Rocco, Usage, and the Twins Bullpen

14 minutes ago, TwinsDr2021 said:

Kershaw was perfect though 7, quite a bit different than Archer gassed after 4 and high sixties in pitches.

Fried 7 -93

Buehler 5 - 79

Bumgarner 5 - 83

Josiah gray (who is this guy) - 5.1 - 87

Cobb - terrible in the 5 around 50 pitches

Megill - 6 -87

Cole Terrible, Det bullpen game

Wainwrigth 5.2 - 92

Luzardo - 4.1 - 88

Kikuchi -5 91

Eovaldi - 4.1 -95

Brubaker - 5 - 94

Burnes - 7 - 107

Rays/Cubs bullpen and terrible start

Sandoval - 4- 85

Valdez - 4.1 - 80

Gibson - 6- 90

Freeland - 5 - 87

Scherzer - 7-102, Web 3.2 -75

Ellis 4.1 -62 zero runs (Hey Baltimore has got the idea)

Irvin - 5 - 95

Sanmartin - 5.1 - 86

Musgrove - 6.1 -94

Gray 5 - 77 (4 runs),

Ray 6 - 85

That is the starters from yesterday and Twins fan are still using short spring training and cold weather, its gross!

 

 

 

Thank you!  For a long time now, I have thought I was a minority of one.  At least now I know there are two of us.    

3 minutes ago, chpettit19 said:

Again, Chris Archer signed on March 29th and made 1 spring appearance. This was his 3rd time pitching in any sort of game action. If your expectations are that a pitcher is totally stretched out by their 3rd appearance I think you're going to be pretty disappointed. I mean you just sent a list of a bunch of guys who threw 80 some pitches after having a "full" spring training and you're mad that the guy with basically no spring training could only throw 76 before coming out? Sorry, I'm not swayed by that.

You think that Walker Buehler guy is supposed to be a decent starter who goes deep into games? Only 5 innings and 79 pitches?! Is the rotation really where he belongs? Webb in the 2nd game of a double header could only go 3.2 on 75 pitches?! Should probably take him out of the rotation. I notice you left Cole's line out since he was bad and his manager pulled him before he gave up more runs. Weird that you find that acceptable, but Rocco pulling Archer after 1B, 1B, BB, BB in a 1 run game in the 5th is somehow unacceptable. Oh, and Alex Cobb got pulled for being "terrible in the 5th" which you don't seem to be complaining about even though he was only at 60 pitches. Sure glad the Twins didn't sign that guy cuz the rotation clearly isn't the spot for him!

His point might be, or if not his, mine, is that in today's game players have the finest conditioning, diet, trainers, facilities, etc. etc. on the planet.  They work out in the off season just like other professional athletes.  Pitchers, especially starters, should be on a throwing regimen year round to keep their arm in shape and "stretched out".  If a player/pitcher needs several weeks of gearing up before they can complete a single game, how do they survive a 162 game season?  Well, I guess they don't, at least not anymore, because they baby themselves more than any other era in sports.  And the teams apparently believe they have to as well.  

Players/pitchers today have more injuries just playing the game than any other cause.  Baseball is a tough game due to the nature of a 162 game schedule, but April shouldn't be the toughest month of all.  Spring training wasn't THAT short; the players knew the score and should have been in shape from the get go.  Just one man's extremely humble opinion. 

Well, amidst all the changes the Twins made, they still needed a bonifide closer. And if they had gotten one, Rogers would've been one of two solid setup guys (with hopefully Alcala surplanting Duffey in that role). 

But we basically have a bullpen of all middle inning guys. Some have decent skill sets, but we keep our fingers crossed if the game is close.

The joy is that there are a lot of bodies at AAA to run thru the system, depending on how far you wish to slip in the standings. And, at some point, you have to give the ball to THE FUTURE: Canoi, Moran, mabe Mason, possibly Gore...guys that you may expect to be around next season.

53 minutes ago, Mark G said:

His point might be, or if not his, mine, is that in today's game players have the finest conditioning, diet, trainers, facilities, etc. etc. on the planet.  They work out in the off season just like other professional athletes.  Pitchers, especially starters, should be on a throwing regimen year round to keep their arm in shape and "stretched out".  If a player/pitcher needs several weeks of gearing up before they can complete a single game, how do they survive a 162 game season?  Well, I guess they don't, at least not anymore, because they baby themselves more than any other era in sports.  And the teams apparently believe they have to as well.  

Players/pitchers today have more injuries just playing the game than any other cause.  Baseball is a tough game due to the nature of a 162 game schedule, but April shouldn't be the toughest month of all.  Spring training wasn't THAT short; the players knew the score and should have been in shape from the get go.  Just one man's extremely humble opinion. 

To clarify, my comments were not pointed at Archer, just using him as an example or them making bad decision.  It was pointed directly at the Twins MGMT. I assume Archer gave his all and it seemed to surprise the Twins he was done a bit prior to 70 pitches. And their plan was what for a pitcher that needs to be pulled after 70 pitches?

My point about posting pitch counts of other teams is that Ryan, Ober, Bundy all have been limited while other teams have been letting pitchers pitch, and Twins fans run cover for them.

Archer is still building endurance and throwing on the side is not the same as facing hitters. He looked really good for four innings and then it was totally obvious that he had lost both feel and command after two pitches in the fifth inning. It was painful to watch him struggle through the next three batters and he was elated to escape damage when Witt hit into a DP. I'm not sure what was going on in that inning. Was Rocco hoping Archer could complete five to get the W? For those who watched the game, he was toast and lucky his pitches stayed out of the strike zone for walks instead of being squared up. Archer should be good for 70-85 pitches next start if his arm is ok.

1 hour ago, USAFChief said:

Concur on all points, including Rocco being a hitter or two late removing Archer.

 

Personally I've been very encouraged by Archer's starts. He needs to develop durability and stamina, but he really should be finishing up spring training.  Hopefully that stamina comes, the pitch quality is impressive, IYAM.

Totally agree w/ you, I'm very impressed w/ Archer. Hardly pitching for 2 1/2 years w/ only 3 innings pitched in ST in which after he was pretty tired, and being able constantly pitch 4 strong innings is admirable. He has added velo to his FB, since basiclly missing ST, last night was more ST for him to work on his slider, which is improving to get more SOs.

Realistically I didn't expect him to pitch more than 4 innings but inwardly hoping he could qualify to win the game, while facing the bottom of the order. But after getting the 1st out it was quite obvious he ran out gass. There's nothing wrong w/ running out of gas, I expect Maeda to take a long time to pitch 5 quality innings when he comes back. 

It was understood that they'd piggy-back Archer as much as possible until he could build up his innings. Talk about putting Archer in the BP is ridiculous. He has been a SP all his career, he gets pumped up before he pitches, changing that would be very disadvantagious.

Archer is and will increasingly be a game changer, I don't like this negativism towards him it's very counter productive.

2 hours ago, Dman said:

While he can create matchups to help them be more successful in the end the players have to perform and the manager has to keep his players in a good state of mind to create as much consistency as possible.  I think Rocco does a decent job of that.

Is that why he brought Theilbar in to face Hernandez and Boegarts, two good right-handed hitters the other day against Boston? IMO that is not creating a matchup that favors Theilbar. 

6 minutes ago, tony&rodney said:

Archer is still building endurance and throwing on the side is not the same as facing hitters. He looked really good for four innings and then it was totally obvious that he had lost both feel and command after two pitches in the fifth inning. It was painful to watch him struggle through the next three batters and he was elated to escape damage when Witt hit into a DP. I'm not sure what was going on in that inning. Was Rocco hoping Archer could complete five to get the W? For those who watched the game, he was toast and lucky his pitches stayed out of the strike zone for walks instead of being squared up. Archer should be good for 70-85 pitches next start if his arm is ok.

With my math he was at 58 after 4, So basically he was maxed out around 60, Which means the Twins should have had a piggy back setup for him, and they didn't. That isn't on Archer, that is on Rocco, and Johnson.

13 minutes ago, Doctor Gast said:

It was understood that they'd piggy-back Archer as much as possible until he could build up his innings. Talk about putting Archer in the BP is ridiculous. He has been a SP all his career, he gets pumped up before he pitches, changing that would be very disadvantagious.

 

Two starts zero piggy backs so far and he pitched 4 a 4 1/3.

7 minutes ago, rv78 said:

Is that why he brought Theilbar in to face Hernandez and Boegarts, two good right-handed hitters the other day against Boston? IMO that is not creating a matchup that favors Theilbar. 

I wouldn't say that was a good matchup.  Thielbar has had a lot of trouble getting righties out IIRC.  If I had to guess I would say he had too much confidence in Thielbar in that situation.  When Caleb is on he can be tough on both sides but I do find that an odd situation to put him in early in the season.  Would love to know the thought process on that one.  Going with the gut instead of the numbers?  Or the numbers told him something about those matchups?  I will agree with you that on the surface that one doesn't look good.

2 minutes ago, chpettit19 said:

There is more time lost to injury now, yes. I guess I should've worded that differently. The MLB teams know what's best for getting the results they want for their organization. In terms of offseason work the teams are absolutely doing what's best for the players in an attempt to get as much out of them as they can during the season, but once the season starts it's about the organization and they don't want injuries, but are willing to deal with them to have the pitchers max out their stuff and performance.

I really don't want this to sound snarky, so bear with me please, but you are saying (I think) that MLB teams don't want injuries, but are willing to live with them to get as many good innings out of them before they get hurt as they can get.  I just don't see how that is what is best for the players, especially borderline players who will be left behind when they can no longer meet expectations, which they can no longer meet due to constant injuries, which they might not have had if...............does any of this even make any sense?  

When a starter throws everything they have into every pitch to get a batter out, yes, they will burn out faster than in the past; both in the number of pitches thrown and the number of innings pitched.  Then the pen will come in and use 2, 3, 4, dare I say 5 relievers each and every game.  And they will burn out, and............where does it end?  30 man rosters with 17 man pitching staffs?  With MLB mandated pitch and innings limits?  Anyone wonder why old schoolers question today's geniuses?  

12 minutes ago, TwinsDr2021 said:

With my math he was at 58 after 4, So basically he was maxed out around 60, Which means the Twins should have had a piggy back setup for him, and they didn't. That isn't on Archer, that is on Rocco, and Johnson.

Agree but the game plan likely is made from the private boxes. He was maxed out. We hope his arm felt good this morning.

3 minutes ago, chpettit19 said:

Twins starters have faced 205 hitters this year and that's including the Gray injury game otherwise it should be closer to 215. 215 batters faced over 11 games would put the Twins right smack dab in the middle of batters faced per start of the league at just over 19.5. The top team (Seattle) is at 22.3 batters faced per game. That's less than 3 extra hitters faced per game. You could argue it's 1 inning, but that's assuming those 3 batters are all retired so it's much more likely it's less than 1 extra inning pitched worth of hitters. 

Going by innings pitched per start the Twins are right smack dab in the middle of things even with Gray's injury game. San Diego is tops in starters innings per game and they're less than an inning ahead of the Twins, again, including Gray's injury game.

If you want to call me, and others, actually comparing trends over the first 9 to 13 games of each team's season "running cover for them" by all means have at it. I'm going to stick to the actual facts (the Twins are doing what everyone else is doing!) over confirmation bias by picking out 1 day's worth of pitch counts and trying to show the Twins are doing something wild by using Chris Archer as the example. The Twins starters are less than an inning different than the very top of the league by both batters faced and actual innings pitched and you're acting like they're doing something crazy. They aren't.

As stated above I used Archer as an example of bad decisions/planning by the Twins, not innings pitched or pitch count.

You are running cover by comparing things other than pitch count which is what I started at, if you actually believe the stats you put up mean the Twins are doing it the right way or the same way, or whatever it is being called, that totally ignores that the Twins starters are doing that while pitching less pitches, Bundy last time out 71 pitches a jump of 4 from the last time out, Ryan 82 which was a jump of 12, Ober 70 which was actually of drop of 12. I don't care about Archer pitch count because of signing late, injury, short spring training, Covid, blah blah blah. This thread was about Bullpen usage and I have been saying Rocco is terrible and using examples of not being prepared for a piggy back, removing a pitcher that is breezy though a game with 70 pitches to bring in a inferior pitcher, Or just flat out missing their starting pitcher is tired and bringing them back out only to pitch a 1/3 of an inning and get in trouble.

I can't stand Rocco and I know this jades my opinion, but I have been saying the same thing about him going back to 2019.

Agree with the OP about Duran. Pretty much don’t agree on Tyler and Caleb.

Come May the roster reduces to 26; likely 13 pitchers and 13 hitters. I’d have these 13 pitchers:

Archer, Bundy, Gray (when activated), Ober, Paddack, Ryan all stretched out to starter length.

Middle or post-starter situational: Duffey, Smith, Cotton (track him down, apologize, get him back), and one of Jax/Coulombe/Smeltzer.

Late (mostly single) innings: Minaya, Duran, Pagan

I also like the Thielbar story, but his stats last year stepped down from a terrific (and short) 2020. The arm is 35 now, speed is down, and the 3 batter minimum means no more cherry-picked lefties only. He simply is not good enough any more, and leaning on him is like leaning on Colomé last spring.

Duffey is in a similar boat, but has probably earned a bit more leash. I’d still only use him in mop-ups until (if) he figures it out, because he absolutely does not look like a good arm with the lower velocity.

Winder is probably one of the five best starters right now, but until he actually is put in the rotation, he should pitch for the Saints so he is fully ready when needed. Which will happen this year.

Barring injury, I’d guess Bundy or Paddack are most likely to pitch themselves into the second group, and Smith or Coulombe most likely to pitch themselves into the late inning picture. (But heaven help us if it is as closer.)

(In reality, the Twins probably keep Jax and don’t re-sign Cotton. Seriously, what happened there? They claim him early, he does well in ST, then gets waived after two scoreless innings against a good team?)

Send down/release Jax, Theilbar, Stashak, Romero. If they have options, fine. If they need waivers and get claimed, good for them. Bet most clear, though, and get a chance to redeem themselves with the Saints.

Duffy has shown some decline prior to this season but was showing some signs this season to be serviceable. But now he looks like a guy who just lost his best friend but wait he did. I'd place Duffy on low leverage until he works himself out of this downer.

BP was looking pretty good leaving ST, led by Rogers. Why did FO unstablize everything by trading him? for a SP that needed to be fixed after ST ended, that makes no sense. Rogers is a very likeable, talented and reasonable to be able to come up with a reasonable extention.

I was very encouraged by the talk of using extensively the piggy-back system because that means we be depending more on our long relief. But Baldelli likes to think of himself as a master chessman, moving around 5 short RPs to counter each circumstance. In theory it's great but in reality it won't work because you're using so many RPs and tend to favor those who are effective. The end result is the short RPs blow up because they're overextended, consquently we over extend our rotation in which they blow up. 

In the beginning of the 2019 season we had the best rotation and BP. Here they over extended their main high leverage BP and they blew up, so they over extended some SPs (Gibson, who was sick all season and Perez who was just brought up from the BP) and they blew up and the Twins limped acrossed the finish line doomed in the post season.

I'm advocating again, Baldelli quit your mindset of depending solely relying on short relief and shift your priority on long relief. Bring up Smeltzer and use Winder & others extensively in every game, rotate in AAA pitchers who are hot. This will keep our SPs and short RPs fresh and strong throughout the season, into the PS. Plus giving our pitching prospects a chance to get their feet wet.

When was the last time the twins community was happy with a twins manager's bullpen strategy and usage?

because I recall people being mad at Molitor for running a guy into the ground (Addison Reed?), running out a washed up vet (Matt belisle), etc. 

Gardy? Were we ok with Gardy, or did we blame him for sending out Wilson Ramos so he could have a proven closer? or was it for running a gassed Joe Nathan out for a 3rd inning?

Kinda feels like we always second-guess the bullpen.

8 minutes ago, jmlease1 said:

When was the last time the twins community was happy with a twins manager's bullpen strategy and usage?

because I recall people being mad at Molitor for running a guy into the ground (Addison Reed?), running out a washed up vet (Matt belisle), etc. 

Gardy? Were we ok with Gardy, or did we blame him for sending out Wilson Ramos so he could have a proven closer? or was it for running a gassed Joe Nathan out for a 3rd inning?

Kinda feels like we always second-guess the bullpen.

And always will, because we are the smartest guys in the room.      

22 minutes ago, Doctor Gast said:

Duffy has shown some decline prior to this season but was showing some signs this season to be serviceable. But now he looks like a guy who just lost his best friend but wait he did. I'd place Duffy on low leverage until he works himself out of this downer.

BP was looking pretty good leaving ST, led by Rogers. Why did FO unstablize everything by trading him? for a SP that needed to be fixed after ST ended, that makes no sense. Rogers is a very likeable, talented and reasonable to be able to come up with a reasonable extention.

I was very encouraged by the talk of using extensively the piggy-back system because that means we be depending more on our long relief. But Baldelli likes to think of himself as a master chessman, moving around 5 short RPs to counter each circumstance. In theory it's great but in reality it won't work because you're using so many RPs and tend to favor those who are effective. The end result is the short RPs blow up because they're overextended, consquently we over extend our rotation in which they blow up. 

In the beginning of the 2019 season we had the best rotation and BP. Here they over extended their main high leverage BP and they blew up, so they over extended some SPs (Gibson, who was sick all season and Perez who was just brought up from the BP) and they blew up and the Twins limped acrossed the finish line doomed in the post season.

I'm advocating again, Baldelli quit your mindset of depending solely relying on short relief and shift your priority on long relief. Bring up Smeltzer and use Winder & others extensively in every game, rotate in AAA pitchers who are hot. This will keep our SPs and short RPs fresh and strong throughout the season, into the PS. Plus giving our pitching prospects a chance to get their feet wet.

Please, doctor, no........I don't want to rely on long relief and Piggy backing, and a reliance on the BP to carry the load.  I want to rely on the starters, with the PB as a plan B, not a plan A.  Go all the way back to little league, then high school, then college, then low level pro ball.  Who were your best pitchers?  The starters, or the relievers?  Where does that change?  In upper lever pro ball?  Why?  Your starters are still your best pitchers, so why not let them pitch?  Rotating AAA pitchers in so your best major league pitchers don't strain themselves...............how has that worked out so far?  

I think this is a debate mostly between older guys and younger guys who never saw starters own their games.  And I don't know if it will ever end.............but it sure is fun.    

12 hours ago, ashbury said:

Even the best bullpen gives up some runs.  But now and then, elite arms do throw clean innings, i.e. start the inning, 3 batters faced, no runners. Put runners on, and over the long haul you won't dance out of trouble often enough.

Here's my count of relevant innings so far in 2022 (no credit for partial innings):

Duran: 6 chances, 2 clean innings

Smith: 2 chances, 0 clean innings

Thielbar: 4 chances, 0 clean innings

Coulomb: 2 chances, 0 clean innings

Duffey: 3 chances, 0 clean innings

Pagan: 3 chances, 2 clean innings

Romero: 3 chances, 0 clean innings

Jax: 3 chances, 0 clean innings

It's late, this was a very quick count and I could be missing a few.  Individually, it's all Small Sample Size.  Taken as a group, this bullpen is hittable, or else they walk batters.  Two guys, Duran and Pagan, have so far shown that they can take charge in the late innings.  Smith, maybe, but he's been given partial innings in the cases not mentioned that were clean.

Again, I'm looking at baserunners, not actual runs scored, because when you put runners on there will be variability.  It's the ability to keep the runners off that tracks, not the ability to somehow magically scatter those runners.

Rocco doesn't have the horses, not at this time.  It doesn't matter how you deploy your bullpen arms, when there are only two.  If things change for the better, later on, that's the time I'll look at how he deploys the resources.

 

 

This honestly isn't being talked about enough. The last clean inning was thrown by Winder Saturday, and it was his only one in 5 full innings of relief. They've gone three entire games now where at least one runner reached base every inning.