Lowe-light?

Baseball Musings has provided space for an article by Phil Allard about the Dodgers starting rotation. The Dodgers' signing of Lowe last month to a 4-year, $36 million contract, along with the Kent and Drew deals, has had people scratching their heads ever since. Jon Weisman and Jaffe discussed it, and other things, at some length.

Michael Lichtman, who's done a lot of research and hard work on measuring defense and is now a consultant to the St. Louis Cardinals, had this to say a couple of days before that:

The weakest (and most controversial) move by far, and that is an understatement, is Lowe’s signing. Funny I thought he was going to be underrated (since he had an unlucky regular season in ‘04) and able to be had for a bargain. I don’t know what happened. Lowe should benefit from a very good Dodger IF defense. There is also some evidence that groundball pitchers do anomalously well in Chavez (and Fenway, BTW); I am pretty sure that Depo knows this. I have a hard time believing that even if true (that Lowe will benefit greatly from Chavez), it makes Lowe worth anywhere near 9 mil a year for four years. If Lowe even has a little bit of bad luck or a severe injury, Depo is setting himself up for a crucifixion.

And over at Baseball Primer, the Primates discussed it, mostly thoughtfully, for two pages.

It'll be very interesting to see what sort of light this season throws on the judgement of Dodgers' GM Paul Depodesta.