Sabathia chokes, does nothing to prevent Brewers playoff loss

FIRE SABATHIA

LINCECUM FOR NL CY YOUNG!!!

by world dictator on Oct 1, 2008 9:20 PM EDT 0 recs

A-Rod, however, grounds into a double play.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Oct 1, 2008 9:54 PM EDT 0 recs

And Barry Bonds strikes out repeatedly.

by peter m on Oct 2, 2008 10:17 AM EDT up 0 recs

CC gets to pitch again Thursday on 3 days rest

by palcal on Oct 2, 2008 1:14 AM EDT 0 recs

Speaking of the playoffs, I was sorry to see Derek Lowe have a good outing, in a way. I was hoping he’d struggle a bit, so that we’d have a better chance of signing him as a free agent starter. If he turns into Josh Beckett, that plan would obviously have to be abandoned.

by peter m on Oct 2, 2008 11:20 AM EDT 0 recs

Pedro’s available.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Oct 2, 2008 3:00 PM EDT up 0 recs

So’s Pavano, I’d imagine!

Actually, the more I think about it, the more I’d like Jamie Moyer.

by peter m on Oct 2, 2008 3:33 PM EDT up 0 recs

So is Paul Byrd. I find it interesting that Byrd’s 08 year was just as good as his 07 year and much better than his 06 year. Seriously, he is worth a look.

by oxforddave on Oct 2, 2008 5:42 PM EDT 0 recs

i blew that prediction, big time

by APV on Oct 2, 2008 7:46 PM EDT up 0 recs

What the heck happened? He looked so awful at first, like his career was a start or two away from over. Then he was just bad. And then he wound up pretty decent. What, did he find a new “dentist”? Jeeze.

by jhon on Oct 2, 2008 8:16 PM EDT up 0 recs

Story I heard was he talked about his curve ball with Bert Blyleven when the Indians were playing the Twins.

by odradek on Oct 2, 2008 9:21 PM EDT up 0 recs

The first comment of the gamethread over at BrewCrewBall.com

CC is coming he is going to rescue us

He will smite our enemies and bring us a victory ;)

if loving CC is wrong, I don’t want to be right

by APV on Oct 2, 2008 7:55 PM EDT 0 recs

i was just looking over that thread. they really had no idea.

Travis Hafner is overrated. Clarity is underrated. David Dellucci is David Dellucci.

by westbrook on Oct 2, 2008 8:39 PM EDT up 0 recs

lower down in the thread, from our friend battlekow:

What the fuck

Since when does CC not have the stuff to strike out Brett F. Myers?

by APV on Oct 2, 2008 7:58 PM EDT 0 recs

It’s like no one paid attention to what happened to Wang last year in the playoffs.

Pitching on 3 days rest against a playoff-caliber team is a recipe for disaster.

by Toxicadam on Oct 2, 2008 8:15 PM EDT up 0 recs

I’d need to be presented with some pretty compelling evidence before I’m convinced pitching on 3 days rest is bad.

I’m having trouble finding anything on B-R.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Oct 2, 2008 8:31 PM EDT up 0 recs

Apparently overlooking the 1999 ALDS.

by Jay on Oct 2, 2008 10:38 PM EDT up 0 recs

Are you talking about Pedro?

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Oct 2, 2008 11:00 PM EDT up 0 recs

No. The decision to throw Colon on 3 days rest in game 4 was a horrible choice

by Roger Dorn on Oct 3, 2008 7:56 AM EDT up 0 recs

Ah, of course. Pedro pitched on 4 days rest in that series anyway. I wished I had looked it up instead of trying to go by memory.

Still.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Oct 3, 2008 11:15 AM EDT up 0 recs

Well, mostly correct. Pedro was removed in game 1 with an injury and it was thought he wouldn’t be able to pitch the rest of the series. He came out of the bullpen fairly early in game 5 surprisingly and shut us down for the remainder of the game.

Probably the second most devastating game for me as a Tribe fan as I was convinced we were watching the greatest offense in baseball history.

by Roger Dorn on Oct 3, 2008 11:47 AM EDT up 0 recs

Yeah, I was at that game. Don’t forget Kenny Lofton writhing in pain after sliding headfirst into first base.

Worst. Game. Ever.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Oct 3, 2008 11:53 AM EDT up 0 recs

right up there with game 7, 97 for me

by APV on Oct 3, 2008 12:32 PM EDT up 0 recs

Well of course, but I was referring to games in attendance. Second would probably be 2001 ALDS when we had a chance to lock it up and Bartolo tried to pick Ichiro off of second base and air-mailed it into center. Boy that sucked.

But nothing compares to that 99 ALDS game.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Oct 3, 2008 12:39 PM EDT up 0 recs

I was at that M’s game, man that was a depressing game

by Roger Dorn on Oct 3, 2008 12:53 PM EDT up 0 recs

That was one of the very best offenses in history, but Pedro was one of the greatest pitchers in history for 1999 and 2000. Clash of the titans.

We lost that series in Game Three, when Hargrove brought Jaret Wright in from the bullpen and threw away a game in which we had the advantage.

by Jay on Oct 3, 2008 12:35 PM EDT up 0 recs

A couple of months ago I was looking at Pedro’s 1999 and noticed he had one intentional walk. I went through gamelogs to find it. It turns out it was against Montreal and the batter was Vladimir Guerrero, who slugged .600 that year.

I love when players are awesome.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Oct 3, 2008 12:42 PM EDT up 0 recs

Yeah, I’ll never forget that decision.

I think that the 1999 Indians blowing that series may be the most overlooked “terrible loss” by Cleveland fans. That loss hurt more than the ‘97 loss to the Marlins for me because that team was soooo awesome (mainly the offense). I really thought we were going to win it all that year. Our top 3 hitters all had OBP over .400!! (From my memory — I didn’t look that up)

The best thing probably is to hit [Grady] 2nd -- Jay

by Buckeye Brad on Oct 3, 2008 5:39 PM EDT up 0 recs

Mainly the offense? How about only the offense?

Our rotation was okay, but the bullpen was a wreck that season.

by Jay on Oct 3, 2008 8:46 PM EDT up 0 recs

I didn’t remember the bullpen that year, but I knew that we had some decent starting pitching (Colon, Nagy, Burba).

Looking at BB-Ref, I’m not sure about your statement that the bullpen was a wreck. I know that ERA doesn’t measure relievers very well, but here are the main relievers that year and their ERA+: Jackson 123, Shuey 142, Reed 119, Rincon 113, Assenmacher 61, Karsay 169). Doesn’t seem awful.

Also, I was wrong about the top 3 hitters (Omar’s OBP was .397), but FIVE starters did have OBP over .400 (Thome, Alomar, Justice, Lofton, Ramirez). And Manny’s SLG was .663!! Simply awesome.

The best thing probably is to hit [Grady] 2nd -- Jay

by Buckeye Brad on Oct 4, 2008 12:45 PM EDT up 0 recs

Burba and Colon were good but not great — that was our 1-2 punch. Nagy was #3 and doing his poor-man’s Livan thing — 33 starts, 202 IP, league-average ERA. Wright and Gooden both had ERAs over 6.00, which is not good for your 4th starter, even in that year’s inflated run environment. It was a rotation capable of adequacy in the postseason and not much more.

As for the bullpen, ERA+ can be deceiving. You expect any key relievers to be better than league average at a minimum, as league average is actually below average for relievers. You also expect your LOOGY and ROOGY to be a lot better than that, as they’re being used in platoon spots the great majority of the time.

So here’s what we really had:

• Closer @ 4.06, 123 ERA+. Like Wickman in a bad year.
• Setup guy @ 3.51, 142 ERA+. Good, like Perez ‘08, but nothing to write home about.
• LOOGY #1 @ 8.18 ERA and disabled list. Awful.
• LOOGY #2 @ 4.43, 113 ERA+. This is actually pretty bad, not much better than Aaron Fultz 07.
• ROOGY @ 4.23, 119 ERA+. Also pretty weak — this guy is a submariner, he’s supposed to be better at getting righties than this.
• Rookie sensation @ 2.97, 169 ERA+. The high effective reliever we had that year.
• Bunch of other guys @ league average.

Total disaster? I guess not, but not good either. Not as good as 2007, and 2007 was not that great.

by Jay on Oct 4, 2008 3:30 PM EDT up 0 recs

Alright, thanks for the breakdown. Like I said, I knew that ERA wasn’t a good judge for relievers, so I didn’t know how to look at ERA+, but on first glance they looked good to me. But I see what you’re saying.

Looking at those stats also made me remember how dominating Steve Karsay was for a couple years. Then he was traded to Atlanta for John Rocker (which turned out awful for Cleveland) and signed a big contract with the Yankees. He was great in ’02, then he got injured, right? Anwyays, he sucked after that. Too bad — he looked promising with the Indians.

The best thing probably is to hit [Grady] 2nd -- Jay

by Buckeye Brad on Oct 4, 2008 5:27 PM EDT up 0 recs

Wasn’t Sean Depaula highly effective for the Tribe late in the season and then even in the postseason? This is going vaguely off memory, I need to look up if he even pitched then

by Roger Dorn on Oct 4, 2008 9:02 PM EDT up 0 recs

Yes, I think you’re right; then he got hurt and essentially vanished.

by peter m on Oct 5, 2008 3:19 PM EDT up 0 recs

His first game was a disaster (3 walks and 4 ER in a third of an inning), but after that he was really good (7 H, 2 R, 18 K, 0 BB in 11 innings). He got hurt in 2000, and his attempt at coming back in 2002 didn’t work out. One of those footnotes that baseball history is full of.

by FredOx on Oct 6, 2008 9:51 AM EDT up 0 recs

As soon as Burba came out with the sore forearm, I figured the Indians were going to lose. Hargrove believed he had a good advantage and could afford to give Jaret a little confidence-builder. He let up a bit when he should have kept his foot on the neck of the Bostons.

by odradek on Oct 4, 2008 2:24 PM EDT up 0 recs

It’s funny you bring this up. I was getting into an argument with a Brewers fan about how they were using CC.

So, around the time of last year’s LCS, there was major discussion about who to pitch in Game 4. Many Indians fans thought it was a huge mistake to run Byrd out there when you could have had CC on short rest and then come back with Carmona on short rest. Well, you know the end result.

So, I went back to some of my old posts and I had posted these stats:

an article on MLB.com says that “since 1995 when the wildcard was introduced, pitchers are 5-7 when brought back on 3 days rest.”

Pitcher Year IP H ER W-L Team Result
Tim Hudson 2005 7 6 3 ND L
Roger Clemens 2004 5 6 2 ND L
Johan Santana 2004 5 7 2 ND L
Tim Hudson 2003 6.2 10 3 ND W
Russ Ortiz 2003 5 7 2 W W
Jarrod Washburn 2002 5 6 1 W W
Tim Hudson 2002 3.1 5 2 L L
Tom Glavine 2002 7 7 7 L L
Roger Clemens 2001 5 6 6 L L
Bartolo Colon 1999 1 6 7 L L
Shane Reynolds 1999 5 9 4 L L
Randy Johnson 1997 8 7 3 L L
Mike Mussina 1997 7 2 1 W W
David Wells 1996 6.2 8 4 W W
Charles Nagy 1996 5.1 9 7 L L
Chris Bosio 1995 2 4 5 ND W
Greg Maddux 1995 7 10 4 W W

You can now add Wang and CC in the loss column. (Were there any other pitchers last year brought back on 3 days rest?). So, that means 5-9.

When you consider the skill level of these names above me, that’s pretty damning evidence against.

—- —-
Found this tidbit, from last year:

Eric Wedge today, on pitching CC on short rest:

And one thing we’ll never do, I don’t give a damn what the situation is, we’re not going to put our players in harm’s way. We’re not going to put them in a position for something like that to happen. The only way we would have even considered it for some reason, he had a very short outing and didn’t throw very many pitches the first game

by Toxicadam on Oct 3, 2008 3:10 AM EDT up 0 recs

Looking more into it, that might be playoffs only. There were other pitchers that have done it in the World Series that are not on that list (Randy Johnson and Beckett for one).

by Toxicadam on Oct 3, 2008 3:23 AM EDT up 0 recs

Per B-ref, here’s the list of starters pitching on short rest in the postseason since 1995 (defining short rest here as <=3).

by FredOx on Oct 3, 2008 10:59 AM EDT up 0 recs

Hey, there’s Jaret Wright, 1997 ALCS! And as we all know, he never had any arm problems after that …

by Jay on Oct 3, 2008 11:04 AM EDT up 0 recs

I guess all I can do is point you here and reiterate that Keith Woolner and a bunch of guys that get paid to do this disagree that pitching on short rest is dangerous.

One thing we have learned is that for starting pitchers, how many days off they get between starts does not seem to correlate with injury risk. This series of articles carefully looks at the track record of pitchers working in a four-man rotation vs. pitchers in a five-man rotation, and finds that pitchers who worked in a four-man rotation stayed just as healthy as pitchers working every fifth day. It also showed that a pitcher working on three days of rest is no less effective than when he works on four days of rest, and in fact that he might have better command on less rest.

What seems to matter isn’t how often a starter pitches, but how much he pitches when he does take the mound.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Oct 3, 2008 11:27 AM EDT up 0 recs

That very well may be true. But I think the point, which Jay mentioned earlier, is that throwing pitchers on three days rest in the playoffs after a whole season of pitching on four days rest is different that pitching on three days rest the whole season. The sudden change in usage might do two things: reduce their effectiveness and increase their injury risk.

Now, I have absolutely no idea if this is true. But I think it’s a valid point to consider. I believe Woolner’s study was about using a 4-man rotation for the season, not pitching on short rest at the end of the season.

The best thing probably is to hit [Grady] 2nd -- Jay

by Buckeye Brad on Oct 3, 2008 11:36 AM EDT up 0 recs

If that’s the case I’ll concede at least that it’s a crapshoot and for certain pitchers who become unnerved without their regular routine (and I’m sure that’s a lot of them) a sudden switch can produce bad results. But I disagree that “pitching on 3 days rest=bad results.” We’ve seen it work and we’ve seen it fail.

I don’t think you can just say “Jaret Wright pitched on 3 days rest, therefore 3 days rest is to blame for Jaret Wright’s arm problems.”

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Oct 3, 2008 11:44 AM EDT up 0 recs

It’s not really about being unnerved. They’ve been honing their four-days-rest routine literally for years, sometimes as many as hundreds of starts in the minors and majors. They know what they need to do on which rest days, and how much, and how long, etc. They are calibrated for the routine of recovering from one start and strengthening for the next.

They may or may not know how best to translate that to having one fewer rest day, but the one thing for sure is, their whole bodies used to one thing, and now they’re doing another thing. In addition, their whole approach to pitching, all their muscle memory, is attuned to where their body is typically on four days of rest. Even if they can be just as healthy on a three-day-rest routine — even if they could be just as effective — that is simply not the body their accustomed to controlling. And perhaps nothing in sports demands more finely tuned control of the body than being a pitcher.

by Jay on Oct 3, 2008 12:00 PM EDT up 0 recs

I certainly agree if anyone was going to have the balls to really reintroduce a 4-man rotation, it would have to start at the minors and take years to work up. And I guess it would have to be a low-budget team that doesn’t bring in many FA pitchers.

The 2003 Royals tried it for most of the year. It worked great at first, and then they all flamed out. But they were throwing waaay too many pitches per start. It seems (although we’ll never know) that had they been kept under responsible pitch counts it would have paid off.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Oct 3, 2008 12:07 PM EDT up 0 recs

Well put. If you’re in a four-man rotation, then pitching on three days of rest isn’t “short rest,” it’s regular rest.

by Jay on Oct 3, 2008 12:08 PM EDT up 0 recs

But I still say it’s a crapshoot. Look at CC’s starts leading up to this last one.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Oct 3, 2008 12:23 PM EDT up 0 recs

Well, yes, it’s a crapshoot — all of it is a crapshoot.

The point is that it seems to make a Total Disaster at least twice as likely and probably moreso (given the quality of pitchers involved). Even outside of the Total Disasters, we still don’t know how much effect it has, probably a somewhat negative effect.

My point last year, talking about C.C. vs. Byrd, is that the difference in their ERA (1.5 runs) still amounted to just one run over six innings, and the high incidence of trainwrecks basically counteracts that completely, so that C.C. on short rest may not be any better than Byrd on full rest — and may well be quite a bit worse.

by Jay on Oct 3, 2008 12:30 PM EDT up 0 recs

Expanding on that … the Brewers don’t have a Byrd, that’s why they’ve been doing this. They’re down to, like, 2.5 starters, and that’s where they’ve been since Sheets went down a couple weeks ago. And while on the one hand that makes extreme measures unjustifiable, on the other hand, it makes them more ridiculous. It means that they have C.C. pitch on short rest four times just so they can crawl into to a five-game playoff series that realistically they had almost no chance of winning.

Yeah, yeah, they did beat the Mets, and I’m happy for them, but the Mets would have been the better team as of this date, and it’s not really even close.

by Jay on Oct 3, 2008 12:33 PM EDT up 0 recs

I remember John Tudor being pretty bad on three-days rest in postseason.

by odradek on Oct 2, 2008 9:31 PM EDT 0 recs

My vote for the worst short-rest appearance goes to Al Leiter in 1999: 0 IP, 2 H, 1 BB, 2 HBP, 5 ER. Or Todd Stottlemeyer in 1996: 1 IP, 9 H, 7 ER.

by FredOx on Oct 3, 2008 11:03 AM EDT up 0 recs

Oh, yeah, I remember that Leiter outing. He was just a little bit jumpy in that start.

by odradek on Oct 3, 2008 11:07 AM EDT up 0 recs

My first instinct just browsing the list was that it may not be that different from the regular-rest list, although you have to correct for the fact that the short-rest guys come in generally as better pitchers (that’s why we’re starting them on short rest).

But then I started noticing how many “unmitigated disaster beyond trainwreck” starts there were in there — 13 out of 93 starts went for three innings or fewer, and seven of them went less than two innings. For this group of starters, there’s no way that’s a normal rate.

by Jay on Oct 3, 2008 11:08 AM EDT up 0 recs

I counted 23 “trainwreck starts” out of 93 — that’s something I made up to distinguish merely lousy starts from, well, trainwrecks. It means the starter allowed as many runs as complete innings, or failed to complete four innings.

by Jay on Oct 3, 2008 11:13 AM EDT up 0 recs

What’s an acceptable Game Score cutoff for crap? 20 of 93 are 35 or less, and 27 of 93 are under 40.

by FredOx on Oct 3, 2008 11:20 AM EDT up 0 recs

Since 1995, there have been 836 postseason starts. Of these, 78 (9.3) were 3 IP or less, as opposed to 14 of the short-rest guys. That’s a material difference, even if not a huge one.

by FredOx on Oct 3, 2008 11:14 AM EDT up 0 recs

I think it’s actually a pretty huge difference, especially if you look at the caliber of pitchers it happens to. Chien-Ming Wang, Kevin Brown, Mark Redman, Derek Lowe, Brad Penny, Dontrelle Willis (2003), Tom Glavine, Tim Hudson, Greg Maddux, Darryl Kile (2000), Andy Pettitte, Bartolo Colon, Al Leiter, Scott Erickson (1997), Todd Stottlemyre (1996).

That is a whole lot of really good pitchers turning into disasters in a short-rest start.

by Jay on Oct 3, 2008 12:07 PM EDT up 0 recs

As the broadcasters always say: it’s not the number of pitches, but it’s the stress situations of those pitches. Maybe this is right to a certain degree: intentional walks (which count as pitch count) are less stressful than pitching to Rod Carew from the stretch with runners on second and third.

Another common, if misguided, belief about the postseason is that “every pitch” matters. Unlike the regular season, when you might just lob a pitch up there, or when you might be day-dreaming at the plate.

by odradek on Oct 3, 2008 2:08 PM EDT 0 recs

Sort of. It’s not the situation (men on base) stress, it’s arm fatigue. Regardless of how he threw those pitches to get there, the danger is letting a pitcher continue to throw when his arm is tired. Where that is for every pitcher is different, but for the most part it comes between 100 and 115 pitches. This is quoted from the same article I linked before:

The system is based on the following principles:

1. While pitching is an inherently unnatural motion, throwing a pitch does not necessarily do permanent damage to a pitcher’s arm. It’s only when fatigue sets in (and a pitcher’s mechanics start to waver) that continued pitching can result in irreversible injury.

2. There is a certain number of pitches that a pitcher can throw before that fatigue sets in.

3. Once a pitcher is fatigued, each additional pitch causes more damage, and results in more additional fatigue, than the pitch before.

If I’m reading your post correctly we’re more or less on the same page.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Oct 3, 2008 2:41 PM EDT up 0 recs

Yes, we are. But is situational stress just another broadcaster’s hobby horse? Does it not exist? I don’t know if it does—I’m not sure if some situations put more stress on a pitcher’s arm than other situations. Maybe adrenaline does have an effect, because it has such a fatiguing hangover.

Broadcasters talk about pitchers’ being in a groove, throwing nice and easy. And then they talk about a pitcher sweating, struggling with his command on the mound. I don’t know if these differ physiologically, but I’m willing to guess the latter tires a pitcher mentally.

by odradek on Oct 3, 2008 3:41 PM EDT up 0 recs

I don’t know that the physical effects of a pitcher sweating through an inning are quantified, so I guess to answer your question: your guess is as good as mine.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Oct 4, 2008 12:38 AM EDT up 0 recs

It’s not so much situational stress as it is the stress of struggling with control or velocity — of course these things often go hand in hand, but this is the difference: A pitcher who has pitched into some bad luck may not be pitching under physical stress even if the bases are loaded with the go-ahead run on 3B. On the other hand, a guy could be struggling with his control and getting hit hard but squeaking through — long ropes hit right at outfielders, spectacular infield defense, guys throw out on the bases, etc. — so that he’s not in a stressful game situation, but he’s still throwing under stress. It’s at that point that a guy could have long-term damage if he’s consistently left in the game in those situations.

by Jay on Oct 4, 2008 3:16 PM EDT up 0 recs

I think not all innings are created equal, but you curve out the rough edges and figure it all comes out even. Sometimes you have a tough inning, and sometimes you have an easy inning.

by odradek on Oct 4, 2008 1:33 AM EDT 0 recs