Andrew Cashner Back to the Bullpen? and Other Terrifying Bullets – May 13, 2011

It’s Friday the 13th, and the Chicago Cubs are expected to lick their Red-and-Cardinal-induced wounds against a team that leads the NL West and has won six in a row. That’s terrifying.

  • Also terrifying? I hope this is just Bruce Levine shooting from the hip, but, in a short article mentioning Randy Wells going out on a rehab stint next week, Levine drops this bombshell: “[When he returns to the Cubs, Andrew] Cashner may be either a starter or return to the bullpen, where he was a successful set-up man toward the end of 2010.” Sweet baby Jesus no. Unless there is a *physical* reason that Cashner *cannot* be a starter, the idea that the Cubs would convert him from a reliever to a starter after they drafted him, and then back to a reliever last year, and then back to a starter this year, only to convert him BACK to a reliever AGAIN this year is too shocking for me to consider. He’s shown that he can be an effective starter, where his ceiling is far, far higher than as a reliever. Please, Cubs. Don’t screw this up.
  • More terrification: Brett Jackson, the Cubs’ top prospect, jacked up his left pinkie on Wednesday, and has seen the Cubs’ hand specialist to work things out. He’s been placed on the disabled list by his AA squad, and, although it’s just a pinkie, you don’t want to mess with a dude’s hand. The Cubs have said the finger isn’t broken, so it’s got to be some kind of strain/sprain. Which might be worse.
  • I know it was two days ago, but Jeff Samardzija’s scoreless inning streak officially ended at 15 on Wednesday. As reader TWC likes to say, Orel Hershiser can rest easy.
  • This is not a joke: body language experts analyze The Hug. Again: not a joke.
  • written by

    Brett Taylor is the Lead Cubs Writer at Bleacher Nation, and you can find him on Twitter at @BleacherNation and on LinkedIn here. Brett is also the founder of Bleacher Nation, which opened up shop in 2008 as an independent blog about the Chicago Cubs. Later growing to incorporate coverage of other Chicago sports, Bleacher Nation is now one of the largest regional sports blogs on the web.

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