I don't know whether this will make it into the link dump later today or not, but it's really got me thinking.  According to Yahoo's recap of yesterday's game, Macha approached Scutaro about filling in for Kendall if he gets suspended:

C Adam Melhuse got the start to give a day off to Jason Kendall, who had been getting days off on the starting day of RHP Esteban Loaiza. Manager Ken Macha spoke to Melhuse, who said he caught Kirk Saarloos the most during his 39 games played in 2005. Macha also was anticipating a suspension for Kendall, who charged the mound after nearly being hit by a pitch from John Lackey, triggering a bench-clearing fight Tuesday against the Angels. "I'm going to say there's going to be a suspension. I asked (Marco) Scutaro if he could catch and he started saying something in Spanish I couldn't understand," Macha said.

Now, I'm sure that many of you dismissed this as some kind of (thin) form of humor.  Bear with me for a minute as I demonstrate that the only flaw with this idea is that it doesn't go far enough!

First of all, consider the advantages.  With Scutaro catching, we know that we will always have him in the lineup to deliver those clutch hits that he mysteriously seems to find with the game on the line.  

Second, the chances of getting a home run from our catcher would increase dramatically.  In fact, assuming identical production this year as last, the ratio of expected Scooter homers to expected Kendall homers is so large that it is undefined!

There are even more compelling reasons to use Scutaro as our catcher.  Might not his mysterious ability to come through in the clutch also translate into defensive skill?  With Scutaro calling games for our pitchers, we might very well see an increase in critical strikeouts from our bullpen and rotation.  Not only that, he might actually throw out a baserunner or two.  

Now, I'm sure some of you are thinking, "But has Scooter every actually been a catcher?  Could he handle a new position?"  Let me point out that Scooter has played practically every other position, already.  He's played in both the infield and outfield and handled the job okay.  
If we have any player who is flexible enough to make the switch to Catcher, it is the player whose name starts with "Marco" and ends with "Scutaro."

However, having carefully considered this option, I have come to the conclusion that it has one fatal flaw: it doesn't go far enough.  Sure Kendall hasn't been as hot as we would have liked.  But he does an adequate job and we have a far more glaring hole: our starting rotation.

Now, several players have made the switch from pitching to hitting and vice-versa and a few have done so successfully.  Given his amazing flexibility and renowned clutchiness, why not give Scutaro a shot at the #5 spot?  (Clearly, Saarloos is our #4).  He certainly couldn't perform worse than Loaiza and this would allow us to save a roster spot.  Since Scutaro could split time between the pitching mound and second base, we could still spell Ellis occasionally and also bring up Jeremy Brown to be our catcher.  For that matter, we could give Perez more opportunities to show his stuff.

While I'm sure there will be objections to this very sensible and straightforward change, I really only see one remaining difficulty:

Is it possible that it would be even better to make Scutaro the manager?