New Year's Odds and Ends

A brief walk around the webworld:

• Doug Milhoan over at Rays Prospects has put together a nice list of starting pitcher rosters up and down the Rays system. Here's what he sees for the Bulls:

Jeremy Hellickson - unlikely but possible

Alex Cobb - quietly effective year after year

Alex Torres* - my personal upper-level breakout candidate

Richard De Los Santos - already re-signed for another year in Durham

David Newmann* - struggled in AA in ‘10, may move to the bullpen or repeat AA

Jeremy Hall - not really a prospect but quietly had a nice year in AA in ‘10

Minor league free agents

Comment: Hellickson isn’t really likely, but minor league free agents are. The Rays always stash some AAAA-type pitchers in Durham. Some possibilities include former Bulls such as Brian Baker, Carlos Hernandez*, Heath Phillips*, Virgil Vasquez, and Jason Cromer*.

• Jim Donten, a frequent contributor to Rays Prospects, has started a blog covering the Charlotte (as in Port Charlotte, Florida) Stone Crabs, Claw Digest. Should be a good place to keep an eye out for prospective Bulls.

• Does it seem to you like the baseball season has been dragging on much longer in recent years? That because it has. Craig Robinson over at Flip Flop Fly Ball has put together yet another of his really great charts that shows us how much longer.

• It seems while we were speculating on the “Montoyo Merry-Go-Round” last year, down in St. Petersburg Joe Maddon was setting his own standard for lineup shifting. In his case, it was likely to have to do with pitching matchups, while in Charlie Montoyo’s case probably mostly about player development. At any rate, Cork Gaines at Rays Index thinks things should settle down with the Rays. A stable lineup is one of his wished for “gifts” in his “Seven Days of Raysmas” series.

Happy New Year!