In her recent article entitled Pitching the priority for Astros in Vegas, beat writer Alyson Footer says:

Ben Sheets is being considered, although he set off alarm bells when he hurt his elbow last season and was unable to help the Brewers during the postseason.

Four sentences later, she goes on to say:

The Astros will not give up draft picks in order to sign a Type A free agent, so don't look for them to pursue any players of that magnitude who were offered arbitration by their original teams.

Well, the Brewers offered arbitration to Sheets, a Type A free agent, which, according to the second quote means that the Astros won't be signing him.  But the first quote seems to indicate that he's still in the running. 

So which is it?  My guess is that Sheets is off our radar now, and the odds are higher that he will take the Brewers up on their offer, and try to capitalize on the free agent market next year, when he hopefully doesn't end the season with an injury and the economy is hopefully better.

But if starting pitching is still a priority, and we're long shots for Wolf, and we won't sign Type A's who were offered arbitration, who will we be targeting? 

Well, we're not the only ballclub to not offer arbitration to their Type A free agents.  On the starting pitching front, the non-arbitration-Type A's include Jamie Moyer (the 46-year old Phillie we heard a lot about back in October) and Braden Looper (Cardinals).  Each guy has the potential to eat up innings at a "pretty good" level of quality, but each carries their own risks.  Moyer's age is definitely a concern even though he's been very consistent over the last 5 years.  And Looper has been a reliever for most of his career, only starting games in the last two years, so it's hard to say how reliable he will be.  What will these guys cost?  I'm not really sure, but they probably won't be found in the bargain bin.  Do they really want to leave the ballclubs they are on now?  Moyer would like to stay with the Phils, but he also wants a multi-year deal.  The Cardinals' beat writer sees Looper leaving.  

[As a sidenote, the Astros have been linked to former-Astro, current-Cardinal reliever Russ Springer, a Type A who did not receive an arbitration offer.  Speculation is that if we signed him, he'd essentially be a replacement for Brocail.  I loved Springer when he was here, so that rumor is intriguing.  One of the reasons he went to St. Louis is because his son has autism and they liked the school he was attending there.  Now, his son receives treatment in Louisiana, and Springer is considering retirement so that he can spend more time with his family.  Whatever he chooses, I wish him the best of luck.]

If the economics of offering Wolf arbitration were no good, though, then it's very possible that the payroll situation is worse than we imagined.  This means that we probably should not hold out hope of acquiring solid starting pitching through free agency.  The best we can hope for is another $2-4 million gamble on a rehab project. 

That still leaves open the possibility that we can obtain starting pitching through the trade market.  I know some people are still holding out hope for Jake Peavy.  For that to happen, Ed Wade would first have to cross his fingers and hope that another team will give us prospects for Valverde and Wigginton that he can then trade to the Padres.  Then, Wade would somehow have to convince McLane that Peavy is like the second-coming of Roger Clemens and that he should get the money for his contract from whatever magic pocket he went to for the Rocket.  What are the odds?  Probably not good.  

So what other options might we have?  Well, Wade can kill two birds with one stone and try trimming payroll by trading Wigginton or Valverde for cheap starting pitching.  Wade loves Valverde, and has indicated more than once that he'd like to see him in a Houston uniform for a long time, and Richard Justice has framed the Wolf arbitration decision as a choice between Wolf and Valverde.  And Wade chose Valverde.  So between Wiggy and Papa Grande, it is more likely that Ty would be traded.

Could trading Wigginton actually yield cheap starting pitching?  Well, to get him, we gave up a darn good reliever who was having an off-year (Dan Wheeler).  Out in the marketplace, cheap, good starting pitching is more valuable than good relief pitching, so we might not see a great return in terms of starting pitchers.   

There's a lot of things that could happen between now and opening day.  What options are out there?  Who needs a 3B?  What about Randy Johnson?  I'm pessimistic that we'll see any great changes, but the Winter Meetings start tomorrow (Dec. 3) and baseball is full of surprises, so we'll just have to wait and see what happens.