03-02-08 - The Dog Days of Spring Training

The thrill is gone.  The excitement in waning.  Now, the real work starts.  This is week 3 of Spring Training and these are tuly the “DOG DAYS.”  The training regemin intensifies with the resultant trips to the training room.  This is the time players work on their game conditioning and focus on fundamentals - drills, drills and more drills to go with all that conditioning training.    This is what separates the men from the boys.  I have a few things that I believe are important:

1. Penny and Kuroda have looked “game ready.”
2. Kuo and Park (Laurel Scheffel of the TC Palm writes about Park) aquitted themselves very well and are both in the thick of the battle for the bullpen.  It’s going to be tough for Park to make the team, but he’s off to a good start.
3. The Dodgers seem intent on keeping Kuo a reliever, not a starter.
4. Tony Jackson reports that Nomar may very well be our utility infielder and with Delwyn Youngs’ improving play at 2B (I apologize for calling him a “butcher”), there may be no room for Hu, Abreu or Martinez.  Nomar is evidently going to see some time at SS.
5. Saito strained the same calf that he stained early last year, which also caused him to miss some time early - nothing to wory about.
6. I think that it’s a given that Jason Schmidt and Yency Brazoban will open the season on the DL and probably pitch a fw weeks of rebab before being eligible for recall sometime in May.  That’s the only prudent thing to do for both players - take it slow, especially since Park and Kuo have looked so well (so far).
7. There are rumors floating around that the Dodgers are interested in Brandon Inge.  He is owed about $20 million over the next 3 years and has had only 1 really good year.  He is a good 3B and can serve as the 3rd catcher, and with Torre’s comments about Nomar being a supersub, it takes on some credibility, but I don’t think they should discount what LaRoche can do at 3B.  I think Torre should move Nomar around the INFIELD - SS 2B, 1B and maybe even a little LF to enhance his versitility and let Andy play every day for 2-3 weeks.  Then, if he’s struggling, I would consider Inge, but only if the Tigers took back Loaiza or Pierre!   Ken Gurnick writes about LaRoche’s approach in this, his 3rd Spring Training.
8. I haven’t personally seen them, but I hear that Delwyn Young made some really dazzling plays at 2B.  Dylan Hernandez has a full report.  If Young can keep this up, a lot of interesting options will materalize.   I’ll talk about that in a minute.  Diamond Leung also covers the same subject.
9. Mark Whicker of the OC Register weighs in with a great inside look at the Dodgers Fram System operations and philosophy.
10. OK - If Young proves he can play 2B, maybe 3B and the OF, we can keep him and Sweeney along with Nomar as the spare infield parts, and I wouldn’t be afraid to use him as our starting LF, if necessary.  Here’s what could open up:  We could afford to trade Ethier, Abreu and DeJesus for Joe Blanton!  He’d be a nice #5, wouldn’t he?  I would trade Juan Pierre and Loaiza to the Tigers for Brandon Inge (the Tigers wouldn’t like that deal), and with the above-mentioned trade to the A’s, our linup would look something like this:
    1.  
       1. Furcal  SS
       2. Martin  C
       3. Kemp  RF
       4. Loney  1B
       5. Jones  CF
       6. Kent  2B
       7. Young  LF
       8. Inge/LaRoche