The Boston Herald’s Michael Silverman is reporting that Boston has requested medical records on free agent Kelvim Escobar, along with reliever Rafael Soriano. They’ve also inquired into Marcos Scutaro.
While Soriano and Scutaro represent higher upside, let’s talk Escobar for a second. Other than one June start, he hasn’t seen the bigs since 2007 thanks to massive shoulder injuries.
If it’s a minor league deal, I would be okay with the signing. Not particularly thrilled, though. While all these low-risk, high-upside signings have inherent value, the Brad Penny/John Smoltz signings proved not to work at all. Should that prevent Boston from continuing to seek low-risk, high-upside starters? No, not at all. But I feel that the team waited way, way too long on Penny as well as Smoltz, before finally pulling the plug. I don’t want that same mistake made again.
In Escobar’s case, two years of injuries and rehabilitation really make me question if the stuff is still there to even be a difference.
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Yes, to a minor league contract. He will need a ton of conditioning and re-learning skills. The shoulder program actually worked well for Smoltz and Penny, and perhaps it will work for him. We will know soon enough from his Portland or Pawtucket whether he can still pitch. At this point it's like any minor league signing, except Escobar could really, really pitch. Soriano isn't a Boras client. That's ok too.
i see what you're saying Evan. But the fact that Escobar has been hurt for so long, tells me that the contract would not be worth much. If they sign him to a cheap contract they won't hesitate to release him if he bombs. But i really think that the Red Sox believe that could a productive pitcher if he adopts their shoulder program.
he was throwing 95 mph before he got hurt again this year
http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20090606&...
I'd rather go for Sheets. He has had a lot of injuries but he's been lights out when healthy and they never really gave him time to recover. I think with a full year of rest behind him he could be a force once he regains his feel
Agree, Sheets or Harden look like better options.
So would I, but it wouldn't surprise me if at least one of the two gets more than a 1-year offer, and I don't know if Theo would be willing to do that. I mean, aren't we essentially looking for a "Wake Insurance" pitcher here? Harden and Sheets are probably looking to start right off the bat.
We may have to cross the two off the list and go more towards the Kelvim Escobars, the Justin Duchscherers, or the Erik Bedards.
people who speak in plurals like that love to hear themselves talk
Please, my Plural Speaking Quotient (PSQ) is hurt by an unusually small sample size. You need at least 2 years, preferably 3 before making a sound judgment about me.
On the other hand, I still don't think what I said is logically wrong.
i see, so apparently the Escobars aren't worth having; either or all of them that is? I just don't get it, and its not just you. the talking heads throughout the "industry" do it as well. if you're going to list off names, just list off the names. the unnecessary plurals have become gratuitous and sadly commonplace.
I dunno, are they? The statement I made wasn't that guys like Kelvim Escobar aren't worth having, it's that I thought both Sheets and Harden would get guaranteed starting jobs, whereas Bedard, Escobar, and Duchscherer and other questionable starters are the ones who are probably going to be targeted by the Sox to be insurance for when Wake or someone else goes down. Then we somehow dovetailed into a weird talk about adding a letter to the end of someone's name, and how it's "sad".
By the way, there’s no article about Halladay?
I don’t like the idea, by the way.
i dont like it either but if they dont pull out the trade, the Yankees will get him
As a Wake-Injury-Insurance Option, we can probably find somebody cheaper and (I hate to say it, but) more reliable than Kelvim Escobar.
Yes, Escobar could dazzle and earn himself a regular rotation spot and make Theo look like a genius, but honestly the probability is slim. In reality, what we need to guarantee production if Wakefield goes down is not a pie-in-the-sky scenario (especially one that involves another injury-plagued player) but just a AAAA hurler. These guys are a dime-a-dozen, but of all things what we don't need is another injury-risk to back up our current injury-risk.
We played the high-risk-high-reward game last year with Smoltz and Penny. We staked our hopes on miracles. Neither panned out for us. Let's shoot ourselves in the foot again, though. It was fun getting swept out of the playoffs, really.