Edgy MD

Gonna be one of those threads.

Pioneer executive Rube Foster was planning on bringing white players into the Negro National League at the time of his untimely demise in 1930. I think that would have been brilliant.

How about that David Wright at shortstop?!

That's generous of you, but there are readers counting on your guidance here, Vic.

I would think it obvious. Ceetar wrote: what's the pitch count? The same. Ceetar wrote: What's the recent workload? Over the course of a season, the pitchers working the same number of innings in half the games typically get twice the rest between appearances that the other two get. I think the box managers put themselves in is when you get Bobby up in the 7th and he struggles that day. You'd want to go to Ramon in that situation but probably can't if you had him throw 45 pitches the day before over 2.1. Now you have to use your third or fourth best guy. Yes, your options diminish if people fail. But now they use their fourth-best guy almost as a matter or course. And their seventh-best guy in a one-run game. Disastrous. The way we do it now, rather than set up a safety net if a guy fails, actually courts failure, and leaves the closer more likely to never have a safety net.

Supposedly, Wally had a sitdown with Valdespin in the last week. And if Wally Backman needs to tell you to grow up, that's maybe something you should look at. Anyhow, that's maybe relevant as far as who got the call last night. OE: The report.

Tony Fernandez built this city.

Yeah, that's what I'm saying. I mean, we can mine the data but only if you're not satisfied with a simple thought experiment. Two managers have two guys of relatively equal bullpenning skills and applicabliity. The first guy has two guys named Heilman and Sanchez. The second manager has two guys named Wendell and White. Heilman and Sanchez have each pitched 80 innings over 80 games. Wendell and White have each pitched 80 innings over 40 games. You're near the end of the season and are fighting for a playoff spot. Who has the more taxed pair of relievers?

Well, it's a subtle but important distinction between the guys scouts see as having little little to no power but hopefully will make up for it in other areas such as speed and contact and plate discipline and guys that have projectable power, which is what you seem to be describing at the end of your post. Few players hit the draft with fully realized power, and fewer still become productive big leaguers. I mean, fear Jason Tyner, sure, but fear Rob Stratton, too.

So how did David Wright look? No Cal Ripken, huh?

George Wright --- Hall of Famer in both cricket and baseball, as well as blessed with an adamantium infused skeleton, razor-sharp claws, animalian sensory powers, and a mutant healing factor.

So, apart from everything else today, how do you like how Wright looked at short? He had two chances, which is two more than he had last year, so he gets a shortstop rating in Strat-O-Matic and everything.

Well, it's not really bootleg footage, but clips from Playing for Peanuts. The Mets, rather than promote it, pulled it off SNY.

Stinks like the day Ike and Wright went down on the same play. Stinks like the say Reyes and Murphy got hurt in the same game. Wright played short that day, also. Course, today, we didn't have two injuries, unless you count how un-necessarily putting your poorest performing pitcher into a one-run game injures my soul. Still, Turner's injury seems to be bonehead related.

Ceetar wrote: Also, most pens have Acosta types at the back end, and using up your good reliever or two on one day may mean they need a day or two and you're stuck with the third or fourth best guy the next game when you could end up needing the better relievers. Especially when you're down by a run and the game may be lost no matter who you use (hence Acosta or Francisco) I think experience shows you burn through your pen faster using them one inning at a time rather than two.

I don't know why Keith and Ron don't kill Terry (and every other manager) for this. Torre, of all people, seemed to understand it. If your job is to win, the redemption of the guys one the back end of your roster has to take a back seat to that. You owe it to the fans, you owe it to the owners, you owe it to yourself. It seems important for Terry to build up loyalty and trust with his charges. But Casey Stengel had a different attitude about that. In the 1950s, he was constantly working pitchers not named Ford or Reynolds into and out of rotation based on who was performing. He expressed his loyalty to his players not by making sure everybody got to play, but by trying to put them in the best situation to win the game, to give their efforts the best chance of not being in vain. Let a reliever pitching well go two, three, four(!) innings. Have another guy ready, but for God's sake, don't use who you don't hafta. Maybe I'm romanticizing the past, but I can't imagine Davey Johnson putting Tom Gorman in that game. This is my hobgoblin. Please forgive forgive the carryon.

I just leave Ramirez in there, and have Rauch or somebody warming for if and when he began to fail. It's easy, it's fun, it's inexpensive, and the whole family can do it.

We all works in progress. Manager Terry ran a haphazard team and ran them haphazardly today.

Like I said, I kind of want two guys capable of playing shortstop.

The question about why he's on the team is the one I ask after asking why he's in the game. I mean, after two starting pitching masterpieces, they should be able to keep him buried unless a blowout or a marathon happens.

Jack Egbert, getting the job done as Met # 930.

Well that answers my question.

Manny Acosta. Anybody see if he brought the gasoline and matches with him?

Murphy comes up MT. Steal home, Torres!

Tying run crosses over. Up to Murphy and Wright to plate it.