It is Opening Day and I wanted to explain the thinking that went into the final decisions concerning our roster coming out of Spring Training. The biggest question that we had was whether to go with 11 or 12 pitchers. Throughout the last two weeks Grady, the big league staff, Ned and the front office staff went back and forth as to what was best. In the end we decided to go with 12 pitchers and give Grady the ability to exploit matchups late in the game with a lead (shorten the game, if you will).

Unfortunately, it was Oscar Robles, who did such a good job for us last year and had a good spring, whose spot on the team was eliminated. Our other competition during the spring was for our fifth starting pitcher, which was won by Jae Seo. What the spring showed us is that we have better Major League ready depth in our system than we did last year. The biggest reason is that our young prospects have had an additional year to mature and are now starting to reach Triple-A. In addition to Robles, we can call on D.J. Houlton, who showed marked improvement during Spring Training; James Loney who had a great spring; Russell Martin; Chad Billingsley who was very impressive in his first big league camp; Andre Ethier, who we obtained from Oakland in the Milton Bradley deal; and Joel Guzman, whom we shifted to left field and has immense potential.

We can also choose from veterans such as Kelly Wunsch, Joe Beimel, Japanese import Takashi Saito and Aaron Sele. The thing to remember is that while we start the season with 25 men, a Major League roster is always a work in progress. If, for instance, our starting pitchers consistently work deep into games and the 12th pitcher isn’t used much, we can send a pitcher out and recall a position player. Mentally, a person in my position works from a 30- to 35-man roster — the 25 in the big leagues and the five to 10 players in Triple-A (or even Double-A) who are primed to help the big league club.

It is a great honor to make the Opening Day roster and a huge mental blow to those who don’t. However a Major League roster is in constant flux and most, if not all of the names previously mentioned will probably be playing in Dodger Stadium before the year is out.