That sucks. Always liked the guy, mouth herpes and all. Wouldn't be surprised if he came back next year or the year after and had a decent 2-3 year run.
No doubt. I know you'll hate this, but one of the (many, many, some sillier than other) reasons Luhnow gave for keeping him down was so he could get some reps in RF. If they had a halfway tolerable RFer they may have moved Fowler to LF when they brought him up. I dunno though.
