moonslav59

The pen is a major problem, but they have NOT been responsible for more losses than the starters. They have also contributed to more wins than the starters. I'm waiting for someone to prove I'm wrong. I'm open to any analysis that shows otherwise. I have wanted a pen arm since day one, so I'm not sure if you are talking about me, but I don't think it's anyone else. Our pen has lost us more games than other pens. No doubt. That does not mean they have been MOST responsible for our low position in the standings. I never said the pen "would be fine." I knew we would need help and hoped it would be okay until we traded for help. It was not horrible until recently.

He just needs to drink more from the clubhouse PED infused water fountain.

I'm on record as saying I don't think bringing Porcello back makes sense, unless he goes along with a significant hometown discount on years and money. I will say that I'd rather have a starter with a 5.00 ERA have 12 games at 3.30 and 2 at 12.75 than all 14 at 5.00, or whatever it is.

I'd settle for 2019, but hell yeah! Let him, Chatham and Lin fight it out. (Maybe Chavis plays some 2B when not at 1B.) Teenie tiny sample size, but his OPS is now at .933.

We have enough budget space to trade for a legitimate closer. That could be all we need, especially if Eovaldi can contribute. Our marginal pen guys get bumped down to more manageable roles, and the worst two get bumped off the 25 man roster.

So many runs were let up, it was hard to keep track. Really just 4 pitchers allowed most of the damage: Game 1 0.1 IP 6 ER Porcello 1.1 IP 8 ER Shawaryn 7.1 IP 3 ER Others Game 2 0.0 IP 4 ER Walden (maybe who you were thinking of) 0.1 IP 3 ER Barnes 8.2 IP 5 ER Others

Is Hembree now the de facto closer?

Nope: 2 games 1 IP 0 ER 0 H 0 BB 1 IP 1 ER 3 H 0 BB

He had actually begun to show signs of turning things around before today: Last 12 games: 12.1 IP 1.46 ERA 15 H + BB 1 SV- 0 BS 5 Holds .682 OPS Against He had not let up an ER in 19 of his previous 24 games pitched.

Tampa uses a pitcher to pitch the first inning often enough to skew the numbers, but we are top 6 in pen IP: 416 TBR 408 LAA 373 TOR 369 SEA 365 MIL 347 BOS Other Pen rankings: 6th SIERA 3.92 8th xFIP 4.22 11th K/BB 2.60 12th ERA- 93 14th HR/9 1.27 (same as Yanks) 18th WHIP 1.39

Josh Taylor is really solidifying his spot in the pen.

You totally missed my point!

They're paid well. They've been babied and pampered all ST'ing and first 89 games. They have good to great resumes, especially when looking at their last 3 seasons combined. It's time the rested millionaires start to carry the load and pick up the slack for others. Our offense may not always hit this well.

Nice game by Price. 99 pitches in 5 IP is somewhat ERodesque, but I'm not complaining. It's just another game where our pen is asked to go 4+.

Kind of strange no Groome in the top 30, but I guess they just rank players that are actively playing. Thanks for the alternate view.

You crack me up!

That's been true back to the days Kareem asked out of Milwaukee and maybe before. BTW, where did Kareem end up? LA. Where did Gretsky end up?

I totally agree. It's almost always about starting pitching. I'm hopeful that the strategy of extra rest early will help our starters be "fresher" than others, and they will begin to perform like we all hoped or expected them to do.

...and my point was that with the "added rest" they got during ST'ing and less IP'd so far this season than previous seasons, shouldn't we expect the starters to carrying the load for the pen, right now as they go through severe struggles? I say yes, but in fact, the exact opposite is happening. If it wasn't for our offense, we'd be 15-20 down right now. Our starters have sucked when we've needed them most.

...and if the pen did allow 5 ERs to score as compared to the 6 by Porcello, it would have been the pen's fault, right? LOL.

Prime example of how you twist a person's statement. He never came close to even implying what you just said. He merely pointed out the true source of the situation of worry.

Porcello's mess is just 3 games deep. He was better than norm in is previous 8-12 starts. Bad for smaller sample size than the other 3. Better for larger sample size prior than others. His last 3 starts were so horrendous that it skews his May 1st to present numbers. I can't make anyone else feel concern or worry over these numbers, but I can say I don't think they are pitching to "norms", of late. 6GS ERod 4.21 (4.21 career/ 4.01 previous 2 years) 6GS C Sale 3.49 (2.97 career/ 2.85 previous 3 years/ 2.56 2 yrs) 5GS Price 4.44 (3.26 career/ 3.74 previous 3 seasons) 5-6 starts is a pretty long time. Plus, ERod actually has a worse 2019 ERA than his previous 6 starts, and he was the only one who pitched a normal amount of ST'ing innings this year. Some cherry-picked numbers ERod since May 15th: 4.73 in 10 starts. CSale since June 22nd: 7.71 in 2 starts. (5.96 last 4 starts/ 3.86 since May 15th- 9 GS) Price since June 9th: 5.40 (4.11 last 6 starts) Porcello's numbers are concerning but mostly just his last 3 starts: 11 GS'd before last 3 GS'd: 3.27 ERA (April 30-June 22) Last 3 GS'd: 12.75 ERA To me, if you are willing to discount smaller and more recent sample sizes in favor of a time frame from around May 1st (4/30 for Porcello), then Porcello should be less of a concern, right? His 4.70 ERA since 4/30 is almost totally skewed by just his last 3 starts, while ERod's last 10, Prices last 6 and Sale's last 9 seem less concerning to you.

I've been a big DHern supporter, but I have to agree, he's not a ML option, right now. Not for a contender, for sure.

I sure hope our big 4 don't continue like the last 28 games: 6GS ERod 4.21 6GS Porcello 6.54 6GS C Sale 3.49 5GS Price 4.44 I'm pretty confident our 4 starters will be fine going forward, but I realize they have to do better than they have been. While a great May was fine and dandy, the numbers after May should be concerning to us all. As for the pen, I'm fine with Workman, Barnes, Brasier and Hembree keeping key roles on the team- just not as the closer. We both agree we need pen help. The debate was about how bad our starters have been and how bad our pen has been up to now, in various time sample sizes that we disagree over the timing and importance of our sample sizes chosen. My position has been that until recently, our pen has not been as bad as the blown saves and site bashing has made them out to be, and that the starters have not gotten the same criticism as the pen has gotten. The pen has pitched many masterful games- sometimes for more than 7 or 9 innings. They have kept us in many games that the starters put us in a massive hole. They have also blown many games- some of which the starters allowed 5 or more runs in short innings before the blown save, but mostly we just hear about the pen losing games for us. No doubt, the pen has lost more games for us that most teams, but they've also been put in a hole and used more often than most contending teams. My expectations for this pen were not high before the year started. My hope was they could do alright until summer trades boosted them to respectability. Until recently, the pen had done better than I expected, which isn't the same as saying they did great or even good. They did a decent job for a while, considering their make-up. Going forward, we need to trade for a decent closer and probably a good set-up man, too. Solve the roster crunch issue by DFA'ing Thornburg and trading out-of-options Johnson. Demote Walden and maybe Velazquez, leaving this... _______ (Closer to be acquired) Workman _______ (Set up to be acquired) Hembree Barnes Brasier Wright Brewer 5th starter: Velazquez or Johnson When and if Eovaldi returns, we'll have to deal with who gets sent down or traded (Velazquez or Brewer?), of we could just try and acquire a solid ace and let the set-up men battle for the 8th inning role.

The only difference is that the pitchers being sought by the big spenders have ERAs of 3.00 and 4.00 not 2.50 to 3.00.