Distrubing Trend?
by Big50 on Aug 21, 2009 2:38 PM CDT
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PrintI am not a numbers guy. I have a hard time taking all the stats y'all throw around here and making sense of them. I do however love watching sports. When my team is involved in a pivotal game I'll be there watching. Having been a Rangers fan for 15 years or so I have not been this into baseball since the mid to late 90's. That being said, I've noticed a disturbing trend recently, namely Ron Washington.
via www1.pictures.gi.zimbio.com
I have my doubts as to how much a manager impacts a team beyond the pitching change here and steal call there. I could be wrong, but one thing I do know is that Wash seems to doing the one thing he should do well, poorly, at least lately. When it's time for a pitching change he won't make it until it's to late.
Example 1: The first game in the latest Boston series. Frank Fransico was off. He walked guys and was not hitting his spots. He gave up hits and the lead. Did he get pulled? Nope. After the Red Sox tied the game he kept pitching. After he went ahead and gave up the winning run, Wash goes to the mound.
Example 2 and 3: The Twins series. Two games in a row Wash decides to leave the starter in until the lead is gone. I've seen some say that Scott Feldman still was pitching well and that's why Wash left him in. Really? Maybe he didn't looked gassed, but he was clearly not getting the job done. The same goes for Kevin Millwood the next night. He wasn't getting guys out, but he stayed out there.
Example 4: Last night of the Twins series. Neftali Feliz comes in and throws two pitches gets his double play. Wash sends him back out there to throw another inning with the game in hand. Why? Why not run out Jennings or Eryre and save Feliz for the weekend series with Tampa Bay?
I don't claim to be an expert on any of this, but it seems to me that Wash is not on his game right now. Would the Rangers have won one or both of those Twins game or the Boston one? Who knows, but it seemed from my prospective that the Manager didn't put his team in the best position to win. Is this a trend or an anomaly?
I hope it's not a trend. I like Washington as person and I hope he takes my favorite baseball team to places they've never been this year. I hope he knows what he's doing....
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I voted "Yes but a mistake or two"...
but I don’t really feel quite that strongly. My real answer isn’t available, and is somewhere between Yes and So-so.
The Rangers could maybe do better, but not a lot better, and there are no guarantees.
What is certain is that the Rangers are doing very well, and could do a hell of a lot worse manager-wise.
We certainly could do worse...
Josey’s crush Trey Hillman says “hey, look at me!!!”
"You dont know much do you, Big Steve?"
--Finnerty.Fan on Aug 13, 2009 5:13 PM PDT
the two areas all managers
get alot of criticism is in bullpen management and line ups.
Elvis Andrus - 2009 AL Rookie of the Year
Mitch Moreland -Tom Grieve Rangers Minor League Player of the Year
Martin Perez - Nolan Ryan Rangers Minor League Pitcher of the Year
exactly
If you win, you are a genius. If you lose, you are an idiot.
I don’t see a problem with how he handled any of those situations.
1 – FF is supposed to be the best arm in the bullpen. He was already spent for the day, so let him close it up so we don’t have to burn any more arms. Unfortunately, 7 runs later he still couldn’t get it done.
2&3 – If those guys work through their jams like they have repeatedly this year , then we save our bullpen at least 1 more inning of work. This practice has seemed to work for the most part this year.
4 – My only problem with this was the length of time between innings. He sat for a long time after getting loose before he got back out there. They have a plan with Feliz that he will work 1 to 2 innings without pitching him back-to-back days.
p.s. I’m too slow, Big Steve already got me
He makes mistakes
But there is no other guy i’d want managing this team into the playoffs. I’m sure they feel the same.
I'm just goofin' new boot goofin'
no other guy?
i think you are alone in that category among rangers fans…
theres NO ONE else you would rather have in the dugout than RW in all of baseball?
uhhh what?
Scout: He was a first-round pick right? Got a huge bonus?
KG: Oh yeah.
Scout: Well, he spent a lot of it on milkshakes.
-
"Taking steroids is only gonna make him whiff on those sliders in the dirt with more fury." -thedirkatron
by knockoutking on Aug 21, 2009 3:07 PM CDT up reply actions
heres what gets me about RW
he has this tendency to leave pitchers in there way too long. if you and i and everyone else in america can tell a pitcher is cooked…hes pretty clearly cooked
its good to have faith in your starting pitchers
its not good to have too much faith in your starting pitchers…
its one thing to believe in your “guys”
its not a good thing to believe too much in your “guys”
unfortunately RW seems to fall into the second category in both of those cases
Scout: He was a first-round pick right? Got a huge bonus?
KG: Oh yeah.
Scout: Well, he spent a lot of it on milkshakes.
-
"Taking steroids is only gonna make him whiff on those sliders in the dirt with more fury." -thedirkatron
Your examples
Ex 1: Frankie is our closer. Wash has shown throughout this and past seasons he shows faith in his guys, almost to a fault. Frankie didn’t have his best stuff but he was still within a strike of closing the game out. Once Boston took the lead he was probably still our best option to keep the game close since we had used other guys to get to him.
Ex 2: Feldman on Tuesday night hadn’t thrown a ton of pitches going into the 6th inning and we were up by a comfortable margin. There was really no need to have anyone up in the pen and once Minnessota started rallying then they were rushed to warm up.
Ex 3: I was at this game and Millwood was around 90 pitches going into the 6th. he didn’t have his best command and didn’t look his best but still Minnesota was not getting a ton of hard hits off him. We were up by 3 runs which the way Kevin was pitching looked like it would take a prolonged rally to overcome that. Something like walking a couple guys or giving up a couple bloop hits. Someone had gotten up to stretch in the 5th inning but sat back down once kevin got out of the jam. Then the Twins struck like lightning to start the inning and before ODay could get ready the game was already tied.
Ex 4: Its been established the Feliz has special rules for his usage. One of those being no back to back nights. Which means that had you not sent him back out after he got out of the jam in the 6th after only 2 pitches thats all he would have thrown and still wouldn’t be available for the next day. So why not give him a dozen or so more pitches to get another inning of work in and hes still gonna be available on Saturday which is the same had he pitched only those initial 2 pitches.
Bryan Smith (12:17:17 PM PT): Justin Smoak and Josh Hamilton. The AL West might just have found their Bash Brothers, v. 2.0.
Look...
The guy has made mistakes. Some of his decisions with the pitching staff make you scratch your head, but I don’t think he makes any of those decisions without significant input from Mike Maddux, so it’s not entirely fair to throw him under the bus exclusively for that…
The team is sitting 16 games over .500 and is very much alive for a playoff birth. Ron Washington is doing his job. And he’s doing it well.
I'm worried about the bullpen
- You have four young guys in your rotation. For Hunter and Holland, I’m pretty sure there will be certain limitations in their usage to close out their first full seasons in the bigs. And if that’s reaching a little bit, then the hope that Hunter and Holland will go out there and give you ~7 IP every start coming down this stretch is probably a little too optimistic
- Feldman and Nippert are your two other starters, neither known to be an innings-eating type.
- You’re ‘horse’ veteran, Kevin Millwood, has failed to reach the seventh inning in seven consecutive starts
Seems like everyone was gassed in this last go-around through the rotation, I just hope the bullpen isn’t getting overworked…
Because they’ve blown 5 crucial games ever since the Oakland series
I agree with your worry about Millwood..
But I think Holland and Hunter should be fine.
Holland has 107 innings this year; 8 more starts, if they are ALL complete games, puts him at 179. He threw 150 last year so it should be a strain.
Hunter is at 132 innings; 8 more starts, all complete games, puts him at 204. He threw 163 last year so that would be horrible.
Lowering each of their IP/game for those 8 starts to only 6 innings saves each of them 24 innings, which should definitely be doable.
The Texas Rangers have been synonymous with explosive firepower ever since they emptied 130 rounds into Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow in 1934. - Alyssa Milano
The losses recently...
have certainly been direct punches to the groin area. The two to the Twins. The BoSox loss. The comeback by Oakland against Frankie. A close one against the Halos.
I think each of the last 5 or 6 losses since that Oakland series have been very winnable. Hopefully the ’pen, and the entire pitching staff for that matter, can come through on this road trip. If not, things could get ugly.
"The only good is knowledge and the only evil is ignorance."-Socrates
This is distrubing indeed
Extremely distrubing.
"You dont know much do you, Big Steve?"
--Finnerty.Fan on Aug 13, 2009 5:13 PM PDT
by WestTxAg06 on Aug 21, 2009 4:02 PM CDT reply actions 4 recs
Frankie
How often does a manager take his closer out while he’s still ahead? It’s extremely rare. If you want to complain about blown saves by closers there are hundreds of examples every year where a manager leaves the closer in.
Maybe it’s a confidence thing. Maybe it’s because some closers just pitch like that, they put guys on but they eventually wiggle out. Maybe it’s because the closer is your best reliever.
Regardless, it’s not really something to complain about.
This is weak.
It’s a 162 game season. No manager is perfect and given their record I’m willing to stand behind the way Maddux and Ron have handled the pitchers this year. How about you go find four instances where he made the right move leaving them in? Those don’t stand out in your mind though so you forget those far too fast.
Millwood is the only example up there that I even questioned at the time. He looked gassed in the 5th. Ron sticking by his horse though was perfectly acceptable. Your Frankie example is crap. Every closer blows a save. All of them. It happens. Pulling him in the middle of it probably does more harm than good to his psyche. When Ron went back to him for the next save opportunity it gave Frankie tons of confidence and made for a very cool moment when he overcame the doubters that cropped up from the meltdown two nights before.
This just in from Texas_Dawg
You’re all racists.
J.P. can take Roy Halladay and shove him up his ass. I’ll take Derek Holland. - AJM
Rangers can no hit curve ball. Straight ball, they hit it very much. Curve ball, bats are inept.
How about
He doesn’t intentionally do anything to hurt the team’s chances to win.
Make an occasional mistake? Sure, in the 20/20 microscope of review.
Has two way confidence with his players? Definitely, at least on the surface.
Always aware of situational criteria? No, not always. Relies on experience.
A little discussed key: puts the game in the hands of the players. Indicators include at times leaving a pitcher in too long, not being overly confrontational with umpires, playing youngsters in key situations, using veteran players extensively when faced with choices, etc. In short doing what most MLB managers do when they compete.
"He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts... for support rather than illumination." - Andrew Lang (1844-1912) also -
"Telephone, n. An invention of the devil which abrogates some of the advantages of making a disagreeable person keep his distance."
~Ambrose Bierce
by Ed Coffin on Aug 22, 2009 11:41 AM CDT reply actions
Is that the standard now?
To be a poor manager you have to intentionally work to hurt your team? Which managers would have ever done that? Why wouldn’t you just fire that person immediately?
Gracchus (about Obama): I think he knows what America is. America is the mob. Conjure money for them and they'll be distracted. Take away their freedom and still they'll roar. The beating heart of America is not the paper of the Constitution, it's the power of the media. He'll bring them debt - and they will love him for it.
by Aquaman, Esq. on Aug 22, 2009 2:26 PM CDT up reply actions
Misunderstood context
“Intentional” is do do things you believe are correct or suitable in a particular circumstance, that in fact don’t often work out. It has nothing to do with the overall intent. Blips on the timeline. I just resist tagging Wash with “good manager” or “poor manager” since my 60+ years around baseball don’t provide me with a clear definition of what either one is.
"He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts... for support rather than illumination." - Andrew Lang (1844-1912) also -
"Telephone, n. An invention of the devil which abrogates some of the advantages of making a disagreeable person keep his distance."
~Ambrose Bierce
by Ed Coffin on Aug 22, 2009 2:48 PM CDT up reply actions
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