Over at Minor League Ball, John Sickels has been reviewing his off-season lists of Top 20 prospects for each major league club.  Yesterday, he re-posted his list of the Detroit Tigers' top minor leaguers, with thoughts and impressions on how they've performed this season and how that's affected their standing in the organization.

Even better, some of MLB's commentors have chimed in to mention several players (Matt Joyce!) that weren't on Sickels' original list, others that have developed into notable prospects (Guillermo Moscoso, Dusty Ryan), and inquire about one or two players (Jonathan Kibler) who have flown below the radar. 

You can give the list a look here.

I have to admit, I didn't think we'd ever see Fernando Rodney pitch for the Detroit Tigers again.  When a guy has to stop throwing sessions short because of pain in his shoulder, and makes appointments to see Dr. James Andrews, his pitching career begins to take on the faint burning smell of toast.  Yet Rodney kept at his rehabilitation.  Six minutes of throwing here, another pain-free day of long toss there.  And the Tigers held out hope, though Jim Leyland acted as if he didn't dare depend on someone who might not come back. 

But Rodney really is coming back (complete with some coaching tweaks), joining the team tonight in San Francisco.  And Joel Zumaya isn't far behind him.  Just as the Tigers are playing their best baseball of the year and appear ready to turn their season around, the two relievers that made their bullpen so dominating in 2006 are returning.  If Rodney and Zumaya are capable of pitching as they once did, is there any other team in baseball that's going to add relievers of such caliber in mid-season? 

With news of Rodney's return imminent, the question became who would have to go?  BYB reader Matt astutely observed that Freddy Dolsi would probably draw the short straw, based on his inexperience and remaining minor league options.  The general reaction to that was "What?  Are you nuts?  He's the Tigers' best reliever right now!"  But it made sense, given that Zumaya and Rodney were likely to take over the late-inning set-up roles, while Dolsi would be better served by getting innings in the minors, rather than pitch mop-up duty. 

Apparently, however, the Tigers agreed that Dolsi is pitching too well in relief to send down right now.  Or they're placing more of a priority on trying to rebuild their starting pitching depth.  In a rather surprising move, Detroit is sending Aquilino Lopez back to Toledo, in order to stretch himself out with more innings and become a starting pitcher for the organization.

What does that say about the depth in the minor league system right now?  Virgil Vazquez hasn't been very good this year (4-6, 5.08), and Jordan Tata has plummeted all the way down to Lakeland (he ain't down there for no rehab assignment).  Macay McBride was injured before the season, and Yorman Bazardo (1-3, 5.17) isn't throwing like someone who wants to get a call back up to the bigs.  The Tigers already called up the one guy they could, when Eddie Bonine came up for his start on Saturday.  And though he got a win, it wasn't exactly a dazzling performance.

Making Lopez a starter is a curious move, considering that Casey Fossum and Zach Miner both have more recent experience as starters.  (Both Billfer and Lee point out that Lopez last pitched as a starter in 2002, with Triple-A Tacoma.)  But he has pitched well in longer outings this season, including a four-inning stint in early April that would've been one of the Tigers' best starts of the year had Lopez actually started the game.  It looks like we'll be seeing him get those starts with Detroit pretty soon.

After last night's Grilli-esque (which is almost an insult to Jason Grilli) eighth inning, Yorman Bazardo might have already packed his bags for Toledo.  If not, he's probably the only one who didn't think he would be sent down to the minors.  The Detroit Tigers designated Bazardo for assignment this afternoon, and he'll hand his roster baton to Clay Rapada, who comes up from the Mud Hens.  This gives Jim Leyland the second left-handed reliever he's wanted since Tim Byrdak was released.

Maybe it's the impending NFL Draft that makes me want to use the word "upside," but I think there was definite hope and curiosity from both the Tigers and fans about Bazardo's talents, and his ability to contribute to a bullpen in need of good stuff.  He had a rough spring, coping with the death of his father and nursing some tightness in his forearm. But if Byrdak hadn't been released and Francisco Cruceta's visa not kept him in the Dominican Republic, Bazardo probably would've begun the season in Toledo, anyway.

My theory, of course, is that "Bazardo" sounds just a little bit too much like Bizarro, whom we all know as one of Superman's arch-enemies.  Bizarro is known for doing everything the opposite as we would do it, saying goodbye instead of hello, or "me hate you" when he means "I love you."  So I think this was Bazardo's way of pitching well.  It's the way he was taught on the Bizarro World.

Me am Bazardo!  Me have bad game to Red Sox and make Tigers lose!  Bazardo am sad with lack of success!

Oh, I was just waiting to make that joke again this season.  And I regret that I probably won't be able to anymore.

(via The Detroit TIgers Weblog)

UPDATE:  Aaron Fultz apparently didn't like that Rapada got the nod over him.  After Rapada got the call up to Detroit, Fultz asked for his unconditional release.  Fultz looked like the guy who would replace Tim Byrdak in the Tigers' bullpen after he signed with the organization.  Four walks in 5 2/3 innings might have changed that opinion.

As exciting as it was to see the Tigers' offense come alive in their first win of the season Wednesday night, it was good pitching from Jeremy Bonderman and the bullpen that finally broke their losing streak.  If you needed a reminder of that, the pitching staff provided a sobering one last night, while also making it pretty clear that this team's long-term problems weren't solved with one win.

Accentuate the Positive?

In writers' workshops, we always tried to start out with a positive criticism before tearing a classmate to shreds.  So let's begin on a good note: Both Magglio Ordonez and Placido Polanco appear to be out of their respective slumps.  Maggs hit his first home run of the season (giving him his first RBI, as well), showing off that familiar whip-like swing that usually means a ball is landing in the seats.  And Polanco went 2-for-4 with two RBIs.  If both batters are heating up, that could go a long way toward solving what's plagued this team.  Unfortunately, it doesn't matter how many runs are scored, if the bullpen insists on giving up huge amounts of runs.

Eliminate the Negative

A slightly nagging question on my mind after Wednesday's game was why Zach Miner hadn't been used when the bullpen had to hold down a lead.  Was there anything to read into with that?  In Spring Training, Miner was being touted as an important part of the bullpen, someone who would be pitching important set-up innings.  One theory could be that Jim Leyland was nervous enough about his infield defense that he didn't want to put a sinkerball pitcher on the mound.  But maybe we got a more illuminating answer last night. 

Nate Robertson had already given up the lead when he left in the sixth inning.  But at 4-3, the Tigers were still in the ballgame.  That is, until Miner got generous with the walks.  He managed to get out of the sixth without a walk to Coco Crisp coming back to bite him.  But in the seventh, consecutive walks to Dustin Pedroia and David Ortiz (who had to be happy Robertson was no longer in the game) gave Manny Ramirez an opportunity to build a more imposing lead.  And he obliged by driving both runners in.

But I don't mean to single out Miner because he wasn't the only reliever that hemorrhaged runs in this game.  Francis Beltran also walked two batters (one intentionally), though those runners didn't come around to score.  Yorman Bazardo, however, might have cost himself a major league job with his performance after taking over for Beltran.  Any chance the Tigers had at a comeback - and they did cut the margin to two runs - were destroyed with Bazardo's eighth inning.  Two walks, three hits, and four runs later, Detroit was flattened.  Even Jason Grilli was probably thinking, "Hoo!  That stunk!" 

Both Tom Gage and Danny Knobler write this morning that changes are likely to be made, possibly as soon as this afternoon.  Something has to be done, because this bullpen really has been as bad as people feared coming into the season.  (Detroit Tigers Thoughts has ideas on how the bullpen should be shuffled.)  Two guys will probably get the boot, as Leyland wants to go back to a 12-man bullpen and he'd prefer another left-hander among the relief corps.

Clerical Issues

Apologies for not sticking around in the Game Thread discussion last night.  Besides wireless connectivity issues here at Fort Casselberry, a long couple of days apparently caught up with me around the fourth inning and I crashed.  Not that it matters.  But if you were hanging out, looking for someone to chat with, I apologize for leaving you to listen to crickets chirp.  Or maybe very few wanted to endure that bullpen meltdown and changed the channel.  Anyway, we're back at it again tonight.