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02/10/2003 Archived Entry: "MLB NEws 2/10/03: Hoffman to Have Surgery"
Padres Announce Trevor Hoffman to Have Shoulder Surgery
by Bart Ewing
San Diego's general manager, Kevin Towers announced today that Padre closer Trevor Hoffman will have shoulder surgery and will miss at least 2 months.
SimGame implications: If all goes well Hoffman will return in April. When's the last time an injury time table went well? Factor in his age of 35 and Hoffman must give sim game owners strong concerns. If Hoffman is your closer make a back up plan. In keeper leagues dump him and try to regain him at auction for a discounted potential bargain. Hoffman has showed no deterioration of skills but this injury may well affect his performance throughout the year.
Potential closer candidates in San Diego: The Padres have some nice pitchers already in their pen and some young future studs who may benefit from a beginning bullpen stint. Pitchers who have the skills to close, especially short term would be Jay Witasik whose numbers look like a closers except for a 0 in the saves category. 27 year old Brandon Villafuerte can bring it as well. I wouldn't count on an ERA of 1.41 though which he laid out in 32 innings. Don't count out 1 of the young starters. I remember a struggling talk show ravaged starter for the Dodgers last year. What was his name, that's right Eric Gagne! I'm not suggesting a Gagne exploding in San Diego. But young arms Oliver Perez, Jake Peavy and the much maligned Dennis Tankersley have the arms to do this. MLB managers are reluctant to give closers jobs to 21-22 year olds (usually for good reason). I wish more teams would return to the former Earl Weaver philosophy of starting young arms in the pen to protect them from injury due to over use before the arm matures. Peavy and Perez are as good a pitching prospect as there are (including the legendary Mr. Prior) but there is some concern these guys may be throwing more than they should be. Watch spring training news for both Hoffman's health and whose getting the looks. My early odds are
1. Witasik
2. Committee including Villafuerte and lefty specialist J Orsosco along with Witasik and maybe Mike Bynum and Luther Hackman.
3. Darkhourse: Tankersley
4. Deep darkhorse: Jaret Wright, remember him? Yep the guy from the Subway commercials-exactly!
Replies: 1 Comment
Hey glad to see John Hunt agrees with me in this weeks Baseball Weekly. Don't ya love when great minds think a like, we gotta quit hanging out in the same bars.
Posted by Bart Ewing @ 02/14/2003 06:27 PM EST
