Can Denny Bautista help save the Tiger pen?
I had heard very little about Denny Bautista before the Tigers traded Jose Capellan to the Rockies for him. With the bullpen looking like the Tigers weakest link for the upcoming season, Bautista’s potential ability to fill some major holes for the team is being closely watched. So far he’s been given as many innings as some of the more established ‘pen pitchers, if you can call them that, Grilli and Miner and he has certainly impressed. Denny has yet to allow a run in eight innings of work and given up only 3 hits and 3 walks along with 8 Ks. Impressive, given the lackluster performances thus far of Todd Jones, Zach Miner and Tim Byrdak. Yet this is only eight innings in the life of a very well traveled 26 year-old who has seen 115.7 innings over work at the major league level over the past four years, 8 innings in ‘07, and not put up numbers close to these. Going into the 2005 season, Baseball America ranked him as the Royals #2 prospect, right behind Billy Butler and ahead of Mark T
