The Fifth Man
Thanks to Mark Prior and Kerry Wood, there's a lot of questions that need to be answered about the Cubs rotation for the start of the season. After Zambrano and Maddux, I think Glendon Rusch and Jerome Williams are pretty well set in stone. Then there's the fifth man. Luckly, there's a number of off-days in April, and the fifth rotation slot will only come into play once (on April 15th), and then not again until April 25th. There's talk of Kerry Wood being available by the end of April, but let's just say I'm pessimistic about the chances of that actually happening. So lets look at the candidates for that fifth slot:
Rich Hill - A lefthander that pitched 23 (mostly terrible) innings in the bigs last season. He's kind of old (26) for a prospect, but anyone that's seen his 12-6 curve falls in love with his potential. He's had a rough spring, as evidenced by his 6.92 ERA. Still, he dominated in AA and AAA last year with 182 strikeouts in 122 innings.
Sean Marshall - Right now, he's the fan favorite. He's a tall drink of water, only 23 years old, left-handed, and he's yet to pitch an inning above AA. I've seen him in preseason a few times, and he's looked great. (The numbers back it up, too. 10 scoreless innings, 8 strikeouts, 6 walks). He's a rather highly regarded prospect in the Cubs system but the knock on him is that he's often injured and has never pitched more than 96 innings in a single season.
Angel Guzman - We've been hearing about this guy for years, it seems, but he's still only 24 years old. A really skinny kid that reminds many of a young Pedro Martinez. Him pitching for the Cubs, of course, has forced him to the DL numerous times over the past three seasons. He only pitched 18 innings last year, but Baker still included him in the mix when he listed the candidates for that last spot. He's been pretty solid this spring with 11 innings of 4.09 ball, but lots of walks. Interestingly, Marshall, Guzman, and David Aardsma combined for nine innings of no-hit ball Saturday against Oakland. John Koronka gave up a hit in the 10th and the Cubs ended up winning in the bottom half of that inning, 1-0.
Jae-Kuk Ryu - Another well-regarded prospect in the Cubs system. The Cubs have brought him along slowly, and you may remember him as the guy that killed an osprey a few years back. He pitched pretty well last season at AA, though he's had a shaky spring, mostly out of the pen.
So what we've got here is a plethora of prospects. Every one of them is among the elite in the Cubs farm system (which in my opinion isn't saying much), and every one of them has some flaws to overlook. Who would I choose? Based on spring performance, I'd have to go with Marshall. But that career-high of 96 innings really gives me pause. What if he does good and the Cubs end up keeping him in the rotation for the rest of the season? He could rack up over 200 innings and his arm would probably turn to sawdust. So based on that, I'll go with Rich Hill. Yes, he's struggled this spring, but in my opinion it's his last friggin chance. If he can't make a decent go of it now, he probably never will. Save the other guys for a brighter day.