Probably I have someone warming in the pen from pitch one. I need pitchers who can throws strikes in this situation Yeah, and when his arm falls off three days later because he's thrown too much in the bullpen you'll be starting a thread that Buck can't manage the pen. I don't believe loosening up and throwing a few warmups in the pen will create re-attachment issues for the Special Surgery wards. If the reliever demonstrates that he can keep the ball in the general vicinity of the strike zone for the first two or three batters, I'm comfortable relaxing the tightness of the leash. I doubt, however, that instructions are as strict and as blunt as the ones I'm advocating. "Your only job here is to throw strikes." I think managers these days profess to claim their pitchers understand that need without specific instructions, but that's really the only reason I can think of that relievers are so wild with big leads, that they're not pitching any differently than they would in a tight game.