Mcgowan to Miss More

John Lott of the National Post tells us that Dustin Mcgowan will probably miss more than just the first week or so of the season, thanks to his plantar fasciitis.  By the looks of it, he's had to stop doing his spring training stuff, since the foot injury was forcing him to change his mechanics a bit, and as result, he's going to need to finish his spring training business once the foot heels up, so he'll need some minor league time.

I spoke about this the other day, but the Jays hardly need a fifth starter any more than once or twice through the first couple of weeks of the season, since they have plenty of offdays to keep the rotation rested.  From the Lott piece linked above,

The Jays will need a fifth starter in the first week of the season, then not again until April 21. Farrell said the club will wait until after they final exhibition game on Tuesday to decide whether Kyle Drabek or Aaron Laffey goes north to Cleveland for opening day.

The job might be temporary at best. Farrell indicated he will go with four starters through most of April, taking advantage of off-days to keep his pitchers on normal rest.

If that's the case, I think I'd prefer Laffey to Drabek.  I think it would be better for Drabek to get regular work (i.e. on his normal 4 days rest consistently), which could only happen in AAA. They can let Laffey spot-start when the #5 spot in the rotation comes up, getting him bullpen work in the meantime, especially since he's left-handed and has more experience relieving.  I don't know whether or not he has options left, but who cares?

Much like Travis Snider, I think it's kind of important for Drabek to get his reps in at a normal, consistent rate.   We don't want him coming up for a start, then sitting in the pen for 12 days, then getting another start, and then having a big question mark flying over his head about probably being sent back down when Mcgowan comes up.  It would be better for his development to stay up when he comes up, and to only come up when he's ready to be up for good.

As for Mcgowan, I looked up exactly what Plantar Fasciitis is, and it doesn't really sound pleasant.  I knew it was something with the arch of the foot, but wasn't really sure beyond that, and figured that he'd probably be out for longer than just a week when wikipedia told me that it's kind of a slow healer that you just have to kind of let sit there and take care of itself.

Update:

Farrell says current thinking is Alvarez likely for four spot in rotation. That leaves Cecil, Drabek, Laffey vying for 3 and 5.
— Shi Davidi (@ShiDavidi) April 2, 2012

Reading between the lines, Henderson Alvarez is going to start your home opener. Probably against Felix Doubront.  Davidi also tells us that Drabek is scheduled to throw 5 innings in tomorrow's spring training game, which tells me that they're probably leaning towards bringing him to Cleveland to start the year.  He was supposed to throw two, and then Aaron Laffey would do the same, but that's changed.