Resurrecting the Lousy

An incredibly disturbing trend is sweeping the National League this offseason: NL teams are highly interested in the comeback attempts of left-handed starting pitchers who were never any good. The southpaw hurlers at the forefront of this latest wave of front office insanity are the esteemed Shawn Estes, a lifetime National Leaguer sporting a career ERA 4.71; the 45 year-old Jeff Fassero, sporting ERAs of 5.35, 5.68, 5.46, 4.06, and 7.80 over his last five seasons; and, perhaps most stupefying of all, Glendon Rusch, he of the 5.01 career ERA.

Your skepticism is warranted, dear reader. Surely these well-compensated baseball executives can dig up some 23 year-old minor leaguer who can post similar numbers to what these washed-up never-wases would bring to the table, right? Yes, this would be the reasonable alternative. Unfortunately, Mr. Estes has already signed with the Padres, Mr. Fassero is being brought in to pitch for Mets scouts, and Mr. Rusch, apparently the most popular of them all, is drawing interest from the Reds, Astros, Cardinals, and, in what can only be described as an orgy of misguided nostalgia, the Padres along with Mr. Estes.

Well, fine, then perhaps these are crafty veterans possessing some smoke-and-mirrors knowhow developed from years of finding ways to get hitters out? No, this is very much not the case. In his 13 years in the big leagues, Mr. Estes has posted a sub-4.00 ERA only twice: in 1996 and 1997. That's right, a full decade. Additionally, although 3.60 in 1996 and 3.18 in 1997 seem downright adequate on the surface, his WHIP for those seasons was a horrendous 1.46 and 1.30, respectively, and he had the benefit of playing home games in that most brutally hitter-unfriendly of ballparks, the old Candlestick Park. Indeed, since 1997, he has lived in the high-4.00 to high-5.00 range. Mr. Fassero last posted a sub-4.00 ERA "only" six seasons ago in 2001, but this was done in a purely relief role; further, as noted above, he has been unacceptably horrid ever since, and his 25 starts in that span have been nothing short of an unmitigated disaster. Mr. Rusch, in his ten-year career, has posted a sub-4.00 ERA once, and that was in 16 spot starts and 16 relief appearances for the Cubs in 2004. But, again, his lifetime ERA is 5.01, and in 66.1 IP last season he posted an eye-watering 7.46 ERA.

Yes, dear reader, you are justified in throwing your hands up in disgust and considering finding out whether you too can throw a baseball left-handed.

We believe we are not alone in hoping that Shawn Estes and Glendon Rusch round out the 2008 starting rotation for a Padres team that came within a one-game playoff of reaching the postseason in 2007. We can only pray that a Randy Jones comeback is somewhere on the horizon.