Apparently Joel Zumaya didn't know who he was tonight, either.

Todd Jones saves Zumaya's ass. Ain't that rich?

Wow, Jake Peavy strikes out 9 in a row. One short of Seaver's MLB record of 10. The 10th batter? A walk which missed by an inch of being a 10th straight K.

Arggg. I can't believe that shit. Peavy pitches a gem and Hoffman loses it to a weak hitting SS. :mad:

And now you know why Jones is the closer. Experience > youth.

And talent+ability > experience, which is why Zumaya is a better pitcher than Jones despite Jones' status as the 'closer'.

Genetic looseness? Never heard that one before.

I have met some women who qualify as having genital looseness.

I'm sure Jim Leyland knows more about this than you do.

Peavy was a victim of the dreaded universal no-exceptions 120-pitch count limit that everyone seems to have arbitrarily agreed upon. A shame, because he was actually showing zero signs of fatigue.

Zumaya is a better pitcher than Todd Jones. "Experienced" closer is one of the most overvalued things in baseball, however. Add to that the fact that Leyland sticks with whatever role he gives a player until he absolutely has to make a change and that is why Zumaya isn't the closer yet.

Experience didn't help Bob Wickman when he gave up 4 runs in the 9th yesterday without getting an out. Experienced pitchers have bad nights, too. Talented pitchers have less bad nights.

Managers that stick with experience over talent is what costs teams ballgames.

This whole bloody sock thing is bizarre. It's not like the damn thing was thrown in the wash the next day - it's in the HoF! Why would someone (either Thorne or Mirabelli) lie about it?

The Giants have now won 7 in a row, despite the lowest OBP in baseball. The pitching has been Santana-esque, allowing an ERA below 3 in the streak.

Yeah, he does. That said, there are some tremendous pressures that have built up over the last 20 years or more to make it next very, very difficult for managers to buck the current "book" on how to manage your bullpen - i.e., closer is saved for 9th inning save situations, setup guys have to deal with critical situations that arise prior to the 8th inning (and many times in the 8th inning as well with closers thought of as 1-inning guys that have to be saved for the 9th).

The creation of the Save rule and it's acceptance as a valid and valued stat (which is a mistake) by those surrounding the game has created a culture that over values the current definition of "closer" while also creating expectations among players about how they are used. Buck that prevailing wisdom and you risk being 2nd guessed constantly (witness the experiments Boston has tried in the last few years with their bullpen roles and the resulting fallout). You also risk alienating players that expect certain usage, as well as pressure from agents who bank on their clients getting save chances they can then use to negotiate richer contracts.

Prior to the popularization of the Save rule and in particular LaRussa's development of heavily specialized bullpen roles, baseball wisdom dictated that your bullpen "ace" came in to critical situations as early as the 6th or 7th innings - closers often pitched 2-3 innings. Managers knew that critical game situations often happen earlier than the 9th inning, so it made sense to bring in your best reliever in those spots. Bases loaded, 1 out with your team up by a run in the 7th inning is a tougher spot than the start of the 9th inning up by 1 run when you start with nobody on base. All this stuff about the 9th inning having some kind of mystique is highly over rated - yeah, it may carry a little extra "oomph" because it's the last chance, but that difference gets wildly exaggerated by many.

Also exaggerated is the 'difficulty' of finding guys that can perform the closer role. If you have the stuff and perform well in the 7th and 8th innings, it's highly likely you'll do just as well in the 9th inning. Yeah, a few guys struggle with transition. But you also see examples all the time of mediocre pitchers that do a decent job as closers - Todd Jones being a prime example.

A savvy manager that also doesn't feel like fully bucking the current conventional wisdom about bullpen roles can do so by placing in key setup roles his most talented relievers so that they can deal with the high-leverage situations that arise in the 7th and 8th innings while setting the table for the closer to work a bases-empty situation in the 9th. This works best when the most talented reliever is a young pitcher and you have a vet that has been a closer for a while regardless of actual talent level - you can keep the young buck in the setup role because he hasn't yet "earned" the closer job, and if the "proven vet" does a good enough job you can keep the young buck from champing too hard at the bit at being promoted.

I would argue this is what Leyland is doing in Detroit - if you look at the numbers closely, Zumaya has been used in nearly as many high-leverage situations over the last 2 seasons as Jones has, and his performance has exceeded Jones in terms of contributing towards Tigers' wins. Bobby Cox may also be doing the same thing in Atlanta this year with Soriano and Gonzalez setting up Wickman - they are both clearly more talented pitchers than Wickman, but Wickman is the "proven vet". Given that Gonzalez has a year's experience as a closer and done the job well, I'm not sure how long Cox can keep him out of that role for the Braves, but as long as Wickman can get by with smoke and mirrors his plan is working. You could also argue that Hargrove was doing a similar thing in Seattle with Putz and Soriano setting up Guardado, but that didn't last long as Guardado couldn't get the job done and Putz was lights-out, forcing Hargrove's hand.

If you want to spend a little more time reading about this subject, here is a good jumping off point for discussion.

Holy crap, I'm not reading all that. :)

And another Blue Jay on the DL. Zaun out 6-8 weeks with a broken hand.

Glaus
Ryan
Johnson
Zaun

My head hurts.

Dawgfan, I nearly died of old age reading your save rant, but you still complete me.

Seriously, I have ranted about everything in there myself, almost word for word. I HATE HATE HATE HATE the fucking save/closer culture in MLB. It's almost complete nonsense. When I rule the world, I will get to ending hunger and human suffering in due time, but the first thing I'm tackling is the save rule. And by the way, no more of this "coming in with a three-run lead, give up two runs, and still get credited with a save" crap. You can kiss that goodbye mere seconds after I'm in power.

After that I'll tackle the "every pitcher gets tired at the 120-pitch mark with no exceptions, and any manager that allows a guy to throw 121 is fired" accepted wisdom.

Short answer is yes, Leyland knows more about managing a team than I do, and I think his use of Zumaya in a setup role to handle all the tough 7th and 8th inning situations that arise is his way of subtly bucking the current save rule/closer culture in effect in baseball. Just because he has Jones slotted as the "closer" and Zumaya as the top "setup" guy doesn't mean he doesn't think Zumaya is the better pitcher...

Some things require a detailed explanation to do them justice. It's one of my pet peeves with modern short attention-span culture, but I'm 37, so I guess that makes me a geezer and grumpiness on this issue is allowed.

Yeah, I don't think every pitcher should be held to this rule. Knuckleballers for obvious reasons (there's not as much strain on the arm throwing primarily knucklers), and vet pitchers that have displayed good endurance and healthy arms (Randy Johnson being a prime example).

That said, there's evidence that throwing 120+ pitches at the very least leads to less effective outings the next time out, and at worst, doing so chronically could be damaging to a pitcher's health, especially younger pitchers.

I think we can agree that rigid thinking is a bad thing.

This is quality. :)

I agree. I think both guys are very important and its a great setup as long as Jones can still get guys out.

Ouch. A little dig at those of us who don't feel like reading long posts. I suppose what you have to say is really important and I should pay you more attention. :rolleyes:

Seriously, why reply with 6 paragraphs to a conversation that previously was a sentence or two?

I already answered that question - some issues, to do them justice, require elaboration. To do otherwise is to short-change meaningful discussion. I don't really care whether you pay more attention to my position or not - that's your choice. But I'm not going to apologize for providing a thought-out post on this subject (or any subject really).

Heaven forbid somebody reply with reasoning and the logic they've used behind it to back it up. Fine if you don't want to read it, but why call out somebody for not just voicing an opinion, but giving people a glimpse into why their opinion is that way, potentially opening doors for further civil discussion into the matter. Provided it's not a 6 page rant full of name calling, why not as opposed to why?

When you made a stupid statement, Dawgfan explained to you repeatedly why you were wrong, and took the patience to do it a lot more nicely than I (or a few others here) would have. Having the attention span of a 10-year old isn't always a good thing.

I think you do care, otherwise you wouldn't have mentioned the short attention-span culture. And I'm not looking for an apology.

Amusingly enough, Zumaya's LI is fairly close to Jones' - but probably for the wrong reasons. Someday, somewhere, a manager will have the balls to use his best reliever in the highest leverage situations, paying fuck all attention to saves. I'm guessing it won't happen for a while, though Terry Francona has shown an admirable tendency towards doing so.

As I said, our short attention-span culture is a pet peeve of mine. That doesn't mean I care much whether you pay attention to me or not.

Yeah, what's too bad is that Leyland probably has as much leverage as any manager out there to buck this trend, both given his history of bullpen usage (didn't always have a defined "closer" in Pittsburgh) and his success as a manager.

I'd say Oakland would be a likely spot to see this trend bucked, except that Beane has profited from taking OK pitchers, putting them in a closer role where they can rack up saves and drive up their value and then dealing them before the cost gets too high for Oakland to keep and to profit off of that value inflation. Leave it to Beane to figure out a way to make the "closer culture" work to his advantage.

I was going to question this part, but it would look like I had something against you. I don't, so I'll just sneak out of the thread. :)

Question all you want - I love a good debate. Really, I rarely take anything personally on message boards, so we're good. If my theory here is wrong, I'd love to know it - knowing the truth is far more important to me than never being proven wrong.

Ok, that's cool then. I am not aware of Beane turning an OK pitcher into a closer, outside of Izzy. I did not think the motivation of that move was to "rack up saves and drive up their value and then dealing them before the cost gets too high for Oakland". If you've seen otherwise, an example would be great. I remember Koch, Dotel and Foulke were already closers when they came to Oakland.

Billy Taylor before him, Billy Koch after him, Keith Foulke was extracted, to say nothing about Hudson Street (who's probably the 3rd best reliever in the A's pen - IMO, the Duke is no 1). A closer like Mariano Riviera, Joe Nathon or Papelbon is brilliant - but 80% of the league's closers are fairly fungible.

Billy Taylor and Jason Isringhausen were my primary examples. Billy Koch was churned for Keith Foulke. Foulke was part of another strategy of Beane's - to let type A free agents walk so as to get draft pick compensation. Octavio Dotel was primarily a setup guy in Houston, as was Arthur Rhodes in Seattle, and though neither of those moves worked out as Beane had hoped I think they also fit his ideas of slotting a non-closer (or obscure pitcher) into the role to inflate their value for trade purposes or free agent draft pick compensation.

I would also agree that Street is probably not Oakland's top reliever, though placing him in that role (IMO) was a deviation from previous strategies by Beane.

I agree that he let them walk for the pick after their playoff run. Most closers aren't worth what they want. I think Taylor was the Oakland closer already when Beane took over. But putting in some "OK" pitcher in the 9th to drive up their save totals for trade value seems kind of cooky to me. Especially in a pennant race.

Well you don't want to sabotage a playoff race by putting in someone incapable of doing the job, which is why the A's didn't stick with Rhodes or Dotel for very long when they struggled in the role.

That said, I still think there is a lot of evidence to suggest that the value of saves is over rated, and I think Beane is smart enough to take that inflation of value and make it work to his advantage. That's really what Moneyball was all about - Beane finding things in the game that are over inflated and under valued and recognizing those trends before other teams do so as to maximize his limited payroll.

Giants sweep Dodgers in LA for their 8th straight win. All tied atop the division.

All is good in the world. Armando got 3 straight savers. I'm not sure that hell hasn't started offering ski trips yet.

SWEEP! Glad we could return the favor.

Nice sweep, especially without Zito and Cain pitching. Ortiz really struggled early, but nutted up and gave his team a chance to win.

Not only that, two of them were of the 1-2-3 inning variety. Trade him now :)

Ortiz was a dying liner from real trouble in the inning he escaped with the bases loaded. It's strange...I don't care about the Giants or Ortiz, but I root for him to fail because I don't see any reason why he does well. Same with Wang - although being on the Yankees is reason enough for me to want him to fail.

Zumaya disagrees with anyone who thinks he should be the closer:


"The Tigers were rained out Thursday night, but for Joel Zumaya, there'd been a previous damper.

Specifically, he came face-to-face with being too full of himself -- and with the reality of not being ready for what over-eager fans want his role to be.

"I can tell you I'm not ready to be the closer," he said. "I have a lot to learn. When it comes, it comes, but I'm not in any hurry because I'm not ready yet."

Anyone remember the last time Rivera was pulled from a game?

This is so great.

I love seeing the yankees get crushed

Man, I can't remember the last time a Let's Go Red Sox chant was heard at Yankee Stadium and NOT completely covered by boos and "Lets go Yankees" chants.

I still have to think that they will come back, eventually.

I'd be much happier if they were still struggling like this by June 1. I wonder if Steinbrenner is going to make a change to shake things up. Even though the pitching isn't necessarily Torre's fault, he has done a terrible job over the years managing the bullpen, plus this year the team just seems out of synch and uninspired. I'm betting he wished he had let him go at the end of the season last year.

So when does Torre get fired?

C'mon, this is a baseball thread. It's a place for slow, deliberate things ;)

SI

All this talk about Joel Zumaya makes me want to see if he'll autographed a Guitar Hero II guitar, thereby creating the coolest (ok, nerdiest) sports memorabilia piece ever :D

SI

Ouch. The Yankees starter get hit with a line drive on the very first pitch of the game right on the leg, and only can pitch to one more batter. The Yankees hopes are pinned on Kei Igawa