Note on last night
July 1st, 2009 | by Joe Lucia |So after his great game last night, Bobby Cox announced that Martin Prado would be his starting 2B. Now, as many of you read in my article last week, I said that I would like to see Kelly Johnson remain the starter, and that he would be a better option than Prado. Despite the happenings of last night, I am not changing my mind. I still think that Johnson would be a better starter at second compared to Prado. But I’m not saying that Prado is going to do a horrible job. He’s doing a fantastic job in limited playing time this season, and lord knows he’s playing better than Kelly. My main gripe is that Prado has never gotten full-time playing team in his major league career, and that his numbers in the minors never really screamed STARTER. We’ll see where things take us, and I’m fully ready to put my foot in my mouth if Prado continues to rake come the end of July, while Kelly is languishing on another team.
We shall see, and thats what makes baseball so great, doesn’t it? I’m going to try to get a piece up tonight, probably about how awesome Rafael Soriano is, or maybe a look at the Danville hitting prospects. Not totally sure. As per the norm, the series recap of the Phillies series will be up tomorrow, and I’ll try to get a prospect report up as well.
Oh, and one more thing. I learned the calculation for FIP. My prospect reports are about to get a whole lot nerdier.
Tags: Kelly Johnson, Martin Prado
By Dick on Jul 2, 2009
I realize you haven’t had a chance to post it but Prado had another awesome game last night. I understand your reasoning that he is unproven as a starter. But at this point I would take his uncertainty over what we know we are getting with KJ right now. I’m a KJ fan as well but he is flat out so far. I’m going all cliche on you now, PLAY THE HOT HAND!
By ZachM on Jul 2, 2009
The nerdier the better I say.
By JustinD on Jul 2, 2009
I might be way off base with this, but i thought that prado could play some short. Wouldn’t we be better off having him at short and Kelly at second, while Yunel is out, than having Diory’s black hole of a bat spending time in the lineup.
By joelucia on Jul 2, 2009
But Diory homered last night man!
Seriously, Prado’s defense is a liability at either of the middle infield positions. We’re at the point where blabbering about his defense wouldn’t do us any good whatsoever, because its bad whether he’s at second or short.
As long as Prado is hitting like he’s been this series, I’m all about starting him, because it can only help the team. If he starts faltering like Kelly was though, I can’t see any reason to keep him in the lineup since Kelly is the proven player.
My ideal plan would be to get Prado some regular playing time while not completely benching Kelly, IE letting him get pinch hit appearances and spot starts. You can’t completely give up on a player like Kelly Johnson.