Thursday, April 24, 2008

Needing a 12th arm, DeWitt is odd man out

Blake DeWitt has gone from a virtual nobody in the minor league system to the everyday starting 3rd baseman for the Dodgers, all thanks to the injuries of Nomar Garciaparra and Andy LaRoche. He started in 15 of the 18 games he appeared in, and was praised for his hard work.

Unfortunately, he became a victim of the numbers game as he was sent down to Triple-A Las Vegas today in order to make room for right-handed reliever Cory Wade.

His final numbers are modest, but pretty good for someone who jumped from Double-A to the Bigs without any prior experience: .255 AVG, .367 OBP, 4 2B, 8 BB, 5 RBI. More impressively, however, is that in 57 total chances, he committed only 1 error for 98% fielding.

As for the new guy, Wade has been at Double-A Jacksonville and has compiled a 4.30 ERA with 13 K in 14.2 IP. He'll throw strikes, which obviously will make Joe Torre feel comfortable about putting him out there if need be. I speculated earlier today that since Jonathan Broxton and Takashi Saito both threw over 30 pitches last night, they probably wouldn't be available for tonight's game against the Diamondbacks. It will be good to have that extra arm ready to go.

I have a feeling we have not heard that last of DeWitt, as he made quite the positive impression. When.... oops, I mean IF Nomar gets hurt again, DeWitt's phone could come ringing for a return.

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