From the firm of Kuroda, Martin and Mitchell

He's right. It got into my head as Hideki, and getting it out is proving a little tougher than I would hope.

BK

Of course, it would be easier for BK to learn "Hiroki" if every time I reminded him, he didn't respond with, "Why the %#*& should I have to learn his name? I'm the one with the %#@& blog!"

AK

We still need to trade Kemp because Plaschke said so and we need to aquire Tejada because Rosenthal said it makes sense to do package deal for him and Saint Eric Bernard....

Will any of you ever believe the garbage that suckered you, as it was intended 'The Dodgers seem willing to give up Loney, Kemp, Billingsley and Kershaw for Cabrera" ?

But of course, you will. Just as all of you that will never watch baseball because of the Mitchell report will be first in line at the gate opening day at Dodger Stadium.

I bet most of you are on chat rooms discussing trading Eithier of Troy Glaus!!!

Domo arigato, Colletti-san!!

are you all kidding? has colleti ever heard of kei igawa? or tracked dice-k's performance last year? kuroda couldn't even dominate an inferior league, and now the dodgers are giving him $12m per? this is crazy. just like the jones signing. this off season is shaping up to be the same as the last. at least with schmidt, there was a minute chance that the signing was going to work out. sheesh.

Benzo Jones,

"Everything is now Hiroki-Dokee!"

I'd trademark that right now. haha

AK

it appears that the Dodgers paid fair market value...Royals offered $48 mill over four years. I think that the Mariners offered like 8-10 mill per and he turned them down. I think that any quality pitcher is going to cost at least 10 mill a year. Kris Benson makes 9.5 million, Kelvim Esobar makes 9, freddy garcia 10, Maddox 10 million. If Hiroki can win 15 games he is worth the 12 million. And as they say...its not my money...so why care?

Sorry if some of this sounds familiar. I posted the first portion earlier, but then made some corrections and additions after the first post was blocked by the infamous spam filter. And as has happened before, the post that was reported blocked was, in fact, posted.

I was glad to hear that the Dodgers signed Kuroda, i.e., if it keeps them from trading the kids. However, I think it's too early for anyone to fully endorse this signing, since I'm guessing that none of us has actually seen him pitch.

At this point I think we have to simply trust that the Dodgers scouted him thoroughly, and trust that they know what they're doing. Yes, it's true that Kuroda's stats in Japan weren't great, but they weren't terrible either. And keep in mind that although he was facing inferior hitters, he was also pitching in smaller ballparks.

As for the comparison with Kei Igawa, I offer the following. Kuroda has a reputation for having excellent control. Igawa issued 37 BB in 67.2 innings with the Yankees. I do not know if he had such control problems in Japan.

Bottom line. We'll have to wait and see how well Kuroda performs. Let's hope that Schmidt recovers, and that one or two our younger pitchers (e.g., McDonald, Miller, Elbert, Meloan) step up, if needed, sometime during the season. Maybe even Kuo can bounce back. As for Kershaw, I think he would be best served by another year in the minors.

One other point. With the addition of Andruw Jones and the continued growth of the younger players (Kemp, Ethier, Martin, etc.), I believe that the Dodgers will generate considerably more power in 2008 than they did in 2007. Kuroda from what I've read should slot well into the 3 or 4 spot in the rotation. The combination of five dependable starters with an improved offense, should result in fewer close games, and create some breathing room for the bullpen. Breathing room translates into less of a chance that we will see a repeat of last year when both Broxton and Beimel made 83 appearances for the Dodgers, and Proctor made 83 for the Yankees and Dodgers combined (quite a few of those with the Dodgers).

Of course, things could change before the season starts. It's possible the Dodgers have deals in the works, so this is all very preliminary.

Brooklyn

I wouldn't sweat the all right-handed starting rotation that much because it's really over rated. Where you need the variety is in the bullpen--being able to turn switch-hitters around or change from inning to inning and having the ability to match a lefty to a hitter who struggles against them during crunch time is far more important. With that said, where the all right handed rotation can be worrisome is if your starters all throw the same pitches pretty much the same way. Then, you go into a 3 or 4 game series and the opposition can really get locked in if every starter is throwing a 92 mph fastball, an 84 mph slider, etc, all from the same arm angle. What's more important therefore is having pitchers who pitch differently. Lowe features a real hard sinker, however, Penny, Bills, and Schmidt (although I didn't see enough of him last year to remember much) seem to be very similar pitchers and could lose effectivness if they all follow each other in the rotation. Here's to hoping that Kuroda is unique enough with his "shuuto" and his arm angle to give hitters a totally different feel than the previous 3. As it stands now, I'd say you'd start with Penny, then Lowe, Bills, Kuroda, and Schmidt knowing that at least 2 similar pitchers are going back to back.
Your trade proposal is interesting. To be honest, when I first read it, I thought that it'd never fly because trading one of your aces plus others to get another pitcher just for the sake of the pitcher being left handed is not really adding, but subtracting depth for a reason that, as I said, is over hyped. But, upon further review, it could make sense from this light--Lowe and Penny only have 1 year left and I trust that the Dodgers have already decided that they'll only be able to afford one of them. If, you could essentially flip them for a pitcher who you could control for more time and less money without down grading the staff, it could really be a sharp move. Maybe Kazmir, maybe Bedard. I believe Bedard has 2 years left on his current deal, so would it make sense to replace one year of Lowe for 2 years of Bedard? It might if the rest of the package wasn't too steep. I know Lowe would like to go back to Boston (at least that's what I've heard) and with the Yankees now getting back into the Santana market, I could see Boston losing Santana to the Yankees and then feeling desparate to make a move. Their depth is in the outfield and so is ours, so I don't see us trading Lowe to them. They would REALLY be after Bedard, but Baltimore has already said that they don't want to give him to a division rival. Sooooo, maybe then we pull the trigger on a deal netting us Bedard and sending Lowe (and others) to Baltimore who flips Lowe to Boston--since they probably wouldn't feel nearly the same about Lowe going to Beantown as Bedard going. It all seems to make some sense, but with most trade speculation like this, it's about 99% fun and 1% reality. Probably never happen, but since it's the Hot Stove League, we may as well play the game and enjoy.

our starting rotation is looking good with kuroda at the number four spot after lowe, penny, bills. at the five spot, i think it will be between meloan, kuo, and schmidt.

our lineup is looking good with the addition of mattingly as a hitting coach. more than torre, i think mattingly is key for our team. i think he'll be able to help out furcal, jones, garciaparra if we keep him. a lineup of martin, loney, kent, furcal, garciaparra, kemp, ethier, jones looks pretty good.

Kazmir is a young pitcher with a live arm, but like with most good young pitchers he has control issues, but a ton of strike outs. He had 239 Ks with 89 BBs in 206.2 innings.

I like the signing for much of the same reasons everyone else has said - they did not have to trade away guys like Matt Kemp, Chad Billingsley, or James Loney to do it. Yes it's a lot of money, but this is MLB, where money talks. Actually, he had bigger offers to go elsewhere so it's somewhat of a bargain in a twisted kind of way.

As for having no lefties, it's not a big deal, but it would be nice to have. Rather than trading for one, I offer you one name of someone they already have - Clayton Kershaw. He's young right now, but he is a stud. I can see him getting a shot during the season. Remember that name.

Kuroda may not be anything more than speculation in our rotation at this moment, but it's got to help put some of us at ease, knowing that one of the people spending a good deal of time scouting Kuroda was Logan White.