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Scouting Closers Everywhere

By craig

Apparently the Marlins have a team of scouts in Arizona looking for closer candidates.

In a 7-4 loss to the A's on Tuesday night, closer Armando Benitez tossed a scoreless inning in his second appearance. Pitching before two scouts from the Marlins, who have expressed interest in Benitez, he threw 18 pitches and gave up two singles before Nick Swisher fouled out to end the inning. "It's coming. It'll come real soon," Benitez said. "I felt great. This year is very important to me."

I'm glad to hear the Benitez is feeling great but I still don't think the Marlins can count on him to be closer for the entire season with his recent history of injuries.  But let's leave that aside for the time being and look at it from another perspecive: First off, he is due $7.6 million this season and in order to make a deal, the Giants would have eat most of his salary.  Guessing that the Giants front office isn't brain-dead they would want something more in return than just taking him off their hands. Especially since the San Francisco's bullpen isn't exactly chock-full of late inning relief. And that means a pitching prospect.  Benitez is in the final year of his contract, so once again, there is no long term upside to doing this. And there may not even be short term upside.

I hope the Marlins just let this one pass by.

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