Who Should Replace Vicente Padilla?

With the news that Vicente Padilla has been sidelined with a strained forearm and will hit the 15-day DL, the question becomes who will replace him in the Dodgers rotation? Who will Joe Torre and Rick Honeycutt deem worthy enough to replace our venerable Number 4 1/2 starter?

First, confirmation from the Dodgers that Padilla is Padidown (/wah wah), and a fairly troubling quote from Vicente:

"I can't even throw right now," Padilla said, declining to speculate on the severity of the injury.

The choices at their disposal, currently up in the bigs:

• Ramon Ortiz
• Jon Link, recalled to replace Padilla
• Carlos Monasterios

A few more choices, currently at AAA:

• James McDonald
• Scott Elbert
• Josh Lindblom
• Josh Towers
  

Eric Stults, where for art thou, Eric Stults? Oh yeah, you're turning Japanese. And Jeff Weaver, who would have undoubtedly gotten the spot-start, is DL'd with a bad back.

Two excellent rundowns of the options come from Mike Scioscia's Tragic Illness, who fears we'll see Josh Towers (who I had thankfully forgotten about), and Eric Stephen at True Blue L.A., who prognosticates Elbert could get the call. One thing that's for sure: we're all just hoping it's not Ramon Ortiz.

If I were to guess, and that's all it really is, a guess, I would rank these gentlemen, in likelihood of getting the start:

1. Ramon Ortiz
2. Josh Towers
3. Scott Elbert
4. Josh Lindblom
5. James McDonald
6. Link/Monasterios
   

Whoever it is (and there is the possibility of rain in New York or Torre deciding to run a 4-man rotation for a short amount of time) the chosen one only needs to realistically go 5 innings or into the 6th, and not get completely shellacked.

I'm fairly positive they all can do it once or twice, but I'll admit it, I'm terrified of a Ramon Ortiz start. Josh Towers doesn't make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside either, but they're both veterans, so it will more than likely be one of them getting the ball handed to them in New York next week.

Still, my vote, if I had one, would go to James McDonald. Then Scott Elbert. Somehow, I think Josh Towers would get the bronze from me. I guess it's because he kind of reminds me of Dave Bush. And that is........well, it's something alright.