I mean it had to be done. My love/hate for Bauer has been well documented around here but with every remaining game virtually a must-win, you have to go with the 5 guys who give you the best chance to win on any given night. Bauer can come out and completely shut a team down, sure, but he can also come out and give up 7 earned in 2 innings and suck the life out of your bullpen that night AND for following game. He has one of those outings at this point in the season, that’d be curtains for 2015. Anderson and Tomlin have much lower ceilings, but much lower floors as we sit here today. You can’t risk a Bauer blowup with 17 left.

I really hope his relationship is as good with Mickey as everyone says it is. Getting pulled from the rotation could be detrimental to the development of a kid like Bauer.

Make sure to stay glued to @BauerOutage’s twitter timeline though. I’m nervous.