Rangers No. 5 Starter

[bigboydan]

There are basically three candidates: Edinson Volquez, Juan Dominguez and Roger Clemens. Clemens is a long shot, and everybody knows what he's capable of -- not to mention that if he signed, he'd hardly be the No. 5 guy on the rotation. So we'll take him out of the equation.

Both of the other guys are righties. Volquez is a 6-1, 190-pound rookie from La Segunda in the Dominican Republice. Dominguez is also Dominican, from Sanchez Ramirez, and is a 6-2, 195-pound hurler with 3 years of experience. The two split time on Wednesday. Volquez surrendered five runs in two innings, walking three, while Dominguez surrendered five in 3 1/3 innings of work, walked three and surrendered a pair of homers.

I guess the question here is less who will win the job, and which one will do less to lose it? So who's it gonna be? I'd give the edge to Volquez based his slightly less awful body of work overall this srping (1-2, 5.73 ERA vs. Dominguez's 1-1, 8.25 ERA). But really, if either one of these guys are the best they can trot out there as a fifth starter, Texas is in trouble in '06.

[Willie Bee]

You might be right about Texas being in trouble, Dan, and they could make me look very bad very easy since I've picked them to have a pretty nifty season. But if their #5 starter, or any #5 starter, gets bombed and has an ERA as high as President Bush's approval rating is low, I'm not sure that really signals a horrible season ahead.

Take Boston, for example. Schilling (9.00), Wells (9.00) and Beckett (6.75) have not exactly fooled a lot of hitters this spring. Not having all of your top three starters pitching well is going to lead to failure far more often than having a rag arm in the 5-hole.

Interesting that you mention Clemens, because I really don't think it's a stretch to think of him in a Rangers uniform. Owner Tom Hicks is really brown-nosing Rocket, and Clemens was quoted a couple of weeks ago as saying he plans to spend a lot of time in the near future in the Arlington area. Now you can sidestep that a little since his wife is originally from the D-FW area, as well as Clemens and his agents (Hendricks Bros) are partnering up on a chain of Rocket Steakhouses, one of which will eventually go near the Ballpark That Dubya Built. But one thing I thought of this past winter is that as much as Clemens really wants to emulate Nolan Ryan, perhaps he'd want to close out his career the same way that Ryan did, pitching for the two Lone Star State squads.