no thanks. I think at least one of the prospects will be ready by the end of spring training, and will be able to hold down that number five spot better than he could

We outta consider it

To go to the original source, rather than mlbtraderumors.com…

sideburns have been edited into non-existence.

So sure, why not?

But that was coming off several injury filled years. He manaded 164 IP last year, so that increases his value if any team thinks he can go close to that many again in 2012.

For a team trying to win in 2012, it won’t kill them to have the depth. But it definitely will take away 2012 starts at the major league level for Bauer and Skaggs. (Unless there are a lot of injuries to the rotation)

There was a lot of howling, (rightfully so), from the Sabermetric community when he won the CY Young in 2005 over Johan Santana. Yeah, he had the pretty win totals, but there was no doubt Santana was the best pitcher in the AL that year. And in 2004, Colon won 18 games with an ERA over 5.

There was also “the trade” in 2002, where Montreal gave up Cliff Lee, Grady Sizemore and Brandon Phillips to get Colon for half a season. Clearly he wasn’t worth THAT

So due to those two season, the trade, and then subsequent injury filled years, I think a lot of people may think of him as a really overrated pitcher.

But from 1998-2005 he had 7 seasons of 3.8 WAR or higher. Only 1 pitcher in the game had more such seasons. (Pedro with 8) and two other guys, named Curt and Randy are the only other pitchers with 7 during that span.

http://bbref.com/pi/shareit/a2zWy

And over the last 20 years, only 8 pitchers have had more than his 7 seasons of 3.8 WAR or higher.

http://bbref.com/pi/shareit/SyWrW

No don’t freak out and say I’m using selective begin and end points to make erroneous comps. I’m not doing that. Obviously those other pitchers around him on the list had higher peaks of greatness which Colon never achieved. His best season was 4.7 WAR.

But he was in fact one of the best 10-20 pitchers in the game over a 7-8 year stretch, and sometimes I think that gets a little obscured in the narrative of Bartolo Colon’s career, especially in this what have you done for me lately world.

I’m bummed.
http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2012/01/reds-sign-ron-mahay-clay-zavada.html

I think it would be a bum moe.

Call me nuts, but I’d put the odds in favor of Colon being better from April-June than Skaggs and possibly Bauer. Guys who post 3.8 FIPs in the AL East usually aren’t available to us for a million bucks or so, so even with the risks, the potential steal is great.

that the team seems willing to block all our young pitchers like this? What could be the reason for that? Concern one of the starters is likely to go down? Not feeling that Bauer or Skaggs is ready? No confidence in Miley? Desire to keep Skaggs from being a Super 2?

I was always a Colon fan having grown up an Indians fan and I don’t have any real dislike to having him in the rotation. But it sure seems like one of the youngsters is bound to break out.

Well, I guess it’s not so bad if we sign him, but I’d rather see Skaggs, Bauer, Miley or one of the bajillion other prospects get the 5th spot. It would be wrong to just give Colon the job, IMO.

I hope we sign him, purely due to all the punctuation-based headlines we will get to use.

Signs with unknown team