Willis

I keep on hearing the argument that Willis doesn't have to be good just good enough for a 5th starter. Why do we want an average 5th starter (Willis) and an average reliever (Phelps) when we could have an average 5th starter (Phelps) and a good reliever (Willis)? Have we given up on defending the title, and declared the upteenth youth movement the club has gone through?

Why can't Willis learn out in the bullpen? He has more time to sit and practice the grip of a new pitch, and can throw it out of harms way in the bullpen every other day while warming up. It's not like he's going to lose everything he learned as a starter.

even pitching like he is right now, Dontrelle is one of the most effective and dominant 5th starters in the major leagues. look around MLB and tell me which team's 5th starter you would rather have than Dontrelle. Even the teams with supposed "most dominant" pitching staffs have 5th starters that are just as shakey as Dontrelle. Jose Contreras (Yankees) is 2-2 with an ERA over 6. Bronson Arroyo (Red Sox) is 2-2 with an ERA of 5.00. Rich Harden (Oakland) is 2-3 with an ERA of 3.83. Heck, even Greg Maddux, the 5th starter on the mighty Cubs rothation, has gotten roughed up just like D-Train has (he's 3-4 with an ERA of 4.74). Dontrelle is 5-3 with an ERA of 3.99 - that's pretty darned good, relatively. And, i know those numbers might seem skewed by his great start, but his statistics in this past wretched May (2-3 with an ERA of 5.10) STILL put him on par with those other "best" 5th starters in the game.

the fact is, if you have a 5th starter who can, occasionally, go out and dominate like Dontrelle did last night, that's all you can reasonably ask. moving him to the bullpen would be a terrible mistake, in my opnion.