Dreamville - Jake Westbrook

by Saberilliterate on Oct 1, 2010 11:19 AM CDT

Any interest in Jake Westbrook next year to help fill out the rotation?

Lets be honest - we have no shot of signing Cliff Lee or Ted Lilly this off season so I was looking for other pitchers with some upside.

Westbrook will be a free agent for the first time at 33 years old. He underwent Tommy John surgery in June of 08 which kept him out all of 09. He had a pretty good year this year between Cleveland and St Louis. 32 Starts, 199 innings, 1.364 WHIP, 4.38 ERA (3.88 in StL) and a 2:1 k/w ratio

He is a righty and could make a good #3 pitcher for us which would give us a rotation of

YoGa

Wolf

Westbrook

TBD

Narv-Dog/Cappy

Last year he made $11M in the final year of a three year extension that he signed with the Indians. I have no idea what his market value is.

Thoughts? Is he someone that we just don't want to think about or will he get snapped up for gobs more money than he is worth by someone else?

BTW - interesting tidbit - whoever the Expos GM was in 1999 should be shot. While researching this I found out that the Expos traded Ted Lilly, Jake Westbrook and Christian Parker to the Yankees for Hideki Irabu who only made 14 appearances for the Expos in two years and was out of baseball after 2002.

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He’s a replacement level pitcher who will probably get overpaid by someone else.

Why pay him market value (even at replacement) when you can get the same results from Narveson for very cheap.

by backtocali on Oct 1, 2010 12:51 PM CDT reply actions 1 recs

youre forgetting one thing

westbrook is a tough veteran pitcher. he provides leadership and can teach the rotation the gritty skills needed to succeed. the brewers have struggled this season due to that. in years past (08 for one) the brewers were successful because they had veteran pitchers like jeff suppan to provide an example to the rest of the rotation. (lol)

by farteater on Oct 1, 2010 4:00 PM CDT up reply actions

NO

Westbrook is going to be another Suppan. he only seems like a decent pitcher because he’s getting mentored by Dave Duncan

by ilikeburritos on Oct 1, 2010 4:41 PM CDT reply actions

Dave Duncan

I’m way sick of hearing how he makes crappy pitchers look good. He doesn’t.

http://www.twitter.com/mykenk

by Mykenk on Oct 1, 2010 6:27 PM CDT up reply actions

Then why were we lured into signing Suppan and Looper?

My goodness.

by BrewHaHeather on Oct 1, 2010 9:26 PM CDT up reply actions

We've got idiotic talent evaluators on the pitching side.

http://www.twitter.com/mykenk

by Mykenk on Oct 2, 2010 12:54 PM CDT up reply actions

Also true.

My goodness.

by BrewHaHeather on Oct 3, 2010 10:44 AM CDT up reply actions

I'm rooting for Francis

That way if YoGa gets hurt, we can throw out Wolf, Francis, Cappy, Narvdog, and Parra/Doug Davis. Let the rest of the NL Central beware! We could name them the Cream City Get-Crushed-ers, or the Southside Soft-tossers, or some such.

by balldeagle on Oct 9, 2010 8:56 AM CDT reply actions 1 recs

Westbrook could be a good option...

…but certainly at less money. Maybe a front-loaded 2-3 ($8-6-4M) year deal, so he’s not costing us $13M in 2 years when YoGa and Braun are making $$$! The difference between Westbrook and Soupan (and Looper I think) is groundballs. Soupy dished out the long ball like it was batting practice. I believe Westbrook leads the available FA’s in ground balls at 56.4%. And if he sucks and we only owe him $4M for a 3rd year, it’s not that big of a deal to dump/trade him.

1) YoGa – R
2) Wolf – L
3) Westbrook – R
4) Narv-Dog – L
5) Cappy – L

And Rogers could be a nice mid-season call up if someone is really struggling.

by Braski on Oct 11, 2010 8:56 AM CDT reply actions

I also like Jon Garland and Hiroki Kuroda..

…but don’t want to over pay them either. Bottom line is the ‘Crew needs veteren starting pitching and are going to have to make a smart move. Money needs to be spent, but not stupidly. However, I’m not sure if their GM can pull that off!

by Braski on Oct 11, 2010 9:05 AM CDT reply actions

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NL Central Standings

	W	L	PCT	GB	STRK
Cincinnati Red Reporter	25	19	.568	0	Won 6
St. Louis Viva El Birdos	25	20	.555	0.5	Lost 1
Houston The Crawfish Boxes	21	23	.477	4	Won 3
Pittsburgh Bucs Dugout	20	24	.454	5	Lost 2
Milwaukee Brew Crew Ball	18	26	.409	7	Won 1
Chicago Bleed Cubbie Blue	15	29	.340	10	Lost 9