Article: MIN 6, DET 1: Stewart Impresses, Rosario Exits Due to Injury

[USAFChief]

Once again, I get the principal of the idea. Seems to make sense. But there is also no guarantee, this idea or a conventional lineup, how the game plays out. Great opener, great secondary pitcher, bad day for either, BB, errors, etc, i still feel you are bringing in a RP early, hoping for the best case scenario.

There is no vitriol, it's just questioning how this works out long term. You mentioned Trout being stuck in the dugout, or on deck, in a key situation, with an adjusted lineup. But even in a normal lineup, who can guarantee Trout would come to bat in any late game situation? No matter how you stack your line-up, or pitchers, there is still so many random outcomes involved that I just don't see a relevance that makes sense.

Nobody can guarantee Trout would come up. But as a manager, I can guarantee Trout will get five PAs instead of four before other hitters do. Or vice versa, by moving him down in the lineup.

[Tomj14]

 

You could do the same no matter the opposing pitcher, no?

You absolutely could, and seems just as logical to me as the opener strategy.

[Tomj14]

 

He WAS available. He already pitched.

again very true, but it was a 0 - 0 game. What if the second pitcher is terrible then you have wasted one of your best pitchers, or in the 7th or 8th in a tight game you are going to a lesser pitcher because you have already used one of your best.

I hate the opener idea so there really is there really isn't anything that wold sway me the other way.

[Mike Sixel]

 

The thing I wonder, which you may be alluding to, if I were an opposing manager and knew this was being employed on a given day, might I not stack my lineup differently to counter? Perhaps I reverse the bottom and top of my lineup. Perhaps I re-arrange my lineup to rest a couple guys, early in the game at least, and make sure i start a guy or two to really push the opener with big splits or high contact/BB/OB ability to try to really push said opener, (think a Grossman), hoping for a run, or at least push my lineup with a baserunner or two so that the "starter" ends up having to face the heart of my lineup 3 times, potentially, anyway.

 

that's great! That means your best hitters are getting less at bats. that would be awesome for the pitching team. awesome.

[USAFChief]

You absolutely could, and seems just as logical to me as the opener strategy.

So then I would say the idea has nothing to do with “openers.” You could do that regardless. Or not do it.

[ashbury]

So we are talking about Bobby Wilson moving up in the lineup, a 35 year catcher with a .242 OBP this year.

That isn't the type of hitter to move around the lineup.

I didn't bring up Wilson in the first place.

 

But, someone did try to suggest that a manager might try to defeat the Opener strategy by moving a stud hitter down in the lineup. That would come at the expense of one or more lesser hitters being elevated to additional plate appearances over the course of a season, however often this strategy was attempted. Wilson serves, for discussion purposes - other choices would be merely less bad.

[ashbury]

there really is there really isn't anything that wold sway me the other way.

You are more honest than many. I'll save further typing for some other poster or some other topic.

[Richie the Rally Goat]

Gotcha. I'm not paying close attention anymore clearly.

im not either, I thought you were right

[ashbury]

Everything, IMO. Otherwise this opener concept wouldn't be a thing. He's not trusted to be a starting pitcher and needs assistance to get the TOUGH outs in the 1st inning.

Concur. If the Opener means anything, using it to help nursemaid a rookie seems to make sense. It's not going to make a good pitcher out of a bad one. It's not even going to make a pitcher much better, at all. But if it acts as training wheels, even as a placebo to let the pitcher relax a bit for his first batters, it seems like it could be of value.

 

With all this discussion, I'm viewing it as more like a flexible tool than any kind of dogma.

[yarnivek1972]

So we are talking about Bobby Wilson moving up in the lineup, a 35 year catcher with a .242 OBP this year.

That isn't the type of hitter to move around the lineup.

Plus if you are the away team you could start a high OBP guy at any position give him an early at bat and then move the starter in to take the field?

That becomes impractical in an era of 3 man benches. Benches are no longer a strategic tool. They are backups. They play when guys are hurt or need a day off, period. Randy Bush ain’t on anyone’s bench.

[by jiminy]

Back to the earlier discussion about openers. Someone above said:

 

"Once again, I get the principal of the idea. Seems to make sense. But there is also no guarantee, this idea or a conventional lineup, how the game plays out. .... You mentioned Trout being stuck in the dugout, or on deck, in a key situation, with an adjusted lineup. But even in a normal lineup, who can guarantee Trout would come to bat in any late game situation? No matter how you stack your line-up, or pitchers, there is still so many random outcomes involved that I just don't see a relevance that makes sense."

 

It doesn't have to happen every time to make a difference over a season. It just has to tilt the odds.

 

Let's say that you and I are flipping a coin: Heads I win, tails you win. I suggest this modification: if it's tails the first time, we flip again, so I get a second chance to toss a heads. It doesn't mean I would always win. There are still many possible scenarios in which the second toss would be a tails, too. So, what's the problem?

 

Suppose you said that was unfair, and I answered, "I get the principal of what you're saying. Seems to make sense. But there is also no guarantee, this system or a conventional coin toss, how it plays out. .... You mentioned that I could win the coin toss in a key situation, with an adjusted system. But even in a normal coin toss, who can guarantee tails would come up in a key situation? No matter how you stack your coins, or how you toss them, there are still so many random outcomes involved that I just don't see a relevance that makes sense."

 

Would you buy that argument?

 

A statistical advantage doesn't have to pay off every time to still give one side an advantage over time.

 

Same with a pitcher starting with the middle of the batting order. He may still face the top of the order in a key situation. He may still face the top of the order the same number of times as the bottom of the order. But he will ALWAYS face the bottom of the order a third time BEFORE he faces the top of the order a third time. And unless he stops after facing everyone in the order exactly once, he will face the bottom of the order MORE times than the top of the order, and NEVER face the top of the order more times than the bottom of the order. Doesn't mean the hitters at the bottom of the order will never beat you -- they're in the major leagues for a reason -- but baseball is a game of statistics and percentages, and over thousands of at bats, these things really do add up. 

 

I'm not dismissing your point that there are many, many other variables, and many ways things can still go wrong for either side. But so what?

 

This particular statistical advantage is designed only to maximize the innings your (former) starter can pitch before the team's best hitters start to get too familiar with his stuff and time him. It doesn't guarantee that your opener will never give up runs. That will obviously happen sometimes.

 

But that opener was a guy who was only going to pitch one inning anyway. You aren't trying to stretch him over as many innings as possible. So there is less reason to pitch him against lesser batters than a starter. Quite the opposite. You're wasting him against lesser batters, because whoever he faces is not going to see him a second time anyway. You want to make sure you don't waste your ace reliever against guys a lesser pitcher would have gotten out. And opening ensures that, in a way closing doesn't.

 

The bottom line is, why not? This way your opener--whether it's your ace reliever, or someone picked to neutralize the handedness of the people at the top of the order--gets matched up against the players of your choice, not some randos who happen to come to the plate in the 9th inning. Your starter maximizes the number of batters faced before their best hitters get the third-time-through-the-order advantage. And the downside is... what?

 

Edited September 20, 2018 by by jiminy