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Catastrophic Injuries

AG/DC Aug 25 2008 11:45 AM

It's part of my worldview that often championships are won not by teams who had a better season than they had in the years immediately prior to and following their championship season, but they had a healthier one. Certainly 1969 and 1986 were seasons marked by very healthy squads. The Mets had a wondeful team down to the wire in 1985, but if Strawberry and Mookie hadn't each missed a third of the season, St. Louis might have been beaten weeks earlier. So part of the answer is clearly making your own luck by having guys ready to step in when catastrophe strikes. But I think the current way rosters are built really undercuts a team's ability to do that. When a team is able to carry only 12 batters, they're going to value versaitility over a guy who can step in and give them something like a starter's productivity in the lineup. The benches in Randolph's era have certainly been filled by a lot of Flexible Frankies, rather than Slugging Sammies. Anyhow, I know there are holes in this thinking, and the Mets have done well by some bench players like Jose Valentin and (to a lesser extent) Damion Easley stepping into the lineup. Others --- Jay Bell, Miguel Cairo --- have been disastrous. I just think we've been giving at-bats in corner outfield or corner infield slots to these guys that in the past would have gone to Danny Heep. And it's not about the Mets. I think other teams have a similar problem. A lot also run out of bench players after nine or ten innings, where in the past they'd make it to 14 or 15 before looking for a pitcher to pinch-hit.

metirish Aug 25 2008 12:20 PM

We have had Tatis step into the team as cover when he would have been a bench player , I wonder though how that would have worked out for him, he seems to have benefited from playing every day.

AG/DC Aug 25 2008 12:52 PM

Yeah, one hole in my thinking is that a lot of the Heeps --- who once would have been rocking a big league bench, pinch-hitting and starting twice a week, and perhaps filling in for a starter when a catastrophic injury came along --- are still retained by teams, they're just living instead in Pacific Coast League and International League cities. Obviously that's a worse living for them --- middling sluggers making AAA money while back-end relievers out-earn them --- but is it a better place for them until those injuries come? Like the dispute over talented rookies, do you want them staying fresher with more reps in AAA or staying sharp in the true proving ground of MLB?