9-News: 38.055: Is 200 Still Possible?
Posted: Tue Apr 16, 2019 10:32 am
Dogface Finds Time Machine
These days Jose Chavez pitches. That’s all there is to it, really. No longer can he find himself able to fall back on the 101 MPH bolt of lightning that his arm used to unleash as reliably as Thor facing Ragnarok. Instead he finds the corner with a shady change up our gets guys chasing a sneaky knuckle curve thrown down in the dirt. Sure, he still busts a guy up and in when the batter tries to take his part of the plate. But, really, those days of erasing mistakes with a heater for down south of blistering are over.
And sure, the pitches pile up and the body can go only so far. There have been injuries, of course. Tommy John in 2030, a ruptured finger tendon last year.So today his manager, who is only 5 years older than Chavez himself, keeps a tight limit on the pitch count, and, indeed, finds ways to shuffle the aging Chavez to the bullpen when he finds the match-up is right. There are a lot of reasons people say they worry about Dogface Chavez, not the least being that his contract pays him too much. As if, given what Jose Chavez has meant to the tea over his career, that was possible.
But, here’s this: Chavez can still pitch.
He proved it recently with five solid innings of three-hit ball against Des Moines. Proved it again with five perfect innings against Montreal, and again with four innings of 1-hit baseball against the dangerous line in Edmonton. Over his last three starts, Jose Chavez is 2-0, and has given up only seven hits and two runs in 14.1 innings. He’s struck out nine hitters and walked only two. Induced 20 ground outs to only 12 fly balls.
“He’s a great pitcher,” said current team ace Carlos Valle. “It’s amazing to watch him work.”
There was a time not so long ago that the league was asking if Jose Chavez could hit 200 wins, and the answer was yes, or at least probably. But with injuries taking both time and velocity away, those questions are mot so easy to answer. He stands today with 167 career win. Thirty-three away. He’s 36 years old. The whispers are that he’s nearing the end, and that the number 33 is looking farther and farther away. Still, though. Perhaps he gets eight more this year to draw that number down to 25, and with three more years on his deal that means he’d need about eight a season. Doable, yes, even if the Vegas odds-makers rule him out.
“I don’t know,” Chavez says when asked about the number. He’s soaking his left arm in brine concocted by the trainer’s staff after stopping Edmonton. “It’s not important to me right now.”
Mostly, you see, Jose Chavez doesn’t care about the number 200. Mostly, the kid the called Dogface is looking at the end of his career and really wants only one more thing. You can see it in his demeanor, can see it in the way he’s willing to do what it takes to get guys out whenever his manager asks him to. Jose Chavez has won games, has won awards, has proven he can come back from that old-man devil in injury itself. But right now, Jose Chavez wants only a night in October where he and his team mates are lifting a trophy into that endless star=filled sky.