Kyle Lohse a Potential Replacement for Hudson?

With Tim Hudson now out of the picture, the Braves will boast one of the youngest starting staffs in all of baseball. It’s scary to think that at this point the Braves would walk into opening day with the oldest starting pitcher currently on their roster at 28 years of age (Kris Medlen). However, Frank Wren has not been shy about the team’s hopes of adding a solid veteran starter who could provide some leadership to a rotation who may need some after the subtractions of Hudson, Paul Maholm and even Freddy Garcia.

The lack of a real suitable replacement on the free agent market had led Wren to turn his sights to possible trade candidates, and while the greed in us fans would love to make a run at David Price, what the Rays are looking for in return seem to be way to much for the Braves to really want to pull the trigger on such a deal. With that being said , the Brewers have appeared to make both Kyle Lohse and Yovani Gallardo available around the league. These asking prices will be much lower than for a former Cy Young award winner like Price. Gallardo is coming off of the worst season of his career and doesn’t seem to be drawing much interest, however the 35 year old Lohse seems to be a perfect fit for a rotation looking for some depth and some leadership.

Lohse has pitched in the bigs for 12 years and hold a career 4.35 ERA. However, over the past few seasons Lohse has become a staple in any rotation he has been in. In his last 3 seasons, he has started at least 30 games and posted ERA’s of under 3.40 in each year and had a career year in 2012 when he went 16-3 with a 2.86 ERA for the St. Louis Cardinals. He was also the starting and winning pitcher in the Wild Card game that knocked the Braves out of the playoffs in 2012. Last season was also very productive for Lohse when he posted a 3.35 ERA for a lack luster team in Milwaukee. He has two years left on his contract which would take him to his 37 year old season and would allow the Braves to let him go after that deal is done similar to how they just handled Tim Hudson. That two year bridge would also allow the young starters of this team to mature into veterans themselves.

Oh and to sell you a little more on the idea of Kyle Lohse, in his career at Turner Field Kyle boasts a 3-0 record with a 2.53 ERA including a complete game shutout last season and a post season win as well. This is an addition that Frank Wren should really look into that would help heal the wounds of the subtractions we have suffered over the last week.