Troy Renck let Jim Tracy interview himself about Tim Redding:
"Right now, are there possibilities where he could make this club out of spring training as a bullpen member? Very definitely, that's a possibility," said Tracy. "Is it a guarantee? I didn't tell him it was a guarantee. But by the same token, I also told him that, if all five guys are healthy when we come out, the thought of him coming out as a starter, the chances of that weren't very good at all. No good at all."
In the wake of injuries elsewhere in the bullpen, notably closer Huston Street, Redding will likely be shifted to bullpen work this week. I know some here were probably rather looking for a return of Justin Speier, which I suppose remains a possibility, but it seems to me the Redding scenario is more likely, esecially in the wake of Tracy's commentary.
The Renck post talks about the mounting issues the Rockies are facing in the pen, with left hander Randy Flores being the latest casualty after a line drive hit him on his pitching arm during yesterday's game. The post doesn't really delve into what happens if the injury is not a minor one, but given Jimmy Gobble's already on the shelf, our left handed relief options would basically boil down to Matt Reynolds and pushing Greg Smith into the bullpen as well.
This would be why the Rockies are apparently now finally interested in bringing back Joe Beimel.
Seeing as we're after the midpoint in March with Street's shoulder woes and haven't seen any real improvement, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it's time to consider a lost season from him as a strong possibility, if not the most likely outcome at this point (at least in an article recapping all the bullpen news, we learn that Rafael Betancourt appears to be progressing still). This means that those of you with strong anti-Franklin Morales feelings better start reconciling yourselves to the idea that he will be the Rockies closer for most of this year.
In interest of timeliness for this post, I'm not going to delve into the numbers as to why this is the case. For that, you could probably go into one of those more cerebral Rockies sites, like ESPN or the MLB.com message boards. Instead, I'm probably just going to post something that will please our corporate sponsors and make me lots of money. Does anybody have pictures of players' wives they'd like to post?
By the way, I'm kidding. I'm clearly in a touchy mood today. Don't post pictures of players wives, or I'll ban you like all these spammers we've been dealing with lately.