IGT: May 30 -- Let's take another one from the Phils!

[Edgy MD]

That's ugly.

But don't miss your Mets last stand. Rallying in the ninth, within five with two outs. Tying run=Rottino.

[Edgy MD]

Murphy does his part.

Three straight two-out hits. Keep at it, Mets. You have tomorrow off.

[Edgy MD]

Blurp.

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

And that's it. And if the bullpen had done even a respectably shitty job, this game would now be tied, or over the other way.

[TransMonk]

Our bullpen is for shit.

[bigpurple:f2lfbtss]BOOO!!!!![/bigpurple:f2lfbtss]

[Edgy MD]

The team has done a good job punching in AAA players, but making them fit on paper and getting them coordinated with the team thang are two different issues. Onward.

Day off. Good day to sign a thirdbaseman.

[Vic Sage]

Me and Vic Jr had a perfectly nice evening in the park, right up until Parnell showed up. It was shiite, as MetIrish would say, from that point on. When Mayberry parked Martinez's fatty into the Pepsi Porch in the 9th, we departed. got new hats, though. Jr got the classic blue, with the orange button. He's a traditionalist. I got a 50th anniversary edition.

oh, and the rebuilt bullpen of ours? the one aspect of the team that Sandy spent money and trades to create?
it sucks big hairy moose cock.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Very much like the midweek game we screwed up on the Reds a few weeks back. All's super till the bullpen gets involved.

[MFS62]

Here's my suggestion for rebuilding the bullpen.
Move the lock to the outside of the gate, then when they're all locked inside, throw away the key.

Later

[Edgy MD]

Yeah, but that's the thing, the more you ask of the bullpen, the worse it will suck, every time. Don't look for new combos, ask more of the starters. Make any relievers force their way into the conversation. That's all I can think of. Not sure how much it would have helped last night. What a lousy job.

[Vic Sage]

last night, i saw Dillon Gee start to weaken in the 6th, getting out of a jam with a 6-4-3. So when he gave up Schneider's well hit 2-out double to deep center in the 7th, i didn't quibble with Collins' decision to bring in Parnell. Gee looked done to me, after 110 pitches, and if we can get that much out of Gee in a game, i say take it and move on.

I think asking more of starters who aren't up to it is as likely to end in disaster as asking relief pitchers to get 7 outs to close out a 3-1 game.

Now i agree that the ritualistic removal of a starter who is going strong just because its "time" for the setup guy or the closer is almost always a bad idea, and a worse idea when your pen sucks. But expecting mediocre starters to go deeper to avoid going to your stinky pen is not really a solution either.

[Edgy MD]

Yeah, that's what I mean by "that's all I got." In general, I believe it, but I can't say as it would have necessarily helped us last night, except maybe that more and better relievers would perhaps have been fresher when Gee was pulled.

I mean, if that's not Gee but Jim McAndrew tiring, Gil Hodges or Yogi Berra goes to Tug McGraw looking for him to get all seven outs there, and doesn't worrying about building a bridge of three relievers to finish the game. And he doesn't worry too much about not having McGraw tomorrow because he's not trying to become dependent on the bullpen.

Ask a little bit more of the starters, and it's a little gift to the relievers. Ask a little bit more of the better relievers, and it's a gift to the lesser ones.

Now, of course, they ask more of everybody, by demanding more appearances for shorter stints, and I'm not sure that's really saving their arms.

[Ceetar]

I wonder if the dilution of pitchers plays in though. Frank Francisco or Bobby Parnell don't seem like they're going to be Tug McGraw. Would McGraw? Or would someone with the ability to pitch 3 innings successfully end up as a 4th or 5th starter on a team somewhere and we left with guys not even that good to pitch the bullpen innings? And it's a little bit of chicken/egg in that small sample sizes tricks managers into pigeon holing guys into very specific roles that the limited data suggests they need to do to succeed, and they never quite break out of that?

Maybe the best solution here is Mejia as a Tug type multi-inning closer? guys that are good enough to start but aren't quite ready to do so? build up innings year to year by having these guys pitch 2-3 (and 120) innings at the back end of games rather than preemptively shutting them down?

[Benjamin Grimm]

The best solution would involve pretending that Tony Larussa and Dennis Eckersley never existed.

[Edgy MD]

I don't believe there has been a dilution of pitchers at all.

A good team used to be able to get the season with eight effective pitchers, the playoffs with seven, the World Series with six. There isn't a dilution of supply but an increase in demand.

[batmagadanleadoff]

There may or may not be a dilution of pitchers but there is surely a dilution in the talent level of major league pitching. When the game changes to the point that each team now carries an extra pitcher or two on the 25 man roster, well that's about four dozen pitchers that wouldn't have been pitching in the majors before the pitch count factor changed the way pitchers are handled.

Edgy DC wrote: A good team used to be able to get the season with eight effective pitchers, the playoffs with seven, the World Series with six. There isn't a dilution of supply but an increase in demand.

That's very old history. Teams can't get by with just eight pitchers when the starter, even if dominant on that day, is usually lifted with two or three innings still left in the game.

[Edgy MD]

Maybe. Though I still say supply relative to demand hasn't diminished.

Those last two guys are not the way to best use your roster spots, I would certainly argue. And they certainly shouldn't be getting meaningful innings, but spending the majority of their month eating sunflower seeds.

I think any diminishution of talent is an illusion caused by an increased percentage of pitchers being allowed to confront higher-leverage situations.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Edgy DC wrote: Maybe. Though I still say supply relative to demand hasn't diminished. Those last two guys are not the way to best use your roster spots, I would certainly argue. And they certainly shouldn't be getting meaningful innings, but spending the majority of their month eating sunflower seeds. I think any diminishution of talent is an illusion caused by an increased percentage of pitchers being allowed to confront higher-leverage situations.

I don't see how teams have a choice when it's no longer unusual for a starter to get taken out after pitching just five innings. If pitchers pitched longer today .... if rosters were comprised of 10 pitchers ... then someone like Manny Acosta would be a AAA pitcher and Chris Schwinden still wouldn't know what a major league post-game buffet tastes like.

[Edgy MD]

Well, then, their choice is to let starters go deeper, relief aces to go longer, and therefore give more good innings to good pitchers.

Somebody will be first to look back and learn from it. It might as well be my team.

[Vic Sage]

if only. sigh.

[Edgy MD]

The flip side is that, with managers artificially limiting the duration of outings by their best and better pitchers, there arises the hidden virtue of the patient approach at the plate. Not only can it help you score more now, it can help you score more at the end of the game. Not only can it help you score more at the end of the game, it can help you score more at the end of the series.

[Vic Sage]

as i noted in another thread, it is exactly that approach (widely criticized by Darling, Ojeda and others in the media) which has allowed our punchless, speedless lineup to generate enough runs to be in the upper 3rd of offenses in the NL, while our run prevention is in the bottom 3rd, thanks to our crappy bullpen and our manager's indiscriminate use of them.