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The Greatest Game Ever Played
| Edgy DC Jul 22 2010 07:23 AM |
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10/15/1986.
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| seawolf17 Jul 22 2010 07:49 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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Could you imagine? Especially getting only five innings out of the starter? Jerry would have burnt the entire pen by the tenth, and we would have been stuck with Raul Valdes. Yikes.
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| LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr Jul 22 2010 09:29 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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I can't look at that box too long. It makes me too sad at the moment.
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| Edgy DC Jul 22 2010 09:35 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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Think also about 10/1/85. Johnson got all he could out of Darling, then went to his closer for two innings. Gorgeous.
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| batmagadanleadoff Jul 22 2010 09:47 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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Or Game six of the '86 WS. Granted, the Buckner game wasn't a long extra inning affair (10 inn), but Ojeda lasted six innings in game six. Davey used his bullpen aces (McDowell and Orosco) right away, and ended with Aguilera. The idea that Davey would hold back either of his aces for when a save situation might have presented itself was unthinkable.
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| Edgy DC Jul 22 2010 09:50 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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Well, that was at Shea, where the top of the ninth is the last chance to earn a save, and I'm looking at games on the road, but yes, truly.
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| LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr Jul 22 2010 09:56 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played Edited 1 time(s), most recently on Jul 22 2010 10:00 AM |
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Backwards, no? The chances for road saves in extra innings abound. (The very reason for Manuel's... um... tactics.)
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| batmagadanleadoff Jul 22 2010 09:58 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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Yeah. What about that?
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| HahnSolo Jul 22 2010 10:14 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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I agree with Edgy 100%, but that was pre-Larussa, pre-Eck. Jesse and McDowell routinely went into games as early as the 7th inning all season, and pitched multiple innings on many occasions.
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| Edgy DC Jul 22 2010 10:32 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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I constructed my sentence and/or placed my commas poorly and meant to refer to home as the place where the save dies after the top of the ninth.
Yeah, but I'm referring specifically here to holding the top reliever out of extra-inning games completely until the save situation appears. It's costing us games.
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| Benjamin Grimm Jul 22 2010 10:57 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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I agree that the strategy is horribly flawed. But the top reliever hasn't been so "top" lately, so it probably hasn't mattered as much in the last couple of weeks.
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| metirish Jul 22 2010 10:57 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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When did this practice become the exception? We see it and it drives us crazy . What really grinds my gears is to see your supposed best guy sitting because it's not a save situation yet he's in the following night in a blowout loss 'cos he needs the work, he thrives on it.
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| Edgy DC Jul 22 2010 11:06 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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It may have more than we can appreciate, and it certainly matters in extra innings. 1) If your not so tied to "save situation" as "game situation," it's easier to get him regular work and get him high leverage roles, instead of the save-or-mopup useage; 2) Using your top guy in the ninth and tenth, means the next-best guy is avaliable deeper into the game; an d 3) Holding him out is meaning that much more work for our next best guy. The eighth-inning guy is not just getting eighth-inning hold situations, but those plus a) eight- and ninth-inning spots down two, down one, or tied; plus b) situations where they're up four and hasn't yet put enough guys on base to transmute the situation into a save one; plus c) situations where the stater was chased earlier and Jerry's reluctance to use relievers for multiple innings means he has to go to the better and better guys as the game progresses. It's a gross domino effect, this savey-savey thing. The screaming truth is that we're not unable to find "eighth inning guys," but that we're destroying them.
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| batmagadanleadoff Jul 22 2010 11:23 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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I first became aware of this in the early '90's. I read a magazine interview where Mitch "Wild Thing" Williams was quoted as explaining to his new team (Houston) that he's most effective in the 9th inning because of the was his adrenaline supposedly worked. The implication was that Williams' was less reliable prior to the 9th. To me, this was a selfish and transparent attempt on Mitch's part to position himself for saves. I suppose that the agents play a significant role in the way relievers are currently used. Presumably, the team has to promise the free agent star reliever the save situations in order to obtain the pitcher's services. While that promise is unenforceable and not binding, the team might believe that if it reneges, word will get out and the team will have difficulty obtaining their next free agent star reliever.
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| Benjamin Grimm Jul 22 2010 11:34 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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The solution to this is not to have a designated closer with a designated ego.
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| Centerfield Jul 22 2010 11:37 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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I'm not defending the practice, but comparing Game 6 of the NLCS (or any other post-season game) to a regular season game isn't exactly fair. The practice of holding back your closer for a save situation on the road is justified (or at least justification is attempted) by the idea that your closer's innings must be limited. In other words, you only get a few appearances from your closer before you have to shelf the guy. Why waste them in a tie game, one where you may ultimately never take the lead, and possibly cost yourself the opportunity to use him tomorrow (or the day after) in a save situation.
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| Edgy DC Jul 22 2010 11:39 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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You know, there may be something to that. But I have to think that if a team can't get enough save situatoins to their big shot releiver, and if their strategy, instead of being tuned to get him 44 saves, is tuned to get him 24 saves and ten wins, well, that's great. It helps the team, and if he needs to stockpile more saves, they can develop a replacement or replacements that has/have several years of good work ahead of him/them before he/they has/have leverage to whine. (If that's what's going on.)
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| metirish Jul 22 2010 11:41 AM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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Boston's "closer by committee" was a bit of a nightmare IIRC , of course that's not to say Bobby and Pedro couldn't handle it. I like it actually.
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| Edgy DC Jul 22 2010 12:13 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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I don't agree with this. That's very much my point. Why waste him by keeping him in the bullpen to preserve him for a save situation that may never come? Save situations are not by definition the highest-leverage situations. Please allow me to re-arrange both of our questions somewhat to display the parallel phrases side-by-side:
Let me first address the Ambiguity of Condition situation. While both of these situations are fraught with ambigutity, his presence curbs that ambiguity. You fear that the team may never take the lead, but putting him in the game increases the likelihood that they will. He provides the team with a better matchup in his innings, and while preserving better pitchers for subsequent innings should they be necessary. In my place in that column, I fear that they are holding him for a save situation that may never come. Well, his presence (and the helpful effect of the presence of better pitchers after him) increasess the chance that that save situation may come. You have to secure a lead before you can secure a save. In a game played one inning at a time, your best available pitcher is the guy to do that. In fact, giving him two innings, he can possilbly secure you both (if not statistically). Then in the Downside column, you tell of the downside being not having him available for saves the next day. Possilby But I say that now is the time of our greatest need when chips are down. Looking at the old win expectancy calculator (not, sadly, recently updated), we are reminded that save situations (one-run lead, two-run lead, three-run lead, or more if the tying run reaches the on-deck circle) tend not to be higher-leverage situations than ninth-inning or extra-inning (which is the same-thing, logically) tie situations. Those games are the games where you want your best. Those are the ones where you have the most to lose relative to what you have to win. And it's statistically supported. And here's the thing. That need of the next day or the day after that, lesser though it is, may never come at all. The need of the moment is known, and i'ts ignored. And so we're getting destroyed in extra-inning games on the road. As far as those two examples I gave from the mid-1980s, in both situations, the team had a vitally crucial game to win the next day. I really don't want to get a whole lot of radical adjustment of bullpen usage out of this thread. But I do most certainly want to get across to any who would hear that holding your closer out of extra-inning games on the road unless/until a save situation can be presented to him is a domonstrably counter-productive strategy.
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| batmagadanleadoff Jul 22 2010 12:28 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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This sounds like a great idea. But the reliever's desire to make money, more than his ego, has contributed to the way relievers are presently used. So long as arbitrators continue to weigh the save in determining the reliever's worth, relievers will want to accumulate saves.
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| John Cougar Lunchbucket Jul 22 2010 12:30 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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Yes but we don't have to be the organization that pays them all that $$ and basically makes them more powerful than the manager once they become established closers. We'd do better developing our own or making bets on non-closers with good arms.
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| Willets Point Jul 22 2010 01:07 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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Tell them you'll pay them more money if they agree to be used in the situation the manager feels most appropriate.
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| LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr Jul 22 2010 01:10 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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And if they're successful for a year or two, then suddenly flameout, it's a lot easier to thank them for their time/service and walk away from them, instead of making up phantom injuries and turning them into last LOOGY/ROOGY on the 'pen bench.
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| Ceetar Jul 22 2010 01:12 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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I don't think Jerry's listening. Also of note is that K-Rod probably threw as many pitches yesterday as he would've if he'd pitched the 9th inning and come out.
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| Edgy DC Jul 22 2010 01:30 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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Yeah, I didn't list the downside of the multiple warmups.
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| Benjamin Grimm Jul 22 2010 01:44 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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I remember, when the Mets were interviewing potential replacements for Art Howe, wondering what kind of questions would be asked at a managerial interview. (I still wonder that.) But I've recently realized that questions like the one above are definitely among those that I would ask. In fact, I think I'd insist on finding a guy who would be willing to break with the tradition that Tony LaRussa initiated. I'd go all Branch Rickey. "Son, I'm looking for a manager with the guts not to kiss his closer's ass!" Maybe I'd even consider some kind of end-of-season bonus based on the ratio of wins to saves.
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| Benjamin Grimm Jul 22 2010 02:00 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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I'm not saying this means anything, but here's the ratio, for all Mets managers since 1969 (when the save became official) of wins to saves. (The columns are wins, saves, and the percentage. For example, half of the games Joe Torre won as a Mets manager ended with a pitcher getting the save.)
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| Edgy DC Jul 22 2010 02:02 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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Poor Salty Parker never got a save!
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| Centerfield Jul 22 2010 02:19 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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Very good stuff Edgy. It helps to clarify the issue a lot. My question, and the reason I am undecided on this issue, is that I'm not sure that using your best reliever in a tie game will necessarily lead to more wins than using him in a situation where you have the lead. How do we know that? If I'm understanding your win calculator link correctly, all I can tell is that a game is much more likely to go either way when it is tied, than in a save situation. But will using your closer in ties necessarily lead to more wins? After all, in tie games, you need to hold the opposition and score a run. (To illustrate this point, a tie game in the fifth inning is much more high-leverage than a one run lead in the ninth, but does that mean you should pitch your closer in the fifth inning of a 5 to 5 game?) The way I see it, if the Jerry strategy were to be justified, one would have to prove conclusively that: 1. Using your best reliever in a save situation is more effective than pitching him in tie games. 2. The difference is so great that you should hold him out of actual tie games in the event a prospective save situation should arise. In order for your thesis to be correct, you must prove: 1. Using your best reliever in tie games in addition to save situations will outweigh the negative effect of having to give a certain number of save situations to a guy who is not your best reliever. A much easier burden than Jerry has, but I'm not sure that it's been met yet. It's also possible that none of this has any effect on the number of wins and losses at the end of the day.
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| Benjamin Grimm Jul 22 2010 02:26 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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I think if you use a lesser reliever in the bottom of an extra inning, he has a better chance of giving up a run and losing the game.
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| John Cougar Lunchbucket Jul 22 2010 02:48 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played Edited 3 time(s), most recently on Jul 22 2010 02:54 PM |
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let's also not lose sight of the fact we lose so many xtra inning games on the road because the other team scores in the same number of chances or fewer. Best reliever or not the Mets got 7 innings of 1 run ball out of the pen last nite, yes? Should be enuf.
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| Centerfield Jul 22 2010 02:50 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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That I understand, but it makes sense to use your best reliever in every situation. This, of course, is not possible, because any one pitcher can only pitch a certain number of innings. So my point is, to prove Jerry is wrong, you must establish that the benefit of using your closer in tie games outweighs the negative effect of having a lesser pitcher pitch in save situations (since presumably, your closer will not be able to handle all of them due to the extra work).
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| Edgy DC Jul 22 2010 02:57 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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No doubt, but I'm tearing apart my brain trying to exted the argument to demonstrate how this team doesn't score because they are demoralized by their manager managing like such a loser. Eventually, if you hold them long enough, Tony LaRussa pitches a backup infielder and you get a runner on and bunt him around the bases.
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| batmagadanleadoff Jul 22 2010 03:09 PM Re: The Greatest Game Ever Played |
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In an extra inning game, I'd use my most effective available reliever -- effective defined by the circumstances (opposing batters, base/out situation) as much as by the pitcher's own abilities. Given the sudden death-like nature of extra innings, I can't see holding back on the most effective pitcher. Your team won't bat in the 11th inning if you're losing after 10 innings.
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