April 26, 2010

Wakefield Switches To Pen

Daisuke Matsuzaka will start in Baltimore on Saturday and Tim Wakefield will be in the bullpen. Wakefield did not have much to say about it after yesterday's loss to the Orioles.
What are your thoughts on going to the bullpen?

"I don't have any."

Are you concerned at all about the transition to relief pitching?

"No."
Francona:
[T]his is not us turning him into a reliever. This is us putting him in the bullpen until he starts again. ... [W]e feel for various reasons, he's the guy that can handle this.
Wakefield's last regular season relief appearance? June 9, 2004, against the Padres.

But his actual last time out of the Red Sox bullpen was on October 18, 2004, for the 12th, 13th, and 14th innings of 2004 ALCS Game 5.

3 comments:

laura k said...

I hate the thought of a knuckleballer in the bullpen.

gojohn said...

Wake has always said that he prefers starting. Hopefully this is just a temporary situation. Eventually another pitcher will go down, and Wakefield will start again.

Edward Lee said...

He'll get 5+ starts as a result of injury/scheduling quirks/etc. But come on, does anybody really think he's better than Matsuzaka or Buchholz?