David Price: The future is...in the minors

The defending AL Champion Tampa Bay Rays optioned 23 year old left handed pitcher David Price to their minor league camp today. The move was based solely on the Rays desire to closely monitor the workload of their young phenom. After pitching 139.1 innings between the majors and minors last season, the Rays do not want to increase his innings by more than 20% in 2009. A 20% increase would put Price’s ‘09 innings pitched to roughly 165 innings.

While I completely understand the decision made by the Rays and am not at all surprised by it, I think it’s the wrong one for the organization. The Rays who are hampered by a limited payroll, play in the same division with the infinite money of the Yankees and Red Sox and realistically have a short amount of time to be competitive. Regardless of how deep their minor league system is and how good they are at developing players, we just have not seen a team consistently compete with one of the lower payrolls in the league. Now I fully understand that with Price pitching in the minors he can be lifted at any point in the game without any real consequences as to the outcome of the game. In the big leagues though, this is much harder to justify. Removing Price from a 1-0 game in the 5th inning is easier said than done, especially if the Rays lose the game. I also understand the Rays desire to give Price regular work and keep him on a consistent pitching schedule but I think it would be more beneficial to their major league team if he was with them all season. They could possibly start Price in the bullpen and then move him into the rotation later in the season similar to what the Yankees did with Joba Chamberlain in ‘08.

Is it possible for the Rays to compete this year even with David Price in the minors for half of the season? Absolutely. In fact I think the Rays have a stronger team than last season. Unfortunately for them so do the Yankees and Red Sox. This means EVERY game matters. This is why I believe David Price should be on their major league roster all season, even if he’s in the bullpen. In such a competitive division you must have your 25 best players available even if that means taking a risk with the left arm of your future ace.

-Robb Lennahan