After giving up six first inning runs today in an exhibition game against the Milwaukee Brewers, Carlos Silva reportedly got in a dugout scuffle with Aramis Ramirez.
Now while this seems like a terrible thing to happen to a club that has struggled in the past with dugout scuffles such as Carlos Zambrano and Michael Barrett in 2007 and Zambrano and Derrek Lee last season, this scuffle might not be all that bad if it ends up giving Carlos Silva the axe from the team.
Silva was a bust with the Seattle Mariners after they gave him a huge contract before the 2008 season and they ended up shipping him off to the Cubs for Milton Bradley and cash last offseason. Many Cubs fans expected the worst out of Silva before last season but Silva was one of the few pleasant surprises on the Cubs for most of the first half of the season last year. Silva went 9-3 going into the All Star Break while putting up a solid ERA of 3.45 but then the wheels fell off as Silva struggled with injuries and poor performance after the All Star break going 1-3 with an 11.12 ERA in just 11.2 innings pitched
The expectations going into this season for Silva are just as low as they were going into last season and now after this incident, the Cubs just need to cut Silva free. The only thing working for the Cubs is this is a contract year for Silva and maybe this motivates Silva to repeat his performance from the first half of last year but I really don’t see this happening. Last season was Silva’s first season in the National League and the majority of the National League hitters were seeing Silva for the first time. Now managers around the league have a developed scouting report on Silva and this along with injuries were probably the cause for Silva’s slide after his 8-0 start.
My feeling is, instead of giving Silva the 5th starter spot, give that spot to young Andrew Cashner who is just 24 years old. If the Cubs plan to use Cashner in the rotation for the near future, give him that experience now especially on a team that doesn’t expect to do much this season in terms of making the playoffs. No need to waste this spot on a guy who won’t be here next season.