When Dodgers manager Don Mattingly confirmed on Sunday that left-hander Hyun-jin Ryu will be activated from the 15-day disabled list and will be starting Wednesday’s game against the Mets at Citi Field, it put into motion a series of events.

First and foremost, it moves left-hander Paul Maholm and his troublesome 5.40 ERA out of the Dodgers starting rotation and into the bullpen, where he was initially slated to be since day-one of spring training. The upside is that with Paco Rodriguez having already been optioned to Triple-A Albuquerque, Maholm once again gives the Dodgers a much needed second lefty in the pen, thus taking a huge burden off the shoulders of J.P. Howell. The trade off, of course, is that somebody has to go to make room for Ryu on the Dodgers 25-man roster and there is only one option available… literally – to option hard-throwing right-hander Chris Withrow back to Triple-A.

Chris Withrow isn’t off by much, but he is definitely off and a little time back in the minors could do him and the Dodgers a world of good. (Photo credit – Jon SooHoo)

As every Dodger fan knows, Withrow was lights out for the Dodgers in the early goings this season. He held the team’s best bullpen ERA for over six weeks and put out a lot of fires that helped preserve several Dodger victories. Unfortunately, he created a number of those fires himself by walking 18 batters in 20.2 innings pitched. On several occasions he walked the bases loaded but was able to pitch himself out of those jams. That being said, most Dodger fans felt that it was only a matter of time before Withrow’s luck would run out – and it did.

In Saturday night’s 18-7 massacre, Withrow allowed five runs on four hits and walked two (both of which scored) in his 1.2 innings of work. When the smoke finally cleared, Withrow’s once team-leading 0.95 ERA had jumped to 3.05 – still very good but a direct result of his inability to throw strikes.

On the bright side Withrow has struck out 28, more than any other Dodger reliever not named Kenley Jansen and giving him a Kershaw-like K/9 ratio of 12.2. On the not so bright side his BB/9 ratio is a ghastly 7.8. This coupled with the fact that Withrow is the only Dodger reliever who still has options makes him the odds-on favorite to be the one who goes on Wednesday.

As much as Dodger fans would like to see Withrow remain, the painful truth is that he needs to work on his command and control, and the best place to do this is at Albuquerque or Chattanooga, not at Dodger Stadium or any other major league ballpark. Some time away from the intense pressure of the Bigs could be exactly what the 25-year-old Austin, TX native needs to get back on track.

There are a couple of other possibilities, however; and to be quite honest they are far more appealing to Dodger fans than shipping the very popular Withrow back to Triple-A. The first would be for the Dodgers to designate Maholm for assignment (and eat the remainder of his $1 million contract) and the second would be to place Brian Wilson on the disabled list for a yet-to-be-determined injury. Closer Kenley Jansen also has options remaining but it is inconceivable that the Dodgers would send him down to Triple-A.

As noted by Eric Stephen over at True Blue LA, if the Dodgers were planning to DFA Maholm they probably would have already done so in order to call up Jose Dominguez or Paco Rodriguez to lend an arm to a very overworked Dodgers bullpen. As for Wilson, both Mattingly and Dodgers general manager Ned Colletti refuse to acknowledge that Wilson in all probability really is hurt, yet they keep running him out there hoping (and wishing) that he will magically returns to the Brian Wilson of late 2013 – the one that they signed to a one-year/$10 million contract (with an $8.5 million player option for 2015) during the off-season.

Although the Wilson move makes the most sense, the likely move will be optioning Withrow to Albuquerque.

…but then, the way things have been going for the Dodgers lately, Wednesday is still light-years away and anything can happen between now and then.

Stay tuned…