dodgers.com: Dodgers cut left-hander Estes

PHOENIX—With the fifth-starter competition eating up diminishing innings, the Dodgers trimmed the list of contenders Sunday by cutting veteran left-hander Shawn Estes.

The club also reassigned knuckleball specialist Charlie Haeger, who will start at Triple-A Albuquerque. Estes was offered a chance to do the same but said he hasn’t decided whether to accept, take his release and seek employment elsewhere or retire.

“I didn’t expect to have this option today,” the 36-year-old said. “It’s disappointing and a little shocking, to be honest. I still feel I’ve got a lot left in the tank, I’ve got the stuff to get big league hitters out and still feel I can be a starter.”

Estes pitched two scoreless innings Saturday, then couldn’t get out of a third inning, allowing a pair of runs. He has an 8.44 ERA in five Major League exhibition games, allowing 19 hits in 10 2/3 innings and a .380 opponents batting average.

“We’re at a point where we had to start separating people and we don’t have enough innings,” Dodgers manager Joe Torre said.

Torre listed the ever-changing group of fifth-starter candidates as James McDonald, Eric Milton, Eric Stults and Claudio Vargas. McDonald stepped to the front of that group with three hitless innings Saturday after an otherwise undistinguished Spring Training.

Estes said he believed his experience put him at least on par with Milton as a front-runner. He said he was told of the decision in a meeting Sunday with Torre, pitching coach Rick Honeycutt and club officials Kim Ng and DeJon Watson. He later met with club officials Rick Ragazzo and Bill Mueller and after that met with general manager Ned Colletti.