West Notes: Giants, Dodgers, Mariners, Rangers

Thinking about it, it would be silly to do a 6 man rotation for the whole year. My main reason for putting out this thought was for Kershaw, who almost yearly goes through an enormous workload in the regular season it’s preposterous to ask him to perform the same or way better come October. But maybe for the majority middle part of the season, at least until around the All Star break or trading deadline, it would work and really preserve arms. My thinking is that with a 6 man rotation, we would still have the traditional 7 man bullpen. Similarly, we’d still have the short 4 man bench Doc has had for most of the year. I know these starters (Kersh’s excluded) are capable of going deep into games, but at times they’ve also shown the incapacity to get out of the 5th. If the bullpen does get burned, simply move the 6th man into the pen. For me this is Julio bc of what I said, put him in major pressure situations to learn to work out of. But in the rounds that the BP is fresh, he can be put right back into the rotation to develop that starter workload, like you said. That gives the Dodgers a very enviable 2 for 1 weapon. Messing with the rotation like this week in and week out will be exactly that: messy. And I’m not saying it should be one week 6 man, one week not. But a specific routine would possibly help the transition, which could also be influenced by playing on the road and against a certain opponent. Like you said, it’s just juggling right now.
The starter surplus we have, with the contracts and age, I know is hard to get rid off and almost foolish to try to with their constant injuries. I was just throwing it in there as part of wishful thinking as part of a package to get rid of an underperforming pitcher for someone who could really help us out, like Stroman. Obviously the Blue Jays would never take one of the surplus pitchers straight up for Stroman. I know a package of prospects could possibly do the trick, revolving around names like Calhoun and Yadi Álvarez, but maybe they would also like a proven major league starter as they close out the year ( I really don’t think they’ll be above .500 at years end). Stroman has a good track record both regular and postseason, he’s young and, being able to say this from actually being there, he fed off the energy at Dodger Stadium really well during the WBC, almost the way José Fernández did in Miami. I just don’t want to see the Dodgers put together a big package of prospects for a pitcher like Ervin Santana, who looks real good to start off the year but has not been nearly as dominating in his overall career. The Dodgers have made mistakes on pitchers like that in the past and have been burned badly. Lastly, Rivero, I don’t know how to get him, especially if something similar to the Stroman trade works out. I know they could use a hitting prospect but that won’t be enough. Thoughts?