• decide that the best the club can do at second base is to platoon Goins and Diaz and at least have good defence there; you get a back-up middle infielder out of this as well and can give Reyes the occasional day off
  
• decide that the club needs a right-handed back-up OF who can play centerfield, promote either Mastroianni or Pillar and send Gose back down
• decide that one is comfortable giving the ball to Dickey, Buehrle and Hutchison for 6 innings plus most starts, but take the radical view that one is not comfortable with any other pitcher at hand and run two tandems out of the other two slots (I would do Stroman and Nolin for one and either McGowan or Redmond and Happ for the other)

To make the tandem happen, you need to make clear that the whole notion of "pitcher wins" is antiquated and leads to gross misuse of pitching resources.  It made sense when pitchers completed most of their starts, retained some value when pitchers completed 1/2 or even 1/3 of their starts, but now it is just a relic of another time.  So, a pitcher in the tandem gets the ball for two times through the order maximum and that's it.  If the pitcher has thrown 4 innings, 70 pitches, and a shutout, he gets a warm handshake for a job well done.  If both pitchers throw well, you will get a complete game.   You have a five man bullpen: long man, two lefties, set-up man, ace.  

It does not have to be fixed in stone.  You might decide by late July that Stroman (for instance) is ready for 6 innings consistently. 

With the office firing, I too agree that a Goins/Diaz defence first platoon at 2B would probably be in our best interest. Hopefully The both find some quick success down at Buffalo and are back soon.

I think we have to remember that McGowan hasn't started for six years and a little patience on his return to the role is probably prudent.

Yes, you missed 2 occasions where he was unfathomably the starting DH against LHP.

In earlier days, the accomplishments of Galarraga, Bichette and Castilla were overrated, and the effects of Coors were not properly valuated, at least in the mainstream. Now the pendulum has likely swung too far the other way, and the accomplishments of Larry Walker and, perhaps, Tulowitzki may well go underrated. Were Tulowitzki playing for any other team, I think he would be a star player that mainstream fans would well know.

Is that a courtesy so that he can get his inning or so of work in and then ice down and then return to his hotel at his discretion? (rather than forcing him to sit around watching a game he doesn't care about just to get some work in in the 9th inning)