Games » Cleveland Indians
Sep4Two pitching decisions
Lee Judge
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To understand what happened in Sunday afternoon’s game, it might help to look at Saturday night’s game, so here we go.
A reader asked me a question and I thought it was a good one, so I took it straight to Royals manager Ned Yost. Saturday night, the Royals had a four-run lead going into the ninth inning. The Cleveland Indians had Carlos Santana (a switch-hitter), Jim Thome (a lefthander) and Jack Hannahan (a lefthander) due up. So why did Ned bring in right-handed reliever Greg Holland instead of left-hander reliever Tim Collins?
Ned said he had Collins and Holland warming up in the bullpen in the eighth inning, and if Luke Hochevar, the Royals’ starter, had put a runner on base, he would have made a move. But because Luke was cruising (he went 1-2-3 against Jerad Head, Ezequiel Carrera and Kosuke Fukudome in the eighth), Ned never made the move. Luke finished the inning at 117 pitches, and when it came time to bring in a reliever, Ned went with the most consistent arm he had, which was Holland.
Tim Collins has given up a lot of walks, and if he got two runners on in the ninth, then Yost would have had to use closer Joakim Soria. A game that’s in the bag becomes an emergency. Using Holland for one inning doesn’t prevent him from being used the next day, so Ned decided to drop the hammer. “When you’ve got ’em down, stomp on ’em.”
Sunday’s game showed the wisdom of Saturday’s decision.
Sunday’s starter, Jeff Francis, did not pitch great, but he left the game after five innings and the Royals trailed the Indians 4-1. That’s not where you want to be, but it’s not an impossible climb, either. This time, Ned did go to Tim Collins, and Tim did what he’s been doing. Collins walked the first batter, struck out the second and walked the third.
Collins has pitched 59 innings this eason, walking 43 batters (which is very bad) and striking out 51 (which is very good). This makes Tim the baseball version of a box of chocolates: You never know what you’re going to get. And that means it can be hard to use him when a game is on the line.
This time it may not have seemed as if the game was on the line, but Tim’s two walks scored in front of the home run that Jesse Chavez gave up to Shelley Duncan. (Technically, both walks did not score, but Carlos Santana hit into a fielder’s choice and first baseman Eric Hosmer went for the lead runner. Santana just replaced the previously walked Asdrubal Cabrera.) Two inning later, Chavez walked Santana to get to Duncan, who homered again. Three walks scored (kind of), and the Royals rallied and still lost by three runs.
So to get us back where we started: Ned Yost did not use Tim Collins Saturday night because he was afraid that Tim would do what he did Sunday afternoon.
Game notes
• Chris Getz again had some low throws from shortstop (apparently he owes Eric Hosmer two steak dinners after Hosmer bailed him out). After the game, Chris said he probably should have thrown from over the top when he’s at short. Shortstops use a variety of arm slots, and in the last two games Chris has struggled to find the right slot for the right play. The exception would be charging a dribbler. There’s no time on that play, and infielders have to throw with a low arm angle.
• Mitch Maier got on the board with an outfield assist. The Royals have thrown 23 runners out at the plate this season. (24 according to the newspaper this morning.) Either way, this is really unusual. Throwing someone out at the plate is hard. So many things have to go right. According to Robert Ford on 610 AM (he’s who I listen to on the drive home from the game), the only team that has thrown out more runners at the plate was the 1974 Montreal Expos (if I’m remembering what he said correctly). So if you’re a Royals fan, enjoy it. You’re seeing something special this season.
• That play at the plate involved another throw from right field, and — if you’ve been following along — you know Brayan Pena has struggled with that play. (There’s a video on this site that explains why.) Basically, if the throw pulls the catcher to the first-base side of home plate, the catcher can lose the plate’s location. He’s looking to right and the runner is approaching from his left, the catcher’s blind spot.
Brayan has had two plays in which he received the ball from the right, turned to tag the runner, but was on the wrong side of the plate (the first-base side) and tagged high while the runner got a foot in. Brayan told me he was going to solve the problem by diving back to the corner of the plate for the tag. That’s what he did on this play. Unfortunately, the runner, Carlos Santana, had not arrived yet, and Brayan’s dive had him lying in front of home plate. Bottom line: It was ugly, but it worked.
• Speaking of tags, Jeff Francis picked off a runner, threw to Hosmer and Hosmer threw to Johnny Giavotella, who was covering second base. Johnny got the ball in plenty of time, but he made the mistake of staying behind the base and reaching out for the tag (which was the same basic problem Pena had). The runner, Jason Donald, got in under the tag. After the game, I asked Gio what he would do differently next time . Johnny said he would come out in front of second base (on the first-base side). That way, he would force the action in front of the base, not at the base. Johnny also said that when someone slides head-first (as Donald did), it makes it a lot easier to block that runner off the bag.
OK, somebody apologize to Mitch
After the game, I was giving Mitch Maier a hard time about climbing the fence down the right-field line but missing the catch. “It was a beautiful play. You were just nowhere near the ball.” I told him. Jeff Francoeur said he would like to see me try to make that play.
Really?
I think we’ve established that I can’t run, jump or catch. And if I could, I probably wouldn’t be going anywhere near a wall at high speed. After the game, I saw a replay and Mitch just barely missed that ball, then bounced backward off the wall and caught the rebounding ball (it hit the top of the padding) on the way down. So it may have been the most athletic play I’ve seen all year that didn’t result in an out.
If you’re with the team and you read this, tell Mitch I’m sorry. (Plus, he’s bigger than me, and I want to stay on his good side.)
Wrong again
On the Royals’ last road trip, when Jeff Francoeur got picked off on the first-and-third move, he took off for second base and Melky Cabrera took off for home plate. At the time, I said Melky broke at the right time because the pitcher threw the ball to second, which meant that the ball was as far as possible from home plate.
Royals first-base coach Doug Sisson told me I had it wrong. In that situation, the coaches want the runner to break on the first infielder’s throw. So in that case, Melky should have waited until the shortstop threw the ball back to first (assuming Frenchy was sharp enough to get in a rundown).
That would have put the ball in the hands of the first baseman (who usually has the worst arm on the infield), facing away from home plate. Melky’s timing put the ball in the hands of shortstop, (who usually has the best arm on the infield), facing toward home.
Hosmer
Giavotella
Maier
The game was full of small oddities and pretty entertaining. Mitch's play looked like some kind of circus trick.
I know Carlos Santana can hit, but otherwise he looks like a fish out of water. Have you ever seen anyone try to avoid home plate on a scoring play like he did? Very strange. As Ryan says, "There's nothing like fun at the ol' ball park."
Fred: One of the things that makes me love baseball is that you can watch it all your life and still see something you've never seen before on a regular basis.
Pena's rolling block of home plate, Mitch bouncing off the wall and catching the ball on the way down, Carlos Santana tripping over second (OK, we have seen that before), but if you pay attention, there's always something worth seeing.
Pena's play at the plate seemed to involve two guys who both thought the other guy would do something diffrent than he did.
Brayan dove and Carlos wasn't there yet and Carlos was trying for the backside of the plate, but that's where Brayan ended up after rolling for a while.
Actually, it seems like what didn't happen to the Royals Saturday night, did happen to the Indians Sunday afternoon: a game that was in the bag became an emergency. Luckily for the Indians, in the middle of the Royals rally, the edge of the shadow from the roof crossed in front of home plate. I'm really curious how that affects the pitcher's pitch selection. Does he pound the zone with fast balls, or does he throw more breaking stuff?
Blair: Good points, I was thinking the same things myself, but the post was running a little long already.
Manny Acta tried to get away with using a pitcher with a 5.18 ERA (Frank Herrmann) and he turned it into an emergency, forcing Acta to use closer Chris Perez to shut down the rally.
The flip side of the decision is this: if you can't use a guy when he's got a six run lead and only needs three outs, when do you use him?
Those kind of performances erode a manager's trust. After the game, Ned said Tim Collins needs to figure this out if he's going to be part of the team next year, so what Tim does between now and Opening Day in 2012 is worth watching.
I also thought about writing about the shadows. They came out in front of home plate during Johnny Giavotella's at bat in the ninth.
I've been at the plate when that happens and when the ball goes from sunlight to shadow your eyes can't adjust that quick and you lose sight of the pitch. (A very scary proposition.)
I'd think something with late break would be the hardest to track, but guys who actually do this for a living (the Indians pitchers) pounded the zone with nothing but heaters from the time the shadows came into play.
Good observations, thanks for bringing them up.
Hey Lee, one day i'm going to figure out a decent way to watch / listen to a Royals game out here in Salt Lake. That being said, I've noticed that Hosmer is moving up quite nicely in regards to the Polk system. Is there any simple way to also list average points per game with the season totals? I "could" do the math, just wanting to be a tad lazy.
Chuck: Yup, go to players page and hit "sort by average" just off to the right.
The starting pitchers will shoot to the top (I think a starting pitcher might be able to lead the entire system, but he'd have to be really dominant...which is probably fair for a guy who only appears every fifth day).
Sorting by average was one of our IT guy's idea, but I should warn you, I think it's a bit misleading.
The system was created decades ago when starters finished more games and I'm not sure it values relievers as accurately as it should (we might add 'holds' next season).
So a reliever who comes into a game, gets everybody out he faces, but does not pitch a complete inning, gets no points (if he didn't strike anybody out). And his points by game average goes down. Same with a defensive replacement who does his job, but doesn't get any hits or walks.
So keep that in mind and it can still be interesting to see who scores the most points per game.
I thought Collins' performance was one of the more interesting things in the game. The Royals are down three runs to a team with a great bullpen, so the chances of a win are looking slim. Collins has nothing to lose by just going out there and throwing strikes. He gets ahead of Carrera 0-2 but then walks him. He then gets ahead of Fukudome 0-2 and strikes him out, but not before going 3-2 on him, too. Then he gets behind Cabrera 3-0, recovers to get the count to 3-2, but then walks him. The Indians have runners on first and second, but there's one out, so Collins is one pitch away from getting out of this mess. But does Yost leave Collins out there? Nope, he sends in a pitcher who just came up from Omaha! I mean, if Yost was concerned about keeping the score close, he would have brought in Coleman or Wood. It seemed like Yost was sending Collins a message. And I guess if Collins didn't get that message, he certainly got the one in Yost's post-game comments.
Blair: Yeah, it seems like Tim Collins is running out of chances. When he's in the zone, he's nasty, so he's being given a chance to figure this out. But I've gotten the sense that Yost is less willing to watch him walk his way into trouble.
Lee: Been thinking about this for a long time. With relief pitchers to me ERA means little. I wish they would post his inherited runners allowed to score. They always show that with Holland but not others. I remember relievers in the past who had really low ERA's but never saw an inherited runner they wanted to keep from scoring. Gobble comes to mind. Do you think this should be something that is highlighted more.
Larry: I know relievers take that stat seriously. Lots of times that's their job: putting out a fire.
A hit that doesn't hurt their ERA can be a complete failure in terms of why they were brought into the game.
Lee: Questions, do you have any idea who the guy standing next to Sisson during the National Anthem was yesterday. Wearing #66 and the name Kennedy on his back.
Larry: He's a coach. I met him briefly and I'm going blank on his first name.
When guys who aren't part of the regular staff come through town, sometimes they're in uniform and put to work, usually pregame. I think there's a limit on who can coach during the game.