Simeon Woods Richardson’s Path Forward Starts in the Bullpen, But it Might Be On Hold

[Western SD Fan]

59 minutes ago, bean5302 said:

So you knew at the beginning of 2021 exactly how the full season would go for those pitchers?

My ultimate point was addressing the idea that signing any pitcher on the DFA market is equal or preferable to leaving Sim in the lineup.  I have been consistent in my opinion that Sim, through all of his faults, is still the better option until we know what is going on with Joe Ryan and Mick Abel comes off the IL.

To address the 2021 season, I would have been very concerned about Happ and Shoemaker.  As for Maeda, Berrios, and Pineda, there was definite cautious optimism.  The real question was how they would respond to a full season after the crazy 2020 Covid season.  A simple search through this website would have given you that information.  This was the pre-season analysis on TD from Nick Nelson, likely someone with more knowledge and smarter than I am.  As you can see, the depth behind this group of starters was shaky at best, even in 2021 analysis.  Less than a month into the season, TD writers were already discussing what happened to Maeda, as shown by the article below by Cody Pirkl.  All of this to say that there were signs that the pitching staff would not be as up to the task as we had hoped.  We had also still been living off the idea that the Bomba Squad would ride again and bail out a study, but questionable pitching staff.