Padilla or Garland - You make the call

With Pineiro and Doug Davis gone. With Sheets deemed to expensive or to risky, it looks like we are down to either Padilla or Jon Garland.

Kensai on 1/15 did the breakdown with Piniero/Garland/Padilla/Looper and covers it nicely so click on the link and give it a read. However I don't want to just link to him so I'll make a few comments myself without all the future projections.

Garland Pro Argument:

• Under innings eater, Jon Garland is the poster child. Has pitched over 190 innings every year since 2002.

                                                        
Player                IP From   To   W  L W-L%  ERA ERA+
Mark Buehrle      1788.1 2002 2009 115 88 .567 3.85  120
Livan Hernandez   1734.2 2002 2009  99 98 .503 4.46   97
Javier Vazquez    1721.2 2002 2009 101 96 .513 4.05  110
Roy Halladay      1710.1 2002 2009 130 59 .688 3.13  144
C.C. Sabathia     1709.0 2002 2009 119 76 .610 3.54  123
Barry Zito        1692.0 2002 2009 109 94 .537 3.94  112
Roy Oswalt        1661.2 2002 2009 123 67 .647 3.27  132
Derek Lowe        1650.2 2002 2009 121 85 .587 3.89  114
Jon Garland       1642.2 2002 2009 107 87 .552 4.38  105
Jamie Moyer       1616.2 2002 2009 107 78 .578 4.21  104

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 1/21/2010.

Local North San Fernando boy, grew up a Dodger fan, pitched for Kennedy High School

During his six starts for the Dodgers in 2009 he was very effective, albeit against less than stellar competition.

Given the youth of the rotation and the trouble the team had going deep into games, an innings eater like Garland just might be the best thing for this particular rotation.

According to wikipedia his girlfriend is USA softball 2nd baseman Lovie Jung and when things get slow, we might be able to have some fun with that.

Garland Cons:

• While he does pitch a lot of innings, most of those innings are merely average. At least they are aren't bad, but they aren't inspiring either.
  
• That is it, Kensai covers the rest so anything I say would be merely repeating what he said.

Padilla Pros:

• Pitched two of the best playoff games of the last 20 years, and did it against a red hot Cardinal team, and followed that up against one of the best offensive teams in baseball.
• His headhunter rep might help out a rotation not known for pitching inside
• Fitted in with Manny and company
• Has always pitched in offensive parks(Arizona, Phillie, Texas) until he found himself in Dodger stadium.
• For some reason he found his dominance again while wearing Dodger Blue. After averaging only 4.9 K's per nine innings for the Rangers, he jumped that K Rate to 8.7 for the Dodgers.
  

Padilla Cons:

• While he was on his best behavior for the Dodgers he has a history as long as Milton Bradley. When your teammates applaud the GM for trading you, it is a fairly good sign you are not a clubhouse guy.
• He's been a lousy pitcher most of the time since 2003. In his first year in Texas (2006) he was okay but nothing to get excited about. Very very good chance his time with the Dodgers was an aberration.
• Has bad aim with a gun
  
• His headhunter rep caused problems for his teammates in Texas. Some players have reps they don't deserve but Padilla does deserve his. He has double digit hit batsman in 5 of the last 9 years, including leading the league with 17 in 2006. Since 2002 he leads all pitchers in hit batsman by a fairly large margin.

                                    
Player            HBP From   To ERA+
Vicente Padilla    98 2002 2009  100
Tim Wakefield      85 2002 2009  110
Carlos Zambrano    80 2002 2009  129
Jeff Weaver        77 2002 2009   90
David Bush         73 2004 2009   94
John Lackey        73 2002 2009  117

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 1/21/2010.

Any way you make the call: