Pitching

With Mike Pelfrey's great outing last night, the pitching situation looks rather secure. This is not definite at all. Mike still has to prove himself more consistently as does Nelson Figueroa, the fifth starter right now.

With Duaner Sanchez back, things look very good for the bullpen. One interesting thing to note is the order in which the relievers came out of the 'pen: Aaron Heilman entering the game before Sanchez. That would seem to imply that the eighth inning will now belong to Duaner, with Aaron being demoted to the seventh. It's not clear that this is what Willie plans on doing (time will tell), but if it is, I'd like to note that I think that it is a bad decision. Aaron is a quality reliever. There is no point in messing with his confidence. Pushing a guy who hasn't pitched in 21 months ahead of him seems rather degrading. If this is what Willie does, I hope it doesn't ruin Mr. Heilman.