KC 5, MIN 2: Molitor Pushes All the Wrong Buttons in Loss

I really hope Molitor would manage elsewhere next season. Sometimes his decision does not make any baseball sense.

Pressly and Duffey should not pitch in any close game. Perkins, Boshers and Turley should not be on any major league roster. Tonkin and Curtiss can not be trusted. This bullpen is probably the worst in the league right now.

"Sometimes a manager pushes all the right buttons and pulls all the right levers and things still just don’t work out. This doesn’t feel like one of those times, at least not to me. Is hindsight 20/20? Am I way off base? You’ll have to let me know."

Not way off base.   Maybe blamed Boshers too much and Pressley not enough.   Apparently Pressley has occasionally been good because I have read about it but have never seen it.   Maybe I need to turn away when he comes in.  

Some of it is luck.   Catro 3 at bats and only one mattered.   In the two that didn't matter he got hits and popped up in the one that did.   Maybe a little bad luck but more a bad slide that got Rosario out stealing the first time.  If base hits had scored the runners that were sacrificed over and Pressley had done his job maybe we would feel differently about it so some of it is on the players and some of it is hindsight but I think enough TD fans were saying No! at Molitor's moves before they happened to rule it all to hindsight.

Can't blame Molitor for the bullpen. It's absolutely terrible, save Belisle (lately), Rogers (maybe), and Hildenberger. As much as it seems like he has, he can't use those two guys every night.

Can't defend some of this guy's decisions to bunt Polanco. It's getting a little ridiculous.

Add Busenitz to that list above

Considering we had a self inflicted and self described burnt out BP, I don't think I ever saw anyone manage? an inning in a more bizzare fashion? There are a lot of games left, sometimes when things go south you just let them go and move on to tomorrow. Lastly, some have pointed to his "dartboard" lineups as his embracement of analytics, but Molitors bunt phobia begs to differ.

  On 9/10/2017 at 4:27 AM, jun said:

I really hope Molitor would manage elsewhere next season. Sometimes his decision does not make any baseball sense.Pressly and Duffey should not pitch in any close game. Perkins, Boshers and Turley should not be on any major league roster. Tonkin and Curtiss can not be trusted. This bullpen is probably the worst in the league right now.

I have zero issue with anyone unsatisfied with the in-game managing, but the comments above read like more of a critique of bullpen composition. That ain't on the manager.

Didn't catch much of the game last night, but fro what I did see...

What a terrible slide by Rosario when he got nabbed by Perez just prior to Buck's dinger. Jeezus H, keep contact with the base. Really, it's not difficult.

That CS may have been one of the best I've ever seen on one of the toughest pitches to handle. Man, Perez is some kinda catcher.

The bunting is just plain dumb.  Playing for one run in the early innings?  Baffled.

But the bullpen....

It's a close game.  You have a chance to win, a very good chance.

You could tell he didn't want to use Rogers/Busenitz/Hildenberger, so he brings in the B-squad. 

Problem is, he had to use Rogers and Busenitz anyway. 

Much rather start the inning with those guys and have a chance to win than use them after the game has already been lost.

Is this one of those things where good managing goes unnoticed, but bad managing sticks out like a sore thumb. It's easy to point at one game and throw Molly under the bus, but I'm rarely thinking, 'wow, what a great move'in any of his games.

How much credit can we give to Molitor for our young players development? Is he pushing the right buttons or is it just our young guys figuring it out? If you can credit Molly for any of the turn around it would be tough to fire him.

  On 9/10/2017 at 1:26 PM, Seth Stohs said:

One might argue that if that second paragraph is all true, then Molitor should probably be manager of the year for getting a team with that big of an issue late in games to a point where on September 10th they have a 2-game lead for the 2nd wild card and are 6-7 games over .500.

Seth, Molitor, if I remember correctly, was brought in because Gardenhire was to "old school" and not keeping up with the changes in the way the game is managed. 

Yet, I can point to more than a few games where Molitor did old-school managing rather than doing something a little different.

For instance, in a couple of games, Molitor could have given up the DH, late in the game, so he had the best defensive alignment available in the field. Moves that, had Molitor made them, could very well have been the difference between winning and losing.

And the constant bunting thing, especially with some of the hottest hitters the Twins have, is ridiculous.

Bill James online did a study on bunting and came to the conclusion the chances of scoring from 1st or 2nd is about the same, percentage wise and sacrificing the runner over is a waste of a very precious commodity, outs.

See here: http://www.billjamesonline.com/stats33/

  On 9/10/2017 at 1:26 PM, Gold15 said:

Going into the eighth inning, game tied and what Molitor had available in the bullpen, did he really think one run would be enough to win the game? Did he think his bullpen could get six outs without giving up a run? Everyone on this forum knew they answer to that , except for Molitor. The question I have is, are the Twins doing this well despite Molitor? What is in the bullpen is not his fault, but he needs to think outside the box sometimes and stop reading from a script. I just wish he would stop with all of the bunting.

The bullpen has held countless leads this year for which they generally do not get much credit.   No one ever knows if one run is enough but it is reasonable to play for 1 run in the 8th inning.    The issue many have on here is that playing for 1 run, based on statistics and probability, is not enhanced by sacrificing an out by your #3 hitter to get the guy to second.    In Molitor's defense, if he gets his run in the 8th perhaps he uses hit bullpen differently in the bottom of the inning.    I would give the bullpen decent grades in holding leads late in games.    In a tie game you still have to imagine that it will go extra innings .   Of course using 5 guys in one inning doesn't further that theory.