Jason Isringhausen did something bad to his elbow while pitching for Tampa on Saturday night and has been placed on the disabled list. Winston Abreu has been called up.
It’s disheartening that Abreu’s promotion had to be tied to what may be a career-ending injury to another player (Isringahusen had that elbow surgically repaired last September), but he was bound for Tampa sooner or later anyway. His line in Durham was eye-opening. Although Dale Thayer, who didn’t fare especially well in his stint in the majors, looked great on paper too, Abreu’s stuff might translate a little better: He keeps the ball down more consistently than Thayer does; and I’ve gotten the sense, watching Thayer, that he sometimes seems a little unfocused. The same isn’t true of Abreu, who always looks locked and loaded on the mound.
Abreu is 32 years old. He has been in the majors briefly before, in 2006 and 2007, but this is the moment for him to prove that he belongs there. He seems to have the will and the determination. Does he have the skill? It’s all about the arm. “His head was full of larceny,” Arthur “Bugs” Baer once wrote of a would-be base-stealer, “but his feet were too honest.” In other words, sometimes the only thing that lets you down is the weapon.
