Volstad Earns His Demotion

It takes a lot for Fredi Gonzalez to be exasperated, but that was the case on Friday night when cameras zoomed at him in the second inning.

Chris Volstad started the first game of a three-game set against the Padres, and he stunk as usual.

After a good first inning, he fell apart in the second inning by giving up four straight hits to start the inning, which included a two-run home run that gave the Padres a 3-0 lead.

With two outs in the second inning, Volstad could not get that elusive third out after giving up couple of more hits and giving free bases to couple of Padres.

Two walks in a row to the Padres ninth and tenth batter was enough for Gonzalez to take Volstad out of the game, and Volstad's outing was the shortest of his career.

Volstad gave up six runs on six hits in one and two-thirds innings on this night. A pitcher has to be awful to give up that many runs and hits against an anemic hitting team in the Padres, but that's what happened with Volstad.

Volstad paid for his awful performance by being assigned to the minors after the game.

It was a move the Marlins needed to make.

It's one thing to be patient with young starters, but at some point, a starter needs to perform, and Volstad was not doing that in recent months.

Quite frankly, Volstad has been horrible for most of the season after a good season last year.

He is either great or lousy, and when he is great, it's only once a month.

Right now, nothing was working for him, and management owes it to the players to go find someone else that can get the job done.

Rick VandenHurk shouldn't have been demoted to the minors in the first place. VandenHurk did well enough for him to stay in the rotation, which is something Volstad can't even say.

At least, the Marlins will bring VandenHurk back in the rotation.

Here's the lowdown on Volstad:

His ERA is 5.03, and his ERA is 9.61 after five August starts.

He gave up 21 earned runs in 19 2/3 innings this month.

He can't complete five innings of work anymore. For the fourth time in five outings, he failed to complete five innings.

When a starter keeps doing that, it takes a toll on the bullpen.

Why should the Marlins keep running him out there every fifth day?

This was a no-brainer.

Volstad must have seen that coming based on Gonzalez's rare disgust.