Tony Jackson's latest update on the Dodgers has some interesting tidbits. First on the agenda is Russel Martin saying he probably needs to cut back and take more days off. Still his own comments seem to fall on deaf ears as he basically reneges on all the common sense he spouted at the beginning of the interview and ends up saying he still wants to catch every game and the built in days off should be all he needs. He also admitted he talked Grady Little into letting him start several games that he was supposed to sit. I love Russ Martin but I expect Mike Liebertthal was not his biggest fan by the end of the year. I don't think Mike gave us a hometown discount just so he could grovel to a 2nd year player about giving him some playing time.
Then we have the daily update on Schmidt. He'll pitch again in two days. So far no pain. But then he told us last month everything was going okay only for us to find out he did have pain but now it is gone. Just like Gagne I believe nothing he has to say about his physical condition. This is the same guy who said he was okay last spring even though his shoulder looked like a grenade had gone off inside of it and he was throwing with such little velocity that batters were disdainfully throwing aside their armor as they went to the plate. I'll wait for the results.
Finally Greg Miller says he's figured it all out again for the 2nd spring in a row. Forget last season, forget the AFL, he finally realized this off-season that "muscle my way through" wasn't working out. Not sure what the clue was. The walk per inning, or the fact the AFL B leaguers knocked his hat sideways. I guess improvement is relative. He went from walking 46 batters in 28 innings at AAA to walking 43 in 48 innings. So yea, that is improvement but still a walk per inning is not something to be striving for. In the AFL he did double duty, walking over a batter per inning while also giving up more then a hit per inning. That is not easy to do. And yet we sit here on Feb 17th and they are trying to tell us that Greg Miller is a candidate for the major league bullpen. Really.......
Someone must still like him in the Dodger organization since he was kept on the 40 man.
Until someone can prove to me that a guy who was this wild at age 23 in AA had any semblance of a major league career I'll continue to be a doubting Thomas. Unless of course he's the 1987 version of Randy Johnson, which just means he'll turn it around as soon as he's in another organization. Though I highly doubt Randy Johnson ever gave up 23 hits in 12 innings to guys who aren't even shaving yet.