season, we will likely be in the wild card chase, if not in the chase for the division (if the Cubs suffer some injury set backs or players have a down year). Also your assertion that a playoff team can't have two average type pitchers is not correct. Have you forgotten already the team that won the world series? The spent much of the year starting Kyle Kedrick and Adam Eaton, both who had seasons significantly worse than what is expected from Suppan and McClung.

 

We will need our offense to play a bit better than last season, as part of our struggles were related to having many of our young stars having down years. But that is entirely possible.

 

I understand being negative, but please, we don't need the same lines repeated over and over and over again. Everyone on the site knows how you feel about things.

[Ennder]

Here is what Shandler has to say about the rotation.

 

Gallardo - 178 IP, 3.50 ERA. Elite skill set and knee should not be a big issue.

Parra - 180 IP, 3.91 ERA. If he finds an out pitch vs RH upside 3.25 ERA, 200 K.

Bush - 189 IP, 4.20 ERA. Mentions how strong his supporting skills looked in 2nd half which makes him interesting for fantasy again.

Suppan - 189 IP, 4.87 ERA. Skillset is pedestrian.

McClung - 81 IP, 4.70 ERA. Poor indicators, stay away. This projection is obviously as a RP too, as a starter that would be worse.

 

Looper - 198 IP, 4.19 ERA.

Sheets - 174 IP, 3.41 ERA.

Wolf - 174 IP, 4.66 ERA.

 

This mostly agrees with my opinions. Gallardo is a future ace, Parra is a fugure #2 starter, Bush is a solid #3. Suppan and McClung fit fine into a 4/5. As long as every pitcher stays healthy the rotation will be ok this year. That really isn't likely to happen at all and we really need to add a decent arm for some depth.

[Blindcheck]

I would like to add a starter if for no other reason, you have to have depth.

[TuesdaysWithRillo]

I have confidence that Melvin will add one more pitcher. It might not be until May or June though after an injury. There's always a possibility that a guy like David Welch or Alex Periard could give us some quality innings this year.

[strawbossisevil]

Here's a question.

 

When comparing Gallardo to Sheets. How much value does Gallardo's hitting have in comparison to Sheets who is awful with the bat? Sheets over his career batted .076, good for about 5 hits over the course of a whole season (67 ABs), and he had about 2 or so walks per season (OBP .113).

 

Gallardo on the other hand, based on his hitting so far in his career (.224) would get 15 hits over the same span of at bats, with about the same number of walks (added on top of that the fact that Gallardo has a bit more pop in his bat, as evidenced by his career slug % of .429.

 

How much value does 10 hits have? Are we talking potentially a win or two more? And how does that play in to what type of ERA Gallardo would have to put up to be considered "equivalent" to the '08 Sheets?

 

My reason for asking is because we were right in the playoff hunt with essentially the same rotation minus Sheets. What type of numbers do we need from Gallardo so that his production (offense and pitching combined) would be equivalent to Sheets?

[MJLiverock]

Using the innings pitched from Ender's post above gives a total of 736 innings out of Gallardo, Parra, Bush, and Suppan. Assuming 6 2/3 innings a start for 162 games yields roughly 1075 innings from the starting staff. Those projections leave a hole of 339 innings of starting pitching needed from McClung and ??

 

Given that Suppan and McClung and even Parra have a hard time averaging 6 2/3 a start the bullpen may be very taxed. They might even have to look at piggyback starting if they can't reliably count on some of these guys to go 6+innings or else the bullpen could be burned up by the third game of a series.

[bklynbrewcrew]

So its February 2 and we still havent added a starting pitcher. At this point I am very very disappointed in this offseason. To think that Melvin went into the offseason expecting to lose Sabathia and having no interest in resigning Sheets at any price and having no plans whatsoever to replace either of them is mindboggling.

 

Does Melvin actually believe that we can win with this lousy rotation as is with no depth whatsoever and two completely unreliable starters in Suppan and 5 inning McClung? I am in shock that Doug seems to have no urgency whatsoever when it comes to improving this rotation.

 

I really hope I am wrong and Doug will make a late move to acquire a starter but if not he has been completely negligent in his handling of this pitching staff.

[TooLiveBrew]

To think that Melvin went into the offseason expecting to lose Sabathia and having no interest in resigning Sheets at any price and having no plans whatsoever to replace either of them is mindboggling.

 

What's mindboggling to me is the intent you project on Melvin each offseason. Are you really going to try & tell everyone that he's just not trying & you somehow know this?

 

 

Does Melvin actually believe that we can win with this lousy rotation as is with no depth whatsoever and two completely unreliable starters in Suppan and 5 inning McClung? I am in shock that Doug seems to have no urgency whatsoever when it comes to improving this rotation.

 

To be fair, you were in shock by week one of the postseason. What do you want from Melvin? To go out & make a bad signing on someone like Oliver Perez (yes I know he inked with NYM) so you can say, 'At least he did something'? Do you want him to trade away someone & create a hole in another part of the organization?

 

He said all along this offseason that if a 'big' SP were to be added, it would be via trade, not FA. Clearly there hasn't been anything out there so far that he thinks will improve the team. There are still arms available (including Sheets), and I'm guessing that if he's going to invest FA money in a pitcher, Melvin doesn't want to saddle the team with a contract like Perez's. So he's playing the waiting game (just like almost every other GM) on the guys still holding out hope for multi-year deals.

[TuesdaysWithRillo]

People thought that the Minnesota Twins rotation looked pretty bad going into the 2008 season, but then Scott Baker and Kevin Slowey emerged to be top of the rotation type starters. If Brewer fans have the same patience with Gallardo and Parra, a lot of the same might happen in 2009 in Brew City.

 

Baker = Gallardo

Slowey = Parra

Livan = Suppan

Perkins = Bush

Blackburn > McClung

 

The only true difference in the 2 rotations was that Blackburn had a lot more upside and talent than McClung. Sure, Livan ended up getting DFA'd and they got 2 good months out of Liriano, but that could happen in Milwaukee if we trade a prospect or 2 for a top of the line pitcher. Small Market teams have to trust their young pitchers or they will dig themselves into payroll purgatory.

 

Without injury, I don't mind the current rotation because we are flexible to add a piece if we are in contention which depends on bounce back years from players in our offense.

[Ennder]

I'm absolutely fine with the rotation as it sits. I just think we need a depth arm, I don't even care if it is a 4.80 ERA type. Just so we aren't completely screwed by the first injury to a SP.

[3Putt]

We need at least one more SP, two if we keep Sheets. Even though I like McClung & Bush I recognize that along with Parra they all had bad stretches last year. We see what we have in Suppan which is barely enough to call a credible #5. Throw in an injury or two (which is likely) and we still need some arms.

[nate82]

We see what we have in Suppan which is barely enough to call a credible #5.

No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. and No. No matter how many times you say this it won't be true. Suppan is the definition of a #5 pitcher who is a borderline #4 pitcher. Don't let Suppan's contract cloud your judgement on what Suppan is and isn't.

[BrewCrewForever]

The fact we have not added even any pitchers to minor league deals tells me that our second options if we have an injury might be Chris Capuano, Mark DiFelice and maybe to a lesser extent Mark Rogers who is coming into camp healthy for the first time in 2 years.