Category Archives: Ted Lilly

The Intrigue Around Ted Lilly’s Shoulder Continues to Grow

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Last night, we talked about the rumors around Nathan Eovaldi & Roy Oswalt, and wondered what this might mean for the immediate future of the Dodger rotation. This morning, we’re starting to learn that Ted Lilly‘s still-not-completely-understood injury situation may be more serious than we had anticipated…

Ted Lilly will be disabled with a shoulder injury and replaced as the Dodgers’ Tuesday night starting pitcher by Nathan Eovaldi, who will be promoted from Double-A Chattanooga.

It is not known if Lilly will need surgery, but the Dodgers are concerned enough that they were looking for a long-term solution by negotiating with free agent Roy Oswalt before bowing out over his financial demands. Lilly is in the second year of a three-year, $33 million contract.

We’d all sort of assumed that this may have been related to the neck injury that sidelined Lilly at the start of the season, but the fact that we’re even hearing the word “surgery” in relation to an arm injury is alarming, especially considering that Lilly had been effective so far this season. (Though not quite as effective as you might think; his 3.14 ERA is not quite supported by a 3.81 FIP and a 4.60 xFIP, each either worst or second-worst among the five Dodger starters.) You can see over at FanGraphs that his velocity was noticeably down even from its usual low level last week against Arizona, when he was shelled, and it’s not hard to think that he was already feeling some ill effects from whatever this injury turns out to be. We’ll still need to wait to hear just how severe this could be, although anyone who is truly surprised by a 36-year-old pitcher with roughly 2600 professional innings under his belt & four previous DL trips for shoulder woes coming down with a shoulder injury should probably reset their expectations. Even though it’s not quite official yet, I’ve updated the Depth Chart to make him approximately the 128th Dodger to hit the disabled list this year.

As for Eovaldi, I like him well enough, but I’ve never been as high on him as others, and if Lilly is expected to be out for a long period of time I do think it makes sense to find a more permanent replacement than to rely on Eovaldi to be a savior. There’s been a few updated scouting reports on Eovaldi recently – here’s a good one – and most paint him as a two-pitch pitcher who may have trouble succeeding as a starter unless he can make improvements on at least one other pitch. That, plus his less-than-dominant strikeout numbers against Double-A competition, have lead many to figure that his future may be in the bullpen. That doesn’t mean I’m against calling up to fill in for Lilly and letting him get some experience with the big club for now, but it does mean that I’m not entirely comfortable with the idea of him being a mainstay in the rotation for the rest of the year on a team that plans to contend. (On a somewhat related note, not that I’m advocating calling him up and squeezing him back onto the 40-man roster or anything, but John Ely somehow has 65 strikeouts in 60 Triple-A innings. How did that happen?)

Anyway, all speculation is premature until we find out the extent of Lilly’s injury. For now, it at least explains the interest in Oswalt, and I’ll be looking forward to seeing what Eovaldi can do in his second taste of the majors.

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Slowly but surely, the A.J. Ellis love train is picking up steam outside of Dodgerville. Jon Paul Morosi of Fox Sports tweeted his support of our ongoing campaign to send Ellis to Kansas City…

Friend of the blog “The Common Man”, best known for his work at The Platoon Advantage, spreads some A.J. awareness north of the border at The Score…

I know this will be hard for some of you to believe, but sometimes we saberdouches miss on a player.  Whether that’s Bobby Kielty, or Billy McMillon, or Daric Barton, some guys just don’t develop the way we hope they will.  AAAA players, guys who simply can’t make the jump from AAA to the Majors, do exist.  Meanwhile, sometimes guys like Denard Span or Melky Cabrera defy expectations and establish themselves as good or even great Major Leaguers, when there’s very little eveidence they will.  We’re wrong sometimes.

But sometimes we’re really not.  And so I’m incredibly excited to see what AJ Ellis has been doing this season with regular playing time.  Coming into 2012, Ellis had managed a .406 OBP in the minors over nine seasons, but with just a .380 slugging percentage, despite spending the last four seasons at Las Vegas and Albuquerque in the Pacific Coast League.  In the Majors, he had totaled 244 plate appearances, and had hit .262/.360/.330.  He was also going to be 31 years old and had never had more than 128 plate appearances in any previous season.

And finally, Ellis himself teams with Clayton Krenshaw… I mean, Clayton Kershaw, to bring us what may be the greatest video in the history of the internet… (h/t Dodger Thoughts)

Forget the All-Star game. We need to get Ellis on the Hall of Fame ballot.

What Are The Dodgers Planning in the Rotation?

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For all of the uncertainty and change we’ve seen in the Dodger roster thus far, one thing seemed secure: the starting rotation, which has been surprisingly effective and hasn’t yet had to stretch beyond the usual five to make a start. It’s with that in mind that today’s dueling news items about Nathan Eovaldi & Roy Oswalt came as such a surprise.

Let’s start with Eovaldi, who once again made an unexpected one-inning relief appearance last night rather than the start he was supposed to make. That fueled speculation that he’d be on his way to the big club to make a start, and it’s starting to sound like that’ll happen on Tuesday in place of Ted Lilly:

Nathan Eovaldi appears headed back to the Dodgers to make at least one start for left-hander Ted Lilly.

Lilly was off to a brilliant start this season, going 6-1 with a 1.79 earned-run average in his seven starts before getting knocked around for eight runs in 3 1/3 innings in Arizona on Wednesday during his eighth start.

The Dodgers would not confirm that he was injured, but Lilly is not expected to make his next scheduled start Tuesday against the Brewers.

It’s odd that we haven’t heard a single word about Lilly being injured, but considering that he did start the year on the shelf with a neck injury and got hit so hard on Wednesday against the Diamondbacks, it’s probably not a stretch to guess that he’s fighting through some sort of issue. If so, fine. (And it would really have to be; I can’t imagine Eovaldi would come up for any other reason right now.)

But if the Eovaldi news makes sense, what about the Oswalt business? I’ve been asked about him semi-regularly this year, and I routinely shoot the idea down, saying it’s unlikely that he’d want to play on the West Coast and that the Dodgers don’t have room for him anyway. I still believe each of those to be true, but that only serves to make Peter Gammons’ report that Oswalt worked out for the Dodgers on Friday even more intriguing.

Now, let’s be straight about one thing: I still don’t expect Oswalt to end up with the Dodgers. It’s much more likely that he ends up with the Cardinals or Rangers due to his geographic presence, and Jon Heyman & Ken Rosenthal each report that the Dodgers don’t appear to still be involved. So anyone holding out hope that we see him wearing the home whites in Los Angeles any time soon should probably rein in those expectations.

Yet it’s not the end result that’s most interesting here, it’s the idea that the Dodgers seemed to involved in the first place, given that they have a full five-man rotation all signed through at least 2013 and Eovaldi ready to step in. Was it just due diligence? Or something more, because how would that have worked? Oswalt would be a nice addition to any team’s rotation, but there’s still no obvious fit.

Clayton Kershaw is obviously not going anywhere, and Chris Capuano has been generally excellent so far. Lilly had also been solid before his last outing, and absent any news that he suddenly has a long-term injury, replacing him makes no sense. Aaron Harang has been steady enough as the #5 starter, and while I’d shed no tears over not having him in the rotation, he’s basically done what he was expected to do when he signed. And then there’s Chad Billingsley, who is routinely infuriating and seems to have fit nicely into the Jonathan Broxton-shaped role of “Dodger who fans seem to absolutely and irrationally despise.”

I don’t argue that Billingsley routinely makes me want to throw things at the television, potentially more than any other Dodger, and he’s had some real clunkers lately. But I also know that his 3.88 ERA is right in line with his 3.82 FIP, and that hardly seems egregious enough to get bounced out of the rotation, especially when that FIP is better than both Lilly & Harang, and when his 8.41 K/9 is both better than Kershaw’s and better than he’s been able to put up since 2008. Besides, compare Billingsley & Oswalt’s FIP over the last five years. Oswalt has been somewhat better, but not by nearly as much as you’d think.

You could, I suppose, put Billingsley (or Harang) in the bullpen, though that seems like an odd fit since durability is a large part of what each brings – and neither has pitched in relief in years. (There’s also not an obvious opening in the pen, since I still believe in Todd Coffey & Matt Guerrier is going to be back at some point.)

Again, I don’t think there’s any chance that Oswalt lands with the Dodgers. But whether it’s him or something else, they’re clearly planning on investigating some sort of move there, and I’m fascinated to see what the thinking is.

Ted Lilly Regresses Spectacularly In the Desert

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Well, we didn’t call it the “house money” lineup without a good reason. Actually, this one was less on the Albuquerque-fueled lineup failing to do much against Joe Saunders – other than Elian Herrera, that is – than it was about the regression I feared was coming for Ted Lilly rearing its ugly head. The eight earned runs Lilly allowed in just 3.1 innings were the second most of his career, behind only a nine-spot he allowed in one of his final starts as a Cub before being traded in 2010.

But let’s not focus on that. So Lilly got lit up; it was bound to happen – predictable, almost – and a Triple-A lineup can be counted on to bail you out so many times. Let’s focus on the positive, and that’s A.J. Ellis taking Saunders deep for his fourth homer of the year. Sounds like an All-Star to me, no?

Dodger Rotation Exceeding Expectations

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Aaron Harang shut down San Diego for seven scoreless innings last night, allowing just four hits without a walk, and while there’s a pretty convincing argument to be made that “it was in Petco and against the terrible Padres,” Harang’s solid outing is yet another in a string of quality starting pitching from the Dodgers through the first quarter of the season. The five Dodger starters are currently second in baseball in ERA, batting average against, & OPS against, with only the outstanding Washington rotation fronted by Stephen Strasburg besting them in each of those areas.

While it’s fair to expect some regression, considering the Dodgers have spent most of the season playing either in the large parks of the NL West, against non-competitive offenses – and the fact that other than Harang, they’re all out-pitching their FIP by a considerable amount – it’s becoming clear that the Dodger rotation is looking a lot more effective than we expected it to be when Ned Colletti ended up with Harang & Chris Capuano rather than Hiroki Kuroda or someone else back in the offseason. Capuano, fully healthy for probably the first time in six years, has been very effective at the back of the rotation along with Harang, and despite Chad Billingsley‘s struggles, the only one I’m really worried about at the moment is Ted Lilly. Sure, 5-0 and 2.11 looks swell, but a decreased strikeout rate (5.17, which would be by far the lowest of his career), an increased walk rate (3.29, highest since 2006), and an absolutely unsustainable BABIP (.196) does concern me about what’s to come.

Still, on the whole the rotation has been great, even considering that we arguably haven’t seen Clayton Kershaw at his best yet, and that opens up a variety of options for the future. Though much has been made of the lack of depth in the minor league organization, if there’s anything the Dodgers have in spades, it’s young, right-handed starting pitching. We’ve already seen Nathan Eovaldi, who would already be in the bigs on many other teams, and Rubby De La Rosa, expected to make his way back from Tommy John surgery later this year. Coming behind them at Double-A Chattanooga (because let’s face it, Triple-A Albuquerque is no place for young pitching) are Allen Webster, Matt Magill, Chris Withrow, & Ethan Martin (plus lefties Chris Reed & Aaron Miller); behind them are Zach Lee, Garrett Gould, & Angel Sanchez. That’s in addition to a new ownership group expected to go out and spend where needed, putting free agents like Cole Hamels & Zack Greinke within reach for the first time in years – and don’t forget, the entire rotation is signed for next year as well.

While I just can’t imagine that we’re going to be speaking about these same five so favorably in May of 2013 – the odds of at least one of the older trio of Lilly, Capuano, & Harang either getting hurt or imploding performance-wise in the next year are astronomical – it’s a clear area of depth for the Dodgers to draw upon to fix more urgent needs, like first base. And third base. And possibly left field. And potentially shortstop. While we all get attached to our own prospects and envision them all in Dodger blue some day (hell, I still get regular questions from people wondering if the Dodgers can bring Blake DeWitt back) it’s important to be realistic and understand that not all of the guys I mentioned above are going to be on this team in the future; with the failure rate of pitching prospects, it’s probably likely that a majority will either not be successful major leaguers or not part of the Dodgers.

It’s here, of course, that I need to put out my regular reminder that I don’t mind trading prospects, as long as it’s in the right deal. People forget that the act of trading Carlos Santana alone wasn’t a mistake; trading him for a decent-but-not-great third baseman when the Indians were also selling C.C. Sabathia to Milwaukee for less was the mistake. Prospects exist to provide value. Sometimes that value is in being on your team, and sometimes it’s in being cashed out for other pieces.

Considering the threadbare offensive options on the free agent market next winter, with only Andre Ethier & Josh Hamilton real difference makers at the plate, the Dodgers are going to have to fill those needs through trade. Their deepest area as far as trade chips is clearly in starting pitching, so as the weeks go on and sellers become more clearly identified, it makes all the sense in the world to identify those opportunities. Maybe that’s Kevin Youkilis, or Paul Konerko, or Chase Headley, or Carlos Lee, or someone else. I know some fans will be turned off by the idea of sending a prospect for an older veteran like that, but as long as it’s someone productive – and dear lord, not someone like Aubrey Huff or Chone Figgins – it’s a move that makes all the sense in the world. Thanks, in no small part, to the surprisingly effective Dodger rotation.

Dodgers Start Fast But Barely Escape Coors With a Win

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On June 27 of last year, the Dodgers crushed the Twins 15-0 in Minnesota, with homers from Matt Kemp, Trent Oeltjen, & Casey Blake leading the charge among 25 hits. Coming as it did just hours after Frank McCourt steered the team into bankruptcy, this led to one of the more memorable quotes of the entire debacle:

This was, of course, laughably ludicrous lawyer-talk, and it earned a rightful place on the long list of McCourt-related sins. Yet it was all I could think of early in today’s game as the Dodgers got off to a fast start in Colorado. Hours after the paperwork was official and McCourt no longer had a claim to the club, the much-maligned Dee Gordon stepped to the plate and hit the fourth pitch he saw from Colorado starter Jhoulys Chacin out of the park for his first big-league home run. After singles from Mark Ellis (the first of four for him tonight) and Kemp, Andre Ethier also took Chacin deep, and four batters into the Guggenheim era, the Dodgers were up 4-0. If it wasn’t the official coming-out party that we’ve yet to see, it sure felt like the start of something special.

That wasn’t even the end of it from the offensive side of things. In the third, A.J. Ellis doubled in Tony Gwynn for the 5th run, then added two more by driving in Gwynn again on a two-run blast off Chacin in the fifth. Look, I know it’s Coors Field and magical things happen there, but this was a game where Gordon (7 HR in 1814 minor-league PA, and while I can’t back this up with facts, we all know at least one was inside-the-park) and Ellis (19 HR in 2119 minor-league PA) both homered. Meanwhile, Albert Pujols is still looking for his first. Life is awesome sometimes.

Yet while it sure seemed like this would be a party atmosphere to usher in the new ownership, life in Coors is never, ever that simple. Ted Lilly breezed through 5.2 scoreless, but then things went downhill quickly as soon as he served up a meatball that was crushed by Carlos Gonzalez for a bomb in the sixth. Oddly, the last homer Lilly allowed was also by Gonzalez, last August, and once he completed the inning, he left after just 79 pitchers after being seen talking to trainer Sue Falsone in the dugout. For the first time this season, Josh Lindblom was completely ineffective in allowing four hits and three runs in 2/3 of an inning; Scott Elbert cleaned up his mess, but Kenley Jansen allowed the Rockies to get within one after letting Troy Tulowitzki lead off with a triple. Despite allowing the tying run to get to third, Javy Guerra bounced back from recent troubles to nail down the save.

By the way, I can’t help but touch upon a somewhat bizarre sequence in the top half of the ninth. Ethier led off with a hit. James Loney then bunted… terribly… in a one-run game. It appeared that Don Mattingly made that call, based on his reaction when Loney returned to the dugout, and while that’s an awful call on his part, it also really speaks to how little confidence you must have in your first baseman to actually get a hit when you’re asking him to bunt. Yet even odder was that against lefty Greg Reynolds, the Dodgers sent up four straight lefty hitters – Ethier, Loney, Gwynn, then Adam Kennedy – without once calling on Juan Uribe. I have to imagine he was unavailable for some reason (especially since it was Justin Sellers who came out to play third for the ninth), but we haven’t heard anything to that effect yet, and if he was available but just not called upon, well, that says a whole lot about him as well. (Kennedy struck out to strand Ethier. Of course he did.)

Get some sleep, because tomorrow is going to be a memorable day; the ownership press conference is at 10am PT, and Clayton Kershaw goes in the series finale at 12:10 PT. If you’re not skipping work, you’re doing it wrong.