The Pirates made the decision to pull closer Salomon Torres from the role and replace him with roto-commentariat favorite Matt Capps. Whether it was a good decison or bad one, I can't say. But I can say that I did not think it was going to happen until early this morning.
In my near-daily rotisserie baseball conversation with my brother, we discuss various trades and happenings - often about the Yankees and Red Sox as I am a NY fan and he a Boston one. This morning I mentioned the Benitez trade and said I could be going from three closers yesterday - Kevin Gregg, Takashi Saito and Salomon Torres - to none if Benitez took over the job in Florida, Saito's arm issues were serious and Torres' blown save last night ushered in a change. I just had a bad feeling when I saw Torres had blown the two-run lead.
I'm batting .333 right now.
To make matters worse, and I'm not sure how many fantasy experts admit this, I had ample opportunity to deal Torres as recently as Monday in exchange for...well that doesn't matter. Whatever it was would be better than what I have right now - a failed closer. To further worsen the situation, the first place team in my NOKA 124.15 grabbed Capps in a trade for Willie Harris a couple weeks earlier.
Events like these are what separates the teams that end-up with the Yoo-hoo showers (for those to young, that was the traditional prize to the league champion) from those who finish just short.
As consolation, Torres should remain a valuable middle reliever as the Pirates would likely go right back to him if Capps struggles and Torres pitches well. The smart fantasy owner hopes to get his own Willie Harris trade for Torres.