Prior to tomorrow's game we'll be posting the final NL Central interview. I had planned to post it this evening, but I thought I'd throw something else together.
Anyone who has read much of anything of mine over the years knows that I'm not one of those people who goes nuts over pitch counts. That doesn't mean I don't pay attention or that I don't think there are certain things that should be done. I do. My opinion is that you take the starter out after 3 times through the order unless he's an elite pitcher. That's basically the idea and I don't want to dive too much into it because it's not really important.
In today's 6-3 Opening Day loss to the Pirates, Ryan Dempster had what I'd call a so-so start. At times he looked excellent and he made a couple huge mistakes. In the end, Dempster allowed 6 runs in 6.2 innings. Mistakes happen. These won't be the only ones Dempster makes this season and the ones today aren't any more or less important than ones he'll make down the road.
In those 6.2 innings Dempster threw 114 pitches. The previous three seasons Dempster threw 91, 98 and 95 pitches in his first start of the season. It was rather cold today at Wrigley Field. It's been cold early in the season before in Chicago. I was kind of surprised to see that in 2009 Dempster's second start he threw 110 pitches. The following year he threw 114 in his second start. Last year he threw 120 in his third start and 111 in his next.
Not being injured in the past doesn't mean he's going to be injury free in the future, but it's clear he's thrown high pitch counts very early in the season in the past. My initial reaction was probably a little too negative. I'd have preferred Dempster not throw over 110 pitches today, but I generally don't like to see pitchers on the mound at 110 pitches anyway.
It's not because of the potential of injury down the road. It's because by that time pitchers are almost always working on the order the fourth time and the offense has a significant advantage at that point. I also understand that managers would don't tend to take that into consideration even though it's something Greg Maddux has talked about many times. So it's clearly something that is talked about amongst the players and/or coaches. I think managers prefer to use their starters in fear of their bullpen or in fear of having to use too many relievers in the future.
It's probably not a good idea, but I don't think it should have irritated me either. Dempster has handled it in the past and was certainly near or above 100 pitches in his next to last start in Arizona. I hope we don't see him throwing over 110 pitches in several consecutive starts, but until that happens I think I overreacted.
Comments
At least the Cubs will have company with the Rays in going 162-0 (dying laughing)
BerseliusQuote Reply
FWIW, the pitch count stuff doesn’t bother me as much as the fact that it was apparent that Demp was running out of gas in the 5th and 6th inning. I don’t have a problem with running him out again in the 6th, since Demp has had plenty of bad innings in the past that he’s bounced back from, but that McCutcheon HR was about as inevitable as they come.
BerseliusQuote Reply
[quote name=Berselius]FWIW, the pitch count stuff doesn’t bother me as much as the fact that it was apparent that Demp was running out of gas in the 5th and 6th inning. I don’t have a problem with running him out again in the 6th, since Demp has had plenty of bad innings in the past that he’s bounced back from, but that McCutcheon HR was about as inevitable as they come.[/quote]
If Demp had only 95 pitches, I still would have liked him pulled. But the fact that he was at 110 pitches gives even more credence to the idea that he was clearly out of gas.
Hector VillanuevaQuote Reply
What did Maddux say about the fourth time through the batting order? If I’m correct, you don’t like a starter going through the batting order the fourth time b/c you feel that a reliever would be more effective. I’m assuming that idea is the basis for Maddux’s discussions. Is the loss of effectiveness from the starting pitcher more due to fatigue (low velocity, less movement, less accuracy) or due to familiarization of the batter with the starting pitchers strategy at getting the batter out?
cdwQuote Reply
[quote name=Berselius]At least the Cubs will have company with the Rays in going 162-0 (dying laughing)[/quote]
It’s been a fantastic opening day. (dying laughing)
MishQuote Reply
[quote name=Manni Stats]It’s been a fantastic opening day. (dying laughing)[/quote]
I actually think one of the most fascinating storylines this season is whether the Rays can still compete with the Yankees and Rays after getting rid of several of their core pieces. Would really differentiate them from those A’s playoff teams.
Hector VillanuevaQuote Reply
cdw, I actually can’t remember what Maddux has said, but almost every time he got through the order 3 times he was out of the game. I wouldn’t say most times because that’s probably not true, but later in his career it is. Early in his career there’s a reason to leave him in the 4th time and that’s because it’s unlikely any reliever is going to better than Maddux in his prime even the 4th time through the order.
The Book showed that pitchers have a distinct advantage the first time through the order. This is why relievers perform better than they do as starters. The second time through the order it’s about even and the third time the hitters have a slight advantage. By the 4th time through the order the advantage is huge.
Interestingly, it doesn’t much matter if a batter has seen a pitcher 50 or 100 times before. it seems to be an in-game thing. Perhaps it’s the pitcher who is weakening though you’d think you’d see a gradual improvement throughout the lineup rather than a distinct change as the lineup turns around.
To go more into detail into what I would like it’s that you take the starter out when the average reliever on your team becomes as effective as that starter. Each pitcher is going to be different because they all have different talent levels, but none of the Cubs are so good that they should be in there for 120 or more pitches. The only exceptions in my opinion are blowouts and that’s something Maddux has talked about before too.
He’s said the time you want your starters stretching themselves out is when you have a big lead. It’s true. When it’s a close game you’re probably better off turning it over to some of the better relievers. A blowout game the starter can sit on cruise control and he gets to give the relievers a break with little chance of losing a game.
To be completely honest though, high pitch counts just don’t bother me. They bother me more early in the season and for younger pitchers, but looking over Dempster’s game logs in the past, there’s really no reason to be upset or irritated by him throwing that many pitches today. He’s shown he can handle it. Same thing with Zambrano, Garza and Wells. If Cashner is out there throwing 115 pitches in his first start, well, that’s just dumb.
mb21Quote Reply
Good stuff, mb. Even if it is nothing. I wad surprised how long Dempster stayed in there. But I was really impressed by Castro. That kid is fun to watch.
AndCountingQuote Reply
He really is, AC. I had forgotten how much fun. Great start for him as he tries to avoid the sophomore jinx.
mb21Quote Reply
I recall Randy Johnson going 130+ pitches many times during his Cy Young run, but he was a special case. I wonder if it depends more on the individual pitcher; by 130 pitches he’s probably gotten through the order at least four times and is getting ready for the fifth round. Maybe there are just true workhorses who can handle and adjust to the opposing lineup four or more times.
That’s just Randy Johnson though, I don’t know too many other pitchers who will throw that many pitches so many times in a row.
Rice CubeQuote Reply
Ichiro is good at baseball.
XoomwaffleQuote Reply
Johnson is one of those pitchers though that he could be facing the lineup the 9th time and he’s likely a better option than all but the ace relievers. Late 90s Pedro could have faced the lineup a billion times and been better than any reliever not named Mariano Rivera. (dying laughing)
I think there probably are true workhorses. I don’t think there’s any doubt about that, but pitching is an unnatural motion and it leads to injury.
That being said, I overreacted earlier. He’s done this before. No big deal. I basically wrote this so I could work through it a little bit in my head.
mb21Quote Reply
I think someone above said something about Dempster looking gassed. There may be something to be said for a pitcher “cruising” through 120+ pitches, yet at other times he could be “gassed” at 80. Might depend on how many pitches he had to get through in a certain inning as well. So I don’t think you necessarily overreacted, the consensus seemed to be that Dempster was left out there a bit too long. I can live with the first grand slam, but the second homer was sort of inevitable.
Rice CubeQuote Reply
Also, holy fuck Brandon Belt.
Rice CubeQuote Reply
[quote name=cdw] Is the loss of effectiveness from the starting pitcher more due to fatigue (low velocity, less movement, less accuracy) or due to familiarization of the batter with the starting pitchers strategy at getting the batter out?[/quote]
yes.
UrkQuote Reply
Actually, i don’t know what maddux said, but it seems to me that it’s all of those thing: batters getting used to a pitcher who’s not doing as good a job of executing the strategy that they are getting used to.
UrkQuote Reply
final nl central interview is up (new thread up): http://obstructedview.net/articles/major-league-baseball/nl-central-questions-a-answers-pittsburgh-pirates.html
mb21Quote Reply
A “so-so” start? 6 ERs in 6 and 2/3 innings? That’s an 8.10 ERA! If Dempster were to end the season with that ERA would you say he had a so-so season? He sucked yesterday.
Koenig, Raymond R.Quote Reply
If he were to end the season giving up over 8 runs per 9 innings there’s no way you could call it anything other than a disastrous season. He’d be getting hit all over the field all day long. However, just because you give up 6 runs in 6.2 innings in one start doesn’t mean it’s a terrible start. He made some mistakes, yes, but he also looked very good at times. If he gave up 8 runs per 9 innings he’d almost never look good. In fact, I’d say it’s an almost certainty he’d never look good because a pitcher who gives up that many runs can’t look good. He’s bad.
Furthermore, Dempster gave up 2 home runs and only 8 fly balls (1 of those was a line drive). That’s a home run per fly ball rate of 25%. No pitcher at the MLB level is ever going to allow home runs at that rate. How many times have you heard pitchers or teams say the pitcher threw well but the results weren’t there? I don’t think Dempster pitched well, but I also don’t think he pitched that badly either. If he continued to pitch as he did yesterday he’d end the season having allowed about 4.5 runs per 9 innings. A bit below average. It’s unlikely he won’t be better overall, but things aren’t often as simple as good start, bad start. And using the runs allowed isn’t the best way to determine that anyway.
mb21Quote Reply
I guess what I’m saying is what we know to be true: you can pitch well and still give up a lot of runs and you can pitch poorly while giving up few runs. It happens. A lot. Pitchers, managers, opposing players tell us about it. You can constantly miss your spot on the outside of the plate by 2 inches and have an umpire that calls a wide zone so the numbers look good. You can make your pitches and the batters can hit some little dinks and dunks and then capitalize in the inevitable mistake pitches. You can constantly be all over the plate and the batters fail to make hard contact. You can throw pitches down the middle while the batters get under it or pound it into the ground. These are all things that we know happens. 6 runs in 6.2 innings tells us a result. It doesn’t tell us anything other than the result. It tells us little about how well he pitched. Actually, by itself it tells us almost nothing in an individual game. If we’re 75 innings in and he’s given up 70 runs, well, then we have a much larger sample and can safely say he’s pitched horribly, but we can’t look at results in one game and determine the quality of the pitcher’s pitches.
He looked really good at times. He was mowing them down for awhile. Then he ran into trouble. He then had no trouble retiring them and then ran into trouble again. It happens. It’s part of baseball.
mb21Quote Reply
More importantly than whether or not Dempster pitched OK or terrible is that he had no chance of winning that game. When the offense scores 3 runs, you’re going to lose 90% of the time. When you score 3 runs against the quality of pitching they faced for most of the game yesterday the offense simply didn’t perform well enough to even think the team could have won. The problem here is that we know Dempster is better, but the offense is going to struggle all season long against right-handed pitchers. I think they’ll struggle to score 4 runs per 9 innings against them. Here’s to hoping the Cubs have a lefty start against them in about 100 starts. Without that, this offense sucks.
mb21Quote Reply
[quote name=Koenig, Raymond R.]A “so-so” start? 6 ERs in 6 and 2/3 innings? That’s an 8.10 ERA! If Dempster were to end the season with that ERA would you say he had a so-so season? He sucked yesterday.[/quote]
Yeah you’d say it sucked. But it’s one start in the very first game of the year. If Dempster goes out next time and goes 7 and only gives up two, he’ll cut that ERA by at least half.
I think Quade made his first mistake of the year by sending him out to start the 7th, and then not going to get him after Walker’s double in that inning. Granted he hadn’t fooled Walker all day, but he hadn’t fooled McCutchen either, and it was clear he was out of gas.
shadasrevengeQuote Reply