Thursday, November 5, 2009

Garland's option declined

Jon Garland did a solid job in his brief stint with the Dodgers. However, forced to choose between paying him $10 million to come back in 2010 or have the Diamondbacks buy him out at $2.5 million, they chose the latter.

Garland won't be back in '10, and will now be a free agent. The fact that his old club has to pay every penny made the decision a pretty easy one.

In six starts with the Dodgers, Garland went 3-2 with a 2.75 ERA. He was a long reliever for the Division Series against the Cardinals, but didn't get any action. He was left of the Championship Series roster altogether.

Had the price tag not been so high at $10 million, I could see the Dodgers bringing him back. He'll always be a solid 4-5 starter mostly because he'll give you at least 200 innings a year. Pitchers like him are always valued. But, it looks like they'll concentrate on bringing back Vicente Padilla instead.

Randy Wolf remains a free agent along with Padilla. That leaves Clayton Kershaw, Chad Billingsley, and Hiroki Kuroda as the only established starters, and we all saw how Billingsley fell apart at the end of last season. There's also names like James McDonald, Eric Stults, and Charlie Haeger that have made starts in the past.

Needless to say, the Dodgers have plenty of work to do to shore up their rotation.

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