Entering the two-game experiment, Sanchez’s ERA stood at a respectable 4.41. Exiting the two-game experiment, it’s at 5.98 with a bullet. Or is that with a line drive. He gave Montreal 5 runs in 3.2 innings, then five days later topped that by allowing Madison’s high-octane offense six runs n 4.1 innings.
“It wasn’t my best hour,” Sanchez said after the Madison shellacking.
He gave up only one homer in the 8 innings of work but walked five and allowed sixteen base hits. This is what experts call “a recipe for disaster.”
ACQUISITIONS SEND SANCHEZ BACK TO PEN
The team’s recent acquisitions of Juan Guerrero and Adam Barnard were presumed to fill the #4 and #5 slots, though Barnard has been pitching effectively out of the bullpen and Guerrero did not see a start in his first week with the team. The Nine say Guerrero will start one of the two games against Madison, but has not given word on Barnard's situation.
“You can say those acquisitions chased Sanchez back to the pen,” said BBA Quarterly analyst Gayle Combs, “but the fact is if he’d been successful you know Bill Inkster would have had him throwing every five days. Jose Sanchez has only Jose Sanchez to blame for being a reliever.”
That said, a rain-out in Madison has potentially altered the situation, and could well juggle the rotation. Further aggravating the situation is that the club faces Omaha in the mix, and given Barnard’s propensity for throwing the long ball, would likely want to keep him out of the rotation in that ballpark.
“We’ll announce our starters as we need to,” Inkster said. “And we’re not really discounting bringing up a minor leaguer for a start, either. We’ll just have to see what happens.”
All we can say for sure is that the Jose Sanchez files seems to be closed at this point.