Originally Posted by
Guacarock
Sign me up for the Scrap Irony plan, calling for the Reds to target the Giants' Sergio Romo as our next closer. Scrap Irony actually proposed that we work a blockbuster with the Giants over the winter, trading Brandon Phillips and Drew Stubbs for Romo, Freddy Sanchez and Eric Surkamp.
Regardless of whether we pursue that particular mega-deal, we ought to set our sights on Romo. He's definitely closer material with a 1.60 ERA this season, 56 strikeouts in 39.1 IP and only two home runs allowed over that span. If he wasn't operating under the shadow of Brian Wilson, we'd all be hearing a lot more about him.
The Giants are notoriously tightfisted about trading away arms, but given their offensive collapse this season, they're going to need to back off that hardline stance. Seems like we ought to be able to pry away Romo, at least. He's not a starter, or their closer, so if we dangle the right bat(s) in the right deal, he could be our successor to Cordero.
He's doubly appealing because he would be a cheap solution to this problem, and his arrival would allow the Reds to seriously entertain moving Chapman back into the rotation, thus potentially helping us to shore up another one of our weaknesses. If Chapman proves he can't pitch deep into games, no sweat. He can then go back to the pen to set up for Romo or compete for the closer's job himself. I'm not going to argue Chapman has to be a starter to be an effective pitcher for us, only that we have enough invested in him to give it a try and see where that leads.