Not so long ago in a land not so far away, the New York Mets had a nice promising pitcher named John Maine who made decent waves through his mid-20s as a starter who threw could keep a sub-4 ERA. Health issues ensued and the breakdown began. Now at age 30, Maine is looking for a place to land.
↵Major League Baseball is full of these stories every off-season and the Kansas CIty Royals just took a flier on one last year with Jeff Francis (which worked out fairly well given the next-to-nothing expectations). Maine is still young and KC provides the ideal environment to have guaranteed playing time and a low pressure environment to come back to the majors. Maine's 2010 season was a forgettable one with only 9 starts and a 6.13 ERA. But that's two runs higher than any of his previous seasons and he's a risk worth taking.
↵The Royals are going to need at least three new starters in the rotation to be competitive in the AL Central and now they've added one with Sanchez. Bringing in Maine could add a low-cost, low-risk addition who could work out quite well at the back-end of a rotation.