Well then, they better get cranking on another song besides "One Thing Leads To Another".

http://tinyurl.com/yvcgdy

Well done sir ....

And ... to bring it back 'round to Will Carroll .... "One Thing Leads to Another" could be the theme song for Will's frequent use of the term "cascade injury"

When a few more Marshall guys get into the bigs, it will shed some more light.

Even then, could they get it back? I doubt it.

14 You just wanted to use "obfuscation", didn't you?

"Walking up to the press box to join the television broadcast of the game for an inning, I was excited to see Dodgers lefty Clayton Kershaw taking the mound. Play-by-play man Jeff Hem handed me an easy one by simply asking for my thoughts on Kershaw, and I got one of those ice embarrassing moments: while I'm calling the him the best left-hander in the minors and projecting him for everything from 20-win seasons in the big leagues to the key for peace in the Middle East, he promptly grooves his fourth pitch of the game to Cedar Rapids (Angels) slugger Matt Sweeney, who goes opposite field with it for the game's only home run. Sweeney is a very real prospect and one of the few sleepers in an Angels system that features a number of high-profile prospects. He's a teenager with good hitting skills and plus-plus raw power, but he needs to refine his approach and find a defensive home; he's been pretty awful at third base so far this year. Luckily, Kershaw made me look good from there on out, sitting at 94-96 mph with his fastball and recording a pair of strikeouts, including one on a curveball that absolutely froze Cedar Rapids outfielder Chris Pettit to end the inning, a pitch that color commentator (and WGN sports anchor) Dave Kaplan nearly ran out of adjectives for. Speaking to a scout later in the game, Kershaw was by far his most impressive arm of the night.

"Nobody can remember the last lefthander in this league with his combination of size and stuff. In pre-game interviews, every player I asked to name the toughest pitcher in the league picked Kershaw, except for one, who listed him second after Manship."

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=6372

Did anyone ask if the Dodgers' recouped any money from Brazoban or Werth's deals when they were out?

Its sound like short of doing a scope job of his shoulder prior to signing a contract, there was no way to know exactly what the deal was with his shoulder?

Look, it is an unfortunate and seems like continued risk whenever you sign a free agent, no matter what their past injury history indicates.

The Angels didn't resign Glaus because he had a lot of injuries in the previous few years and they had some guy ready to go (they thought) in his place.

They did sign Vlad Guerrero, though he also had some injury concerns that he has mostly avoided during his stay.

J.D. Drew got the injury-prone label early in his career, his one serious injury was due to being hit by a pitch, not something you can exactly plan for but it was damaging nonetheless.

You can certainly take the route of never signing 32+ age free agents due to potential injury risks but that will limit you greatly in terms of adding players to the roster.

If they're on the hook for all of Schmidt's salary, then the payroll is affected. If he's covered, they don't have to pay most of the 15.66 million dollars per year and can spend the money elsewhere.

It's just an interesting topic and so open ended that it makes for good conversation. Plus, we got to see Schmidt pitch twice together, BH. Now, that's like seeing the Loch Ness monster.

It's a relevant issue in Schmidt's case because if insurance picks up any portion of his $15-16m/yr, it gives the Dodgers real money to play with.

They were able to get insurance money on something like 80% of Dreifort's 2005 salary (saved them in the neighborhood of $8.5m). That's significant. Hence the concern.

With Schmidt, it'd be reasonable to be concerned that he had an on-going or chronic issue, and wasn't right, or likely to be right, at the time he signed the deal. He certainly was never sound from day 1 of Spring Training, and his decline in velocity with SF was a known factor.

In other words, there is a certain inherent injury risk with any player, and with older players in particular. Jason Schmidt, I think carried more risk than what's inherent. It was a worthwhile gamble, I think, but a gamble nonetheless. I'd hope that the Dodgers tried to improve their odds, both by getting and using as much information as they could, and by insuring the deal.

Well, that explains that.

My guess on Schmidt is if there is some insurance on him, it will cover a low % of salary - 50% at best, and the cost was likely 10-15% of his salary to begin with. Just guesses on my part. Obviously we'd like to see McCourt recoup the most $$, but not sure if McCourt puts that into the "payroll" bucket, or if it just sort of ends up in other places.

There's about 23 million (not counting Wolf and Kent or Hendy) that will come off the books with the amounts owed to players no longer or here or retired (Mueller) plus removing Tomko from the roster.

While Schmidt's contract if he never pitches a ball again will certainly be a disappointment, they could probably work around it like they did last year with Gagne's deal.

It will make for an interesting off-season if Wolf gets his automatic renewal (180 IP), Kuo and Billingsley pitch well and Lowe and Penny continue to be very good.

This does mean that all those calls to trade Penny or Lowe for offense goes away for this year and with Elbert out and no other high ceiling starter on the horizon for at least another couple of years, any offensive upgrade will come by either dealing our own high ceiling offenseive prospects or wait until the off-season.

I am betting on the latter.

I can't think of the last player who had his contract invalidated unless it was because a team signed the player illegally.

He's like that Minoan thing. The Minotaur.

Goldstein and everyone else needs to stop building up Kershaw. TINSTAPP with dodger pitchers is too real to get too excited.

My only question is that if Kershaw doesn't exist, won't that hurt the BA Dodger prospect ratings next season? :)

I wash born here, an I wash raished here, and dad gum it, I am gonna die here, an no sidewindin bushwackin, hornswaglin, cracker croaker is gonna ruin me bishen cutter.

How about that Spike Lundberg eh? He's gonna be the next big thing!

What's that? There really is a Spike Lundberg? Well, I stand by my comment.

Obviously, you can't power your TV on potential energy, but that doesn't mean the energy is not there.

Furcal, SS

Pierre, CF

Nomar, 1B

Kent, 2B

Gonzo, LF

Martin, C

Anderson, DH

Ethier, RF

Abreu, 3B

Billingsley, P

Furcal, SS
Pierre, CF
Nomar, 1B
Kent, 2B
Gonzo, LF
Martin, C
Anderson, DH
Ethier, RF
Abreu, 3B
Billingsley, P

Still no start for Kemp

"Clayton Kershaw will be playing in the Futures Game, it was announced today. That takes place the Sunday before the All-Star Game up in SF. "

I say skip the Futures Game. For my well being. Just skip it. Please.

Not used to people agreeing with me, now I'm beginning to think I'm making a mistake and that maybe I should glory in his greatness even if it is for just a short time. If he is going to be Steve Avery maybe we should enjoy the ride and not worry about things we can't control. Wishy Washy Charlie Brown.

42/43: Hey, at least Billingsley's starting! Finally. Let's at least look on the hopeful side.

I assume you don't need a ticket to the All-Star game to go the Futures game? If you do, then never mind.

I feel sorry for Milton Bradley. Let's bring him back!

whats your point? his numbers this year are more in line with his stellar minor league record.

Arm angle

no, he was trying to say how this year is an aberration and we should be worried because last year proved he isn't good.

The sheriff is a TINSTAAP!

Also brutal platoon splits with Marcum.

That's not what I meant at all. I remember people being worried last year about how Chad wasn't striking anyone out. This year, he's striking a lot of people out, but I didn't remember seeing anyone mention that.

But Marty is uncanny. Never fails

Then again, maybe he's not.

have you not been here the last 2-3 years? D4P is easily the most cynical poster in this community. Maybe its an act he puts on to impress andrew, greg and now the ghost of steve, but i will not let his curses be casted upon Chad Billingsley!

That's including Kemp's shot into the loge level.

I miss The Ninja.

OL...?

Me too. Hopefully we won't have to wait until 2008 for:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0453538/

Now there's this thing, floating, out there.

Prior to this week, it seemed to me that Grady had as much of a Bison crush as anybody, so this is indeed puzzling.

Maybe its failing to make contact and looking terrible at the plate in the last few games... I don't know... I wish he was in there too, he needs more ABs... but I think Grady looks at platoon splits a lot. Its as though "if were going to be a weak hitting club, lets do it from the best side"

I was mainly thinking about Beltre's call-up.

Meloan may not be mythical because I think he's coming up to the big club pretty soon. The Minotaur, however, is still a ways away.

This is one screwy lineup. I am growing more disenchanted with Little each passing day.

In Kemp's last four starts, he went:

2 for 3 with a homer June 12
3 for 4 with three runs June 13
1 for 3 June 15
1 for 3 June 17

He hasn't started since.