Four down, one still to go

2-9-2010 @ 12:45 Andy Charles 

Just a month from now Spring Training will be in full swing and the Dodgers will be getting ready for the first game of the regular season, which comes on April 5 in Pittsburgh. But there is still no update on the problematic fifth starter role.

There is little doubt, as far as MLB Predictions are concerned, that Clayton Kershaw, Chad Billingsley, Hiroki Kuroda and Vicente Padilla will take the ball in the first four games, in some order, but there is no chance of the Dodgers competing with San Francisco and Arizona unless they can find a fifth starter, and soon.

At the moment it appears as if there will be a March free-for-all for that all important spot, although it is possible a couple of candidates will start the season with the big club with one acting in long relief, a role James McDonald excelled in last season.

Of the internal candidates McDonald would appear to be favorite, according to the MLB odds,  to take over from Randy Wolf in the rotation, although his performances after taking the spot early in 2009 were not exactly encouraging.

The difference in his demeanour from the bullpen led many to suggest that would be his ideal role going forward, but McDonald says that he grew up while pitching in the Dominican Republic even if his numbers were not brilliant apart from the strikeouts.

"It was a great learning process," he said in an interview with MLB.com. "You're facing a lot of older Latin guys down there and they know how to hit so you have to learn how to pitch. I came out of it a way better pitcher."

And the Dodgers had better hope he has a good spring, because the other candidates for the position in the rotation really do not set the heart racing unless Scott Elbert is finally ready to take it to the next level – he certainly seems better suited to a bullpen role as well.

Jason Schmidt may well be on his final go with the Dodgers, and retirement may not be too far on the horizon, while we have probably seen enough of Shawn Estes, Eric Stults, Eric Milton and Charlie Haeger already to realise that they just do not have the talent to make it in a major league rotation.

After that it is Rule 5 pick Carlos Monasterios, who has yet to show anything outside of High-A, and a pair of Ortiz’s, Russ and Ramon, who have already had more than enough chances.

Pray that McDonald really has grown up or there could be trouble ahead when a fifth starter is required…unless of course Chien-Ming Wang turns up and becomes the pitcher Joe Torre looked after with the Yankees before his shoulder started playing up.