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Ouch.  Chad Billingsley slipped on an icy step on Saturday, fracturing his fibula.  Bills is supposed to be good to go by Spring Training.  I’m actually a little more worried about how he handles this mentally.  Chad’s a big guy at 6′ 10″ and he uses that left leg to push off during his throwing motion.  He’ll need complete confidence to get by this, as well as his performance in the playoffs.  Hard to believe Billingsley is the veteran of this Dodgers rotation…

So Ned reportedly made a play for Manny, but it surely is a two-year deal for $55 million.  A nice move, but does anyone seriously think Manny is going to take that?  Not with Boras as his agent!  Good thing the Dodgers cleared some salary by buying out Penny’s contract for $2 million (not a pretty penny! sorry, couldn’t help myself…) as they’ll need that for either Ramirez or Sabathia.

On a related note, Blue Notes had an interesting post relating to comments from Steve Henson at Yahoo! Sports on the Padres’ asking price for Jake Peavy:

The Dodgers would be long shots because the Padres are loathe to help their intra-divisional neighbors to the north. It would take Clayton Kershaw or Jonathan Broxton, plus DeWitt and Ethier, just to pique the Padres’ interest.

JUST TO PIQUE THEIR INTEREST!!! Whatever…could you seriously imagine playing the Pad’s and seeing Kershaw on the mound with DeWitt and Eithier behind him?  Unbelievable.

What happens in the offseason stays in the offseason, right? Not if someone takes a video of it and sells it to TMZ!

TMZ is reporting that Dodger pitcher Brad Penny is spending his offseason attempting to hurt that multi million-dollar right hand of his in bar brawls. On Monday, October 27th, Penny and his pals were partying it up at the Key Club in Hollywood. Apparently, a scuffle ensued over a girl and Penny got involved.

Looks like it was an isolated incident and everyone walked away OK, but in our litigious society, who knows what might come of this - just ask Larry Johnson of the Kansas City Chiefs…

Dylan Hernandez of the L.A. Times had a great article about the upcoming offseason work that the Dodgers need to do to begin prep for the 2009 season.

Here is a small exerpt:

Twelve players from this year’s NL West championship team will be free agents, including Ramirez, pitcher Derek Lowe, shortstop Rafael Furcal, third baseman Casey Blake and second baseman Jeff Kent, who is pondering retirement. McCourt ensured a certain level of stability when he told The Times on Wednesday that Colletti would be back next season, but the front office could lose assistant general manager Kim Ng, who is a finalist for the GM vacancy in Seattle.

This seems like a staggering number in my book - I don’t know how it compares to other playoff teams, but clearly Casey Blake and Manny Ramirez (both acquired prior to the trading deadline) inflated this # a bit.

With the Dodgers not scheduled to hold their organizational meetings until later this month, the most Torre could say was that pitching would probably be their top priority.

“I still think that pitching is really something you really have to pay attention to,” Torre said. “I know we all get caught up in the offensive part of this game, but I certainly think that pitching is something that really should be front and center as far as being addressed.”

YOU THINK??? Wow, amazing that Torre could utter this after the debacle in the playoffs and seem so understated about the whole thing. Maybe he is in shock over the collapse in the NLCS, but appearing a bit more focused on pitching being priority #1 would probably make sense.

Lowe is assumed to be leaving. He has often felt underappreciated in his four seasons with the Dodgers, according to sources close to him who spoke anonymously to avoid creating tension while the team was still in the playoffs. The club never approached Lowe, 35, about a contract extension this season, though that in part was because he is represented by Scott Boras, who prefers that his clients test the market.

Another big decision in the coming weeks will concern Brad Penny, who was 16-4 in 2007 and was the opening day starter this season. But Penny was 6-9 with a 6.27 earned-run average and left the team after being put on the 60-day disabled list, which ended his year.

Penny’s contract includes a $9.25-million club option for 2009 that could be bought out for $2 million.

Torre said he recently reached out to Penny and said he wanted to have lunch with him.

“He’s been frustrated with his condition,” Torre said. “He’s a young man with a bright future, whether it’s with us or somebody else.”

Amazing that with so much riding on the Dodgers future pitching staff that there was almost a lack of courting going on with Lowe and Penny. The Manny Ramirez factor has to be tough for these guys, as they were trying to shine in order to maximize value ahead of free agency, only to see Manny grab the spotlight and never let go during his Red Sox paid tenure in L.A..

With or without Penny, the Dodgers will be forced to target a top-of-the-rotation arm if they can’t re-sign Lowe. At this point, the only sure bets for the rotation are Chad Billingsley, Hiroki Kuroda and Clayton Kershaw. James McDonald, who impressed as a September call-up, and damage-shouldered Jason Schmidt, who has a year left on his three-year, $47-million contract, could also be factors.

CC Sabathia, who pitched the Milwaukee Brewers into the postseason, is the top free-agent pitcher but could command a deal similar to the seven-year, $126-million contract that Barry Zito signed with San Francisco two winters ago.

A.J. Burnett and Ben Sheets could also be available. A longshot could be 2007 Cy Young Award winner Jake Peavy, whom San Diego is attempting to shop.

Trading for Peavy would probably force Colletti to break up the Dodgers’ nucleus of young players that includes catcher Russell Martin, first baseman James Loney, and outfielders Matt Kemp and Andre Ethier. Colletti says he intends to keep the group intact.

Still, there are plenty of openings.

Bill Plaschke had a good summary from Dodger Stadium - it was the PITCHING that did us in last night, and some of the choices were really perplexing…

The Wade and Kershaw choices were the strangest ones for me. Wade threw over 30 pitches the night before in the Dodgers win in game 3 - was it really necessary to bring him in ahead of Kuo? The Kershaw situation was another strange one…Clayton doesn’t have experience in the postseason and had only acted as a relief pitcher three times in the entire 2008 season - definitely not a seasoned veteran for mid-game appearances.

Bottom line - we may have stocked up on hitting with the likes of Manny Ramirez and Casey Blake this year, but pitching may be the piece that costs the Dodgers the chance at the World Series. Don’t blame Torre, blame the pitching dilemma we are in - an issue that is the responsibility of the Dodgers front office.