There isn’t a member of the Dodger team who didn’t like Ted Lilly. He was also well liked by fans who got to know him and interact with him every day at Dodger Stadium during batting practice. But the cold hard fact is that Lilly had taken his 3-year/$33 million contract as far as he could. Simply put, he was done and him being designated for assignment on Thursday afternoon really shouldn’t have come as a surprise to anyone. What is a surprise is that it took this long for the Dodgers to do it.

Fans who came to know and like Ted Lilly shouldn’t feel too sorry about his unceremonious release by the Dodgers – he will receive every penny of the $12 million still owed to him by the Dodgers for 2013 whether or not he hooks up with another team between now and the end of the season. And chances are even pretty good that he would also receive a share of any post-season money should the Dodgers be blessed to be in such a position. In other words, Lilly isn’t going to go hungry nor will he need to file for unemployment benefits. He is financially set for life, as are his kids and their kids (etc.).

But in spite of Ted being a nice guy, a good teammate and being liked by fans, and in spite of his financial security, his numbers over the past two seasons pretty much tell the whole story. In his five starts with the Dodgers this season, Lilly was 0-2 with a 5.09 ERA. He issued 10 walks, struck out 18 and gave up 4 home runs in a total of 23 innings pitched. Twenty-three innings in 5 starts averages out to 4.2 innings per start which is absolutely unacceptable even for a number five rotation guy.

Ironically, Lilly made more rehab starts this season than he did actual starts with the Dodgers – five with the Advanced Single-A Rancho Cucamonga Quakes and one with the Triple-A Albuquerque Isotopes. In fact, he actually had more innings pitched with the Quakes than the Dodgers – 24.1. Unfortunately, his numbers against kids nearly half his age were no better than they were against major leaguers. In his 24.1 innings with the Quakes, he was 1-4 with a horrible 8.14 ERA. He walked 7, struck out 24 and allowed 4 home runs. In his one start with the Isotopes (which he lost), he gave up 6 runs, 8 hits, one walk, one home run while striking out 5 in his 6 innings of work.

Lilly spent more time this season with the Rancho Cucamonga Quakes than he did with the Dodgers. (Photo credit – Ron Cervenka).

In spite of Lilly’s struggles in his five starts with the Dodgers and six rehab starts in the minors this season (with similar results last season), the Dodgers stood behind Lilly for a very long time – longer than they have with any other struggling starting pitcher that I can recall. I suspect that this was predicated more on Lilly’s enormous and insane contract than anything else. If Ned Colletti has taught us anything, he has taught us that he tries to justify his bad signings by trying to make them work, even if they are clearly failures (Andruw Jones and Garret Anderson come to mind).

With all of this said, I have a very strong suspicion that it was Lilly himself that brought about his ultimate demise with the Dodgers. If you recall, several months ago (in May I believe), Lilly told the Dodgers that he refused to make any more rehab starts in the minor leagues and basically told the Dodgers to ‘play me or trade me.’ This obviously did not sit well with Colletti or Dodger ownership. Lilly eventually recanted and agreed to do whatever the Dodgers wanted him to do and he eventually returned to the Dodger rotation for a couple of games before again having neck and back issues and returning to the DL.

Lilly reported tried this ‘play me or trade me’ tough-guy approach again a couple of weeks ago insisting that he was ready to return to the Dodgers and that he didn’t want to make any more rehab starts. The issue was apparently resolved (again) when Lilly told the club that he would be willing to accept a bullpen role rather than a starting role. In fact, Lilly came right out and said that he wasn’t sure that he could still go multiple innings but was confident that he could help the club as a reliever.

In spite of this concession by Lilly (if you can call it that), it put the Dodgers in an very awkward position. They were in the middle of a historic run from worst to first in the NL West because of a sudden burst of offense and because of a tremendously efficient and successful bullpen – a bullpen that already had two left-handers in it with another (Chris Capuano) likely to join it when right-hander Stephen Fife returns to the starting rotation (or the addition of another starter acquired by Colletti before the July 31 trade deadline). Adding Lilly to the bullpen would mean that someone would have to go and it would have to be someone who still had minor league options. This limited it to Paco Rodriguez, Jose Dominguez or Chris Withrow, all of whom have been doing exceptionally well and have proven themselves as being major league ready.

Even though the writing was on the wall with Ted Lilly, the Dodgers could not do anything with him while he was still on the DL. Those familiar with Dodger history will recall that Walter O’Malley released popular Dodger slugger Carl Furillo in 1960 while he was injured, which prompted the Dodger outfielder to file a lawsuit against the Dodgers the very next day – a lawsuit which he subsequently won (for a whopping $21,000). Unfortunately, Furillo’s lawsuit subsequently blackballed him from baseball, as no other team would sign him. This was well before the players’ union was established and would never fly today with the Collective Bargaining Agreement. (Trivia note – Carl Furillo eventually went to work for the Otis Elevator Company and helped installed the elevators in The World Trade Center).

With their backs against the wall and with Lilly basically holding a gun to their heads, the Dodgers activated Lilly from the DL (replacing Matt Kemp, who went back onto the DL), and then designated Lilly for assignment the next day, opting to eat the balance of his salary.

“It was really about how we could use (Ted) and how he would fit at that point,” said Dodger manager Don Mattingly when asked about the move prior to Friday night’s game. “It was nothing personal, it was not because of the fact that we don’t think he could pitch, but it’s hard for us just to blindly at this point during the season say ‘he can do it’ when we have no real feel for it. That was our biggest issue.”

This situation will undoubtedly occur again within the next couple of weeks when fireballer Jose Dominguez is ready to return from the DL for a quad strain. Chances are pretty good that unless recently acquired right-hander Carlos Marmol absolutely tears it up, he will most likely also be designated for assignment – for the second time in as many months. According to Mattingly, Dominguez is already throwing on flat ground and is on track to return from the DL after the minimum 15-days.

Will Carlos Marmol be the next Dodger to be DFA’d?
(Photo credit – Jon SooHoo)

Stay tuned…