FanHouse R.A. Dickey

Starting Five is our wrapup of the previous day's baseball action, with a quick nod to what is ahead.

You Oughta Know ...
That it's quite a luxury to have a dependable setup reliever with closing experience such as J.J. Putz or Carlos Marmol. Just ask the Royals or the Tigers or the Astros or the Red Sox.

Kansas City's Kyle Farnsworth, right, Detroit's Brandon Lyon and Houston's LaTroy Hawkins -- all signed to contracts in the offseason -- each allowed a tying or go-ahead homer in the eighth inning of his game. Boston's Hideki Okajima gave up a pair or runs to turn a 5-1 game into a tight one.

There's a long history of position players coming in to pitch during major league games. It's often seen during total routs when a comeback is beyond reach and the actual pitchers are better off getting rest than work. Yesterday in Seattle, though, backup catcher Jamie Burke came into pitch during the 15th inning of a tie game between the Mariners and Tigers.

Burke didn't embarrass himself but still picked up the loss when Marcus Thames hit a sacrifice fly to win the game. He got Ivan Rodriguez and Edgar Renteria to close out the inning and didn't look bad doing it. Still, how does Burke end up on the mound in that spot? Jim Riggleman didn't have many options after exhausting his bullpen.

Reliever Arthur Rhodes woke up with a sore arm and couldn't get loose. Brandon Morrow had pitched four of the previous five days and Riggleman wanted to give him a day off. Tuesday's scheduled starter, Carlos Silva, had thrown on the side earlier Sunday. Saturday's starter, R.A. Dickey, volunteered to throw, but had tossed more than 100 pitches in his start.

You don't use someone who's hurting and Morrow is probably too valuable to the franchise's future to throw out in those circumstances. Why not use Dickey, though? He throws a knuckleball, which would surely be harder for the Tigers to master than the slider of a catcher. I realize the Mariners season is going nowhere fast but just giving away games hardly seems like the best solution.

The Mariners spent the majority of the off-season doing everything in their power to try and pry Erik Bedard away from the Baltimore Orioles. Since they weren't the only team bidding for Bedard's services, they had to pay a pretty hefty price to finally get him. So far this season, I think it's safe to say the Orioles are winning that trade. They currently find themselves a half game out of first place in the AL East in large part due to the players they got from Seattle in the trade.

Bedard on the other hand, has missed two starts already for Seattle, and he's about to miss a couple more because the Mariners placed him on the disabled list on Tuesday thanks to some left hip inflammation.

The move is retroactive to April 9, the day after he last pitched. The club will make a corresponding roster move Wednesday.

"[My hip is] a lot better," Bedard said. "A little rest is the only thing that will help it right now."

"We have said consistently that we were not going to rush Erik back," Mariners manager John McLaren said in a statement before Tuesday's Royals-Mariners game. "At this point, we thought it made the most sense to go ahead and place him on the DL. It should not change when he's available to make his next start, and gives us the ability to add another player in the meantime."

So that means the Mariners are currently without their number one starter, and their closer, J.J. Putz. Putz is scheduled to come off the disabled list on Friday, but he likely will have to spend some time in the minors on a rehab assignment before he rejoins the Mariners.

As for Bedard, the recently recalled R.A. Dickey is slated to take his scheduled start on Friday against the Angels.

As Matt "Night Train" Watson just shared with you in the previous post, last year Daisuke Matsuzaka introduced Americans to a pitch called the gyroball. Well, while folks debate whether it's a real pitch or just a myth, I've always been a fan of the knuckleball myself. I can actually throw one of those.

Now whether I could catch or hit one remains to be seen, but ESPN's Jim Caple recently got together with Mariners knuckleballer R.A. Dickey to find out for himself.



Somewhere, Doug Mirabelli is crying.