Beinfest Doesn't Care About the Bullpen; Reds Win 10-8 in 11

[Namaste]

2.5 games out of 1st after 8 games and as far as I'm concerned, 4-4 could have easily been 2-6. 8 games out by May 15th is incredibly realistic for me.


And keep in mind, I never said our rotation was perfectly fine. We're real good #1-#2 but after that it's a guessing game as to what type of performance we can expect from our starter. Tack on a lead off guy with a .200 OBP and blam, you have a team that has dug itself a huge hole.

[Bobbob1313]

Our bullpen has been far worse than anyone has a right to expect it to be going forward, and like you said, our lead off guy has a .200 OBP. Also, our defense has been worse than it likely will be and JJ and Ricky haven't been themselves yet.

You can say we've dug ourselves a hole and that we are lucky to be 4-4 and that we could be 8 games under by May and all that, but I think that's assuming that nothing improves. I don't see anyway the bullpen and defenses as a whole will be as bad as they have been, and Coghlan is likely to turn it around.

Right now, nobody has really over performed for us to be 4-4. We've lost 2 1-run games and we've won 3, so it's not a huge discrepancy there.

So yeah, worst case scenario, nobody improves, we keep playing exactly how we are and we might be 8 games behind the Phillies.

I'm still at the point where I think taking anything out of what we've seen so far is overreacting. If it's 8 games in June, nobody bats an eye. The first 8 games don't have to be any more indicative of the future than any random 8 game sample size you care to choose.

Regression to the mean works both ways. Extreme performances that are out of the ordinary or expected (ie. Coghlan's shittiness, bullpen's eraticness, etc. as well as Cantu's giant sackedness and Hanley's amazing OBP) can be expected to normalize when given enough of a sample size. We are still well within the small sample size time frame.

That being said, I'm not opposed to making moves based on that small sample size in certain cases. If they cut Jose Veras, I would not have a problem with that. He's never shown much, and he's looked very bad, so sure. If they give CC a day off, I'm fine with that. I just think it's far too early to expect what we've seen to continue, and it's too early to start freaking out.

[wanks1212]

Sanches has been phenomenal over the last 4 seasons at the minors and was pretty damn good last year in the majors.

I think people are optimistic because if he can come in and put up something like an 8.5 K/9, and a 2.5 K/BB ratio, and he replaces Veras, the pen looks a whole lot better by replacing whoever is performing worst with someone who can at least be average, and can probably be above average.

Sanches has been phenomenal over the last four minor league seasons, and in three of those four major league seasons he was dismal (WHIP no lower than 1.70). Yes, sample size, of course, but in three of his past four seasons, he wasn't good enough to stick in a major league bullpen. And last year, he had a strand rate of ~85%. Sustainable? Meh, maybe, but I'm gonna say probably not, since he's never put that type of rate together before and strand rate is kinda flukey.

also, I'd love Sanches to put up an 8.5 K/9 and 2.5 K/BB rate, but even last year, in his career season, his K/BB was just under 2 with a K/9 over 8. So yeah, not optimistic about him cutting down his walks enough to improve that control.

I agree with what Swift said, in that, yeah, Sanches gives this team better innings than Veras. But Sanches is also a "hope to catch lighting in a bottle" type of guy. If he improves a bit from last year (and with his age, count me as being doubtful on that), then yes, great setup man, but there's a pretty good chance that he has a letdown similar to the one Joe Nelson had after his career year here (when Nelson couldn't carry over his ~85% strand rate to the next year). In which case, Sanches is still better than Veras, but he's the easily replaceable 6th-7th inning type, which this team already has in spades.

Basically, the FO is counting on a guy who had one good season out of the last four, and did so in large part on the strength of a near league-best strand rate that's probably unsustainable, based on his prior history and strand rate flukiness in general. This guy solidifies the bullpen? Yeah, I'm not buying that.

[Flum]

I love you blowhards.

[Party]

Sanches has been phenomenal over the last four minor league seasons, and in three of those four major league seasons he was dismal (WHIP no lower than 1.70). Yes, sample size, of course, but in three of his past four seasons, he wasn't good enough to stick in a major league bullpen. And last year, he had a strand rate of ~85%. Sustainable? Meh, maybe, but I'm gonna say probably not, since he's never put that type of rate together before and strand rate is kinda flukey.

also, I'd love Sanches to put up an 8.5 K/9 and 2.5 K/BB rate, but even last year, in his career season, his K/BB was just under 2 with a K/9 over 8. So yeah, not optimistic about him cutting down his walks enough to improve that control.

I agree with what Swift said, in that, yeah, Sanches gives this team better innings than Veras. But Sanches is also a "hope to catch lighting in a bottle" type of guy. If he improves a bit from last year (and with his age, count me as being doubtful on that), then yes, great setup man, but there's a pretty good chance that he has a letdown similar to the one Joe Nelson had after his career year here (when Nelson couldn't carry over his ~85% strand rate to the next year). In which case, Sanches is still better than Veras, but he's the easily replaceable 6th-7th inning type, which this team already has in spades.

Basically, the FO is counting on a guy who had one good season out of the last four, and did so in large part on the strength of a near league-best strand rate that's probably unsustainable, based on his prior history and strand rate flukiness in general. This guy solidifies the bullpen? Yeah, I'm not buying that.

I know this has already been discussed at length, but this has been this FO's MO since 2006. Three of the starting 8 are lightning in the bottle types.

i don't buy it either, but if they do turn it around with a bunch of scrubs and has-beens I wouldn't be surprised either.

[nny]

also, I'd love Sanches to put up an 8.5 K/9 and 2.5 K/BB rate, but even last year, in his career season, his K/BB was just under 2 with a K/9 over 8. So yeah, not optimistic about him cutting down his walks enough to improve that control.

he had a ton of IBB (8). His uBB/9 was 2.88 compared to his BB/9 of 4.15.

The average IBB for that many TBF is 1.5. So if we give him 1-2 IBB instead of 8, that's K/BB of 2.55-2.68

[Chewford]

The FO really needs to learn that you need to give a damn about your bullpen to compete.

It is, in fact, an important part of the game. You can't just send a bunch of random people into spring training, pick the best 7, and hope everything works out. You need to put some effort and money into the damn thing. Otherwise, you're just demoralizing your entire team night after night by having their effort wasted by a bunch of tit mice who come in and blow the game every night.

And for the love of Hanley, this front office needs to realize that just because someone is a lefty doesn't mean they belong in the bullpen. You'd think they would've learned after Almanza, Perisho, Pinto, etc. but apparently their programming has no If statements.

[Bobbob1313]

You can't just send a bunch of random people into spring training, pick the best 7, and hope everything works out.

Ignoring, of course, the fact that that has worked really well for us over the last 3 years and is, all things considered, the most efficient way to build a pen.

Bullpen arms are extremely fungible. The only guys that are consistently great are the guys who make a lot of money. Pretty much everyone else varies between good enough and bad, and there's not a huge amount of difference between them.

So since everyone seems to agree that improving this bullpen in the offseason was such an obvious move that could have been solved by throwing a few million dollars at it, who would we have liked them to get in the offseason?

[kylekash]

As bad as the pen has been this season the Marlins had a good chance at winning the last two games. Bases loaded and one out... failed to get the winning run in. Bases loaded again yesterday failed to get the run in (although with two outs this time).

The bullpen has been all kinds of aweful, but with that being said we could be 6-2 right now with a couple key hits. It's still early and there is lots of time to work things out... Pinto was actually decent last night, but I am wondering how much longer until Veras is released? He has been a Jorge Julio type disaster.

[wanks1212]

And the problemw with the "lighting in a bottle" guys is that they usually don't carry over their performance from one season to the next.

[Party]

Ignoring, of course, the fact that that has worked really well for us over the last 3 years and is, all things considered, the most efficient way to build a pen.

Bullpen arms are extremely fungible. The only guys that are consistently great are the guys who make a lot of money. Pretty much everyone else varies between good enough and bad, and there's not a huge amount of difference between them.

So since everyone seems to agree that improving this bullpen in the offseason was such an obvious move that could have been solved by throwing a few million dollars at it, who would we have liked them to get in the offseason?

You can only go to the well so many times. It is like tearing up this team and expecting to find another Jorge Cantu, Dan Uggla and Cody Ross on the scrap heap just because it worked last time. You are setting yourself up to fail miserably.

[Bobbob1313]

When you don't have the resources (and Beinfest doesn't, regardless of whether Loria does), then this is the best way to go about building a pen.

I don't see any reason to assume it won't work again because of the most recent 8 games.

[kylekash]

Middle relievers in general are hit or miss. That's why most teams don't really want to sign any of these guys to long term deals or shell out a ton of cash for them. Look at Kiko Calero for example... he had a great season last year and the best he could do was a minor league deal... he didn't even make the team out of spring training!

Outside of the super elite relievers who generally tend to closers... there just aren't that many really good relievers. Most of them have a great season and then go on to suck for the next year or two.

Another example was JJ Putz last year. He was awful in NY after having a very good season with SEA the year before. It would be interesting to see which relievers in baseball have a huge contracts outside of closers, because I don't think it happens too often.

[Party]

When you don't have the resources (and Beinfest doesn't, regardless of whether Loria does), then this is the best way to go about building a pen.

I don't see any reason to assume it won't work again because of the most recent 8 games.

I don't see any reason to assume it will work again.

[Bobbob1313]

Because within our organization, we have enough live arms that eventually, a solid pen will come together. It was ugly at the beginning last year until guys stepped up.

I fully believe that between nunez, meyer, pinto, veras, meyer, hensley, badenhop, Tucker, RVH, Leroux, sanches, tankersley, strickland, and Ceda, along with the handful of waiver additions we generally add, we will find 7 moderately consistent arms.

You're not going to get a lights out everytime bullpen with this method, but if you accept their volatility as an inherent part of their being and treat them acccordingly (which we generally do) you can have success. It just takes a few (or more) blowups by the assholes before you find the right mix.