MVN - Most Valuable Network

Smoltz Will Probably Miss Next Start, At Least

(Update: Yes, he’s on the DL. Ugh.)

John Smoltz had his worst start of the year against the Mets yesterday. Unfortunately, the bad news doesn’t end there: according to MLB.com, he “likely have to miss his next scheduled start,” and moreover he “has told some of his friends that he thinks he might need to go on the disabled list.”

Smoltz only made 55 starts in 1998 and 1999, then missed the entire 2000 season and first month of 2001 following Tommy John surgery. He switched to the bullpen at his own request, because he said that the reduced inning load would help his arm; then, a few years ago, he returned to the starting rotation because he said that the regularity would help his arm (and that the irregularity of closing was too much of a strain). He will not return to the bullpen. This is out of the question, so don’t ask.

We have three off days in the next week: today, Thursday, and next Monday. This doesn’t make any sense, but it may help us skip over John’s spot while our other starters get their normal rest — of course, when I say “normal starters,” I’m including Tom Glavine, scheduled to come off the DL tomorrow. We’ll have to hope he does. And we’ll have to hope that Tim Hudson’s velocity and location return, and that Jurrjens doesn’t turn back into a pumpkin, and that Jeff Bennett continues to pitch well in Chuck James’s spot.

So that’s a whole lot of conditional statements. Right now, let’s just be happy that a scheduling glitch will let our guys get a whole lot of rest, and hope that tomorrow we’ll get to welcome Yunel Escobar, Chipper Jones, and Tom Glavine back to the field.

This entry was posted on Monday, April 28th, 2008 at 6:27 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.