Lend-lease update: Over before it started
It was an interesting concept. Cardinals manager Tony La Russa and Orioles manager Dave Trembley cooked up the possibility of the O's lending a few pitchers to the Cardinals to ease the O's innings squeeze and help the Cards with a shortage in the same department, but it didn't get far.
Cardinals general manager John Mozeliak shot it down in a hurry.
"That's not going to happen,'' he said, chalking up the difference between him and his manager on the subject as "a disconnect."
Instead, the Cardinals are going to bring some more minor league pitchers into the major league mix to alleviate the problem.
The concept never got to Orioles president of baseball operations Andy MacPhail, who was surprised when it was brought to his attention. He said earlier he would have been open to talking about it, but was non-committal on what he characterized as a very unusual idea.
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Comments
That seems like it would have been a great opportunity to help the surplus of pitchers get some much needed innings in...I'd rather we share some pitchers and get the quality prep time in than see a ton of pitchers only briefly, ya know?
I bet John Mozeliak shot it down becuase he doesn't want to be known as the guy who had to borrow pitching from the O's! He could do worse, though...he could've gotten yesterday's pitching corp...what a mess!
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Pete's reply: I think you're right.
Posted by: Anonymous | February 26, 2009 1:16 PM
What a novel and actually really smart concept. It sure seemed to benefit the Orioles more, and ultimately the Cards probably made the right choice. If this had happened, the only thing that seems really important would have been for an O's coach to be there with the pitchers.
Posted by: Joe | February 26, 2009 3:12 PM
I think the MLB could learn a thing or two from European soccer. Since so often prospects are blocked (like Ryan Howard when Thome was in Philly or Felix Pie when he was in Chicago, etc), they could lend them to a crappy team in the other league to get them major league experience for a year or less. The receiving team gets a cheap potentially very good player for a year, and that player is experienced and ready to contribute when they come back.
Posted by: Anonymous | February 26, 2009 5:35 PM
Actually this has happened before. So it is not new, just very rare. I am sure the Orioles hitters were disappointed......
Posted by: cb coach | February 27, 2009 7:36 AM