My paying gig is absolutely killing my time this week, but baseball goes on so I'll try to keep up.
First of all, yesterday Joe Kennedy got little support from the offense, but didn't help his own cause by melting down once again when the going got tough. His lack of poise after bad things happen that he can't control are keeping him from staying in my radar as a future part of this team. If he can somehow get over these meltdowns we might reconsider, but right now I see his most likely role to be sixth starter/long relief in the distant day when we actually have pitchers to fill out the staff.
Ace to be or not to be, aye, there's the rub.
Speaking of the staff, boy-howdy (see my Western Slope roots sprout up every now and then) did I create a tizzy with my suggestion that Jeff Francis is not an ace yet and hasn't yet shown that he will become one. Both Dan at Up in the Mountains and Mark at TGTBTB say otherwise. Look, right now Francis isn't even the most valuable rookie pitcher on our team. Saying that he's the next Greg Maddux is still a little premature. I commented on Dan's site that yes he could still prove to be that ace, but I say we shouldn't put that kind of pressure on him until he proves he's ready and that we should be content to let him be the next Tommy Glavine for right now.
Meanwhile, Mark says a trade for Jennings is a no go because he isn't valuable enough (although maybe he'd be in favor if we tried to deal Jeremy), while Dan say it's a no go because he's too valuable. I'm going to take the John Kerry route and say that both are correct and that's exactly why we should see what we can get for him. Although please tell Brad Hawpe he doesn't have to try and create a market for the trade anymore.
And hopefully the market for Preston is heating up as he is, another week or two and we should start to see some real interest if he can keep this up.