Late Inning Gas is Coming. Get Ready

Not 100 mph but I get more excited when I hear about nasty stuff than just pure heat.    In the early to mid 2000 decade we had Romero, Rincon, Santana, Hawkins, Guardado, Crain, Guerrier and Nathan which was pretty exciting and if you look at some of their ERA's in that time you will understand why.   I remember in that time period Konerko getting mad at the White Sox for their lack of urgency in early innings because the Twins were lights out in the later innings and that the bullpen was the difference between the two teams.    High velocity can reduce the margin of error but not if you can't control it and not if you don't have a quality secondary or third pitch.    Like I said 100mph doesn't excite me.   Give me a guy with great control, a good fastball, a knee bending curveball or changeup  and a nasty slider.    If the fastball is 100 mph then all the better but not mandatory.  Runs allowed is still the yardstick.

Throwing a fastball 100mph is like hitting a homerun 500ft. Hitting the ball 350ft may accomplish the same thing, be just as effective, but it's still awesome to see someone hit a ball 500ft. It's true that great control, a good fastball, a knee bending curveball/change and a nasty slider are all more important qualities/attributes in a pitcher. It's true that for 100mph to be effective, it has to be accompanied by some level of control, and maybe even life. But I think people are underestimating how hard it is to hit a pitch that fast. The difference between 94mph and 98mph is pretty significant in terms of just catching up, even if you know it's coming. Countless times I've seen entire sides retired on hard fastballs alone. And you really only need about 50% control. For a hitter to even get a piece at 100, he has to commit so early, mentally and physically. All that being said, what's more exciting to me about the hard heat in the system right now, is that it signals a change in the organization. It shows a recognition that at least a few power arms are needed to succeed in the league today, especially in the playoffs. It's not important that they throw that fast, it's just cool that a few of them do. Lastly, I think that most promising of our minor league relievers (Burdi, Chargois, Melotakis, Reed, Zack Jones) do have solid to plus second offerings (mostly sliders) and from what I've read, command isn't a glaring issue for any of them. So c'mon man, get excited about some minor league relief pitchers, dammit. 

I would like to see our Ace reliever come in whenever there are men on base and less than 2 outs*  Stop the bleeding should be #1 priority.  Setup and closing are important, but I want our best reliever to stop the rallys.

*This can be any inning where the manager decides to pull a pitcher because of inefectiveness.

 

 

Right now, your evaluation of these guys is relying an awful lot on rookie league or A-ball stats of college pitchers (and perhaps too much on inconsistent or "peak" radar gun readings as well).  

 

Well, I really haven't done any evaluating at all. I relied on brief scouting reports included in various organizational prospect lists, and was probably most influenced by Kiley McDaniel's recent list on fangraphs. Honestly, I barely even glanced at any of their stats at all. I think it's interesting that relievers would be displacing starters and position players on prospect lists. I think it takes a lot for minor league relievers to gain attention. I don't usually pay much attention to them. When I check the minor league box scores, I see everything, but I really only take note of the starter's performance and if anybody hit a jack or went 3 for 3 or something. I don't really care that much if Anthony Slama threw a scoreless 9th for a save. My point is, that based mostly on glowing scouting reports, this group has forced my attention. 

It was interesting to read the Sickle grades that you posted. I hadn't looked at those. Do you have a link for that info? I'm more familiar with the 80 point scale. Are the grades relative to that? 

Advanced stats have provided so much useful information over the last 20 years that I am shocked that the role of the closer hasn't been exposed.  This theory just seems to still be in the dark ages when you compare it to other aspects / theories of baseball.  I strongly advocate that your best relief pitcher should be used in your most important situations, regardless of the inning.

How great would it be to have 3-4 (especially if one or two were lefties) guys who throw gas and you could bring them in mixed and matched with the situation.

Obviously the closers and their agents like the 9th inning specialist role. I think the managers like it too, in large part because it takes that decision out of their hands, and they aren't criticized for bringing in the wrong guy if that guy is always the same guy.

The establishment of roles among relievers is way overblown, IMO. The closer knows his role, but the set-up man has the same role regardless- come in late to a game when you need some outs. The only difference for them is that they know it won't be their time to come in if the team has a three-run or less lead in the ninth inning.

OK, back on topic... 

Are you suggesting that closer effectiveness diminishes more than that of set-up men?  I don't think that's clear at all.  If you've seen a study or something to that effect, I would be interested, but I think any general effect one might suspect in that regard would be drowned out by much larger effects (different pitch repertoire, platoon splits, even marginal differences in pitcher quality, etc.).

 

I think the key distinction, in terms of hitter preparation (and adjustment), is simply between starters and relievers.  Among relievers, I doubt there is a constant effect.

I wasn't clear about that. I think most teams have, or try to have, an established closer; but that the role of set up man can be a revolving door. If a team has an established set up man, then I think the same suggestion would apply to him as to closers. The idea is just that the more times a hitter sees a pitcher, the more informed he is. Divisional opponents will face Glen Perkins many times throughout the season, perhaps more than other late-inning guys; and, they know they will face him in a high leverage 9th inning. I think that those are two advantages for hitters in terms of preparation. If there was an established 8th inning guy, the advantage in preparation would be the same. But, I have not seen a study to this effect. It is a hypothesis. And, what I'm suggesting really only makes sense if the pitchers we're talking about turn out to be of comparable quality at the MLB level. They would be interchangeable regardless of inning, with some attention to platoon splits.

For example: I think that Wade Davis and Greg Holland were probably interchangeable in terms of quality for the Royals, and that Herrera was close. But let's say you're facing the Royals in a close game, maybe down one or two runs in the sixth or seventh inning. You anticipate that your at bat will come in the 8th inning, and you expect to face Davis. I think that you start mentally preparing for that match-up, while you're in the field, and while you sit in the dug-out. You go over the scouting report, you recall previous at-bats against him, etc. But when your at-bat does come, in the 8th, it's Holland instead of Davis. I'm not saying that you're rendered suddenly helpless, or even unprepared, but I think you do lose a slight margin of the advantage you were developing through the mental preparation. And, that slight margin could be significant. But I don't really know how hitters prepare. I'm sure that it's entirely individual. It would be interesting interview content.

 

 

I didn't mean to nitpick, but it's just my natural reaction when I see a list of low minors guys.  The Twins could be sitting pretty in 2017-2018 if a number of them pan out, although by that point our bullpen may be completely turned over -- not sure if we'd really have a surplus to do anything unorthodox with.

Nitpicking is good here. It's a bit of a far out idea, and I mostly wrote about it to get more of a sense of how far out it might be. If somebody else had written it, I'd probably be saying the same stuff. It probably would've been prudent to wait until all these guys have their assignments to start the season; then we'd have a better sense of how close or far they really are, but I was thinking about it now, and wanted to talk about it now.

Here is the Sickels link -- it's just his top 20 Twins prospect list, so you may have seen it already:

http://www.minorleagueball.com/2014/11/8/7157261/minnesota-twins-top-20-prospects-for-2015-sickels

 

Are you referring to the following Kiley McDaniel piece?

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/evaluating-the-prospects-minnesota-twins/

 

 

Thanks, and yep.

One potential, significant obstacle to any non-traditional bullpen ideas that people have been raising here is the concern that players (and their agents) are attached to the traditional roles- for financial reasons, but also for preparation/routine/comfort reasons, and that managers are also possibly attached to recent tradition for the same reason.

I did mention these briefly in the article, and think they are probably overcome-able. Do people think they are not? 

I think it would be weird to ask somebody like Perkins who has been the closer for a few seasons now, and performed well in the role, to suddenly do something unorthodox. But I think it's a much more manageable concept when talking about new major leaguers (actually guys still in the minors) who would probably do just about anything for a cup of coffee. I also think that with Ol' Ron G, the idea would've been totally laughable, but, well, he ain't here no more. We got ourselves a rookie manager, folks; the sky's the limit!