Friday, October 1, 2010

Rooting for Shawn Hill

Former National sinker-baller, frequent James Andrews patient, and all-around good guy Shawn Hill made a brief return to the major leagues over the last few weeks, and fans of Hill will be glad to know he did very well.

Hill is pitching for the Toronto Blue Jays, where new GM Alex Anthopoulos and AGM Dana Brown, both formerly of the Nationals/Expos organization, happily scooped Hill up off the scrap heap for a minor league deal back in January.

In four starts and 20 and 2/3 innings, Hill displayed the impressive skill set that made him a legitimate #2 starter in 2007. He pounded the strike zone, allowing just 4 walks, and generated ground balls on 49.3% of balls in play. He's mixing in a change-up more and throwing the sinker a bit less, but the results are similar.

I'll always be rooting for Hill because he was such a happy surprise in 2007, and also because he was hosed so badly by the team after he won in arbitration and the team cut him just to save a couple hundred thousand, despite the fact that Hill is exactly the kind of low-risk, high-reward veteran a team like the Nationals should be targeting.

4 comments:

An Briosca Mor said...

When was Alex Anthopoulos ever part of the Nationals front office?

Steven said...

back in the expos days. post edited to be more precise.

Dryw Loves the Nats said...

Thanks for the update. I also am very glad to see Shawn doing well. I will continue to cheer him on!

ff said...

Just bitter because you were wrong on Hill. The team doesn't need him. The guy wasn't all that great to begin with when he was healthy, but he was rarely healthy. The team should be moving on from guys like him, Patterson, Wang