Eric Gagne will save 40 games this year

[Never Outhustled]

Gagne looks just like he did closing with Texas last season, when he was outstanding despite pitching in the 2nd best hitters park in baseball. His health is the only real question mark.

[TuesdaysWithRillo]

If my math is correct, after 12 games, Gagne is on pace for 40 saves.

 

162 / 12 = 1 / 13.5 of the season

 

13.5 * 3 saves = 40.5 saves on the year.

 

I haven't taken any math since high school cause I avoided it in college so I could be wrong.

[TheBrewer]

Bill and Brian said today that he was hitting 94 on the NYM Radar gun.. and they thought it was wrong because Mota was around 92-94, Sheets and Santana were around 92-94, and all those 3 pitchers go alot higher than that.. with that said they were saying they think it was at least a couple miles per hour slow.. so with that thinking Gagne MIGHT have been around 96-97.. but thats just speculation but it sounds correct

[TuesdaysWithRillo]

Today, his fastball was consistently 94-95 mph. He started out shaky but got the job done for another save. Now the Brewers just have to give him a few more opportunities.

[True CryM]

He still didn't look completely comfortable. The St. Louis broadcasters noted that he was getting audibly frustrated during his warm up tosses as well. As long as he keeps missing down, he should be alright.

[Glennron]

Why does it seem like he won't throw any off-speed pitches til he's faced a couple of batters? I've only seen him pitch three times, but I swear everytime it's just straight fastballs until a couple guys get on or something.

[rluzinski]

According to gameday, he threw a changeup to Ludwick (the first batter) that got smoked for a double.

[Gopher74]

You know, you have to wonder why he didn't pan out as a starter. Was it because of his stamina? He wasn't awful his last years as a starter posting a whip of just 1.23 and an ERA of 4.75, but clearly wasn't anywhere near what he would become.

 

And I know he's obviously developed his curve, but he's always had a very good change, and he did have a solid curve. He also wouldn't have thrown 99, but he'd likely have been sitting at 94-95 as a starter. It just seems to me that with that type of velocity and two two plus off-speed pitchers that he'd have been a very good starting pitcher.

 

Anyway, not important, just an interesting thought. Usually you become a reliever because you've got good velocity but only 2 pitches. But when you've got a change and a curve with great velocity, you'd think you've be given every chance to start.

[PKBadger]

Why does it seem like he won't throw any off-speed pitches til he's faced a couple of batters? I've only seen him pitch three times, but I swear everytime it's just straight fastballs until a couple guys get on or something.

 

Is Rivera to blame for this? I noticed while following the game on MLB.com Gameday that 11 of the first 12 pitches were fastballs. Is this because of what the catcher was calling or was Gagne shaking him off? I know that he previously said that he "learned his lesson" about shaking off Kendall, but is there a trust issue with Mike?

 

[splitterpfj]

According to FSN today, Gagne's fastball was topping out at 90 MPH, I don't know if that was accurate, but I never saw a reading higher than that - and he didn't have command of his fastball either.

 

He looks like a different guy when he's mixing his pitches, when he tries to throw fastballs consistently, he doesn't do as well, and he drives me nuts.

 

Since his awful Opening Day performance, he's allowed one run in five appearances, I'm sure people will continue to dump on him, but he's doing the job.

[Ennder]

Gameday shows his fastball at 93-95 so I really think the FSN gun was probably way off.

[tomter38]

We were talking about it in the chat a little. FSN had Gagne living around 89-90 and topping out at 92 on the last pitch I believe. Gameday had him 93-94 topping at 96. Rluz I'm pretty sure that pitch to Ludwig was a fastball, almost positive but could be wrong.

[xisxisxis]

We were talking about it in the chat a little. FSN had Gagne living around 89-90 and topping out at 92 on the last pitch I believe.

 

I don't think FSN has a gun. They just pay a HS student minimum wage to hold up a cardboard cutout of a gun and to guess at the speed.

[BrewCrewForever]

Since his awful Opening Day performance, he's allowed one run in five appearances, I'm sure people will continue to dump on him, but he's doing the job.

 

Yeah some will. Not me, I've been a big Gagne fan for years and I was very happy when we signed him. It's not all that often one of your favorite players in the league actually sign and play with your team. He has done a very good job I think, of course he didn't have good command on opening day and threw one bad pitch against the Reds but he has been fine.

[Tbadder]

First, I'm pro-Gagne. I thought it was an excellent pick up by Melvin because I think he'll be at least a type B free agent. I also predicted that he'd save 37 games and blow 7, mostly early as he regains his form and confidence.

 

Having said that, I don't believe that results are the only thing that counts, and right now he's:

 

a) throwing too many pitches

b) hasn't locked into the strike zone

c) hasn't shown a consistent fastball

d) appears to be struggling, his body language is just awful

e) is always hunting for a pitch he can count on

 

So I remain a little skeptical. If he can't solve some of these problems by the All-Star break we could be in for a rough ride at times.

[TuesdaysWithRillo]

c) hasn't shown a consistent fastball

How much more consistent could his fastball be? He's been around 94 in every outing and he's located it just fine. I think you're being a bit critical in your analysis. Most other closers in baseball have the same issues you stated above.

[stoutdude04]

I dont think the problem is his fastball, except for the fact that it seems like thats all hes been throwing. In last nites save he seemed to be struggling. Finally he threw a few changeups and the threat was over.

[rluzinski]

We were talking about it in the chat a little. FSN had Gagne living around 89-90 and topping out at 92 on the last pitch I believe. Gameday had him 93-94 topping at 96. Rluz I'm pretty sure that pitch to Ludwig was a fastball, almost positive but could be wrong.

 

I'd trust pitch f/s's speeds from gameday over any park gun. And even if you think the absolute value of the pitch f/x velocity was wrong, these velocities from that AB:

 

94,94,94,95,94,86

 

It was a changeup.

[TuesdaysWithRillo]

I wish we wouldn't have had to bring him in tonight, but he came in and got the save. Our bullpen is getting burned up by the game. It's going to melt down in July again if our starters can't go deep into games. On the bright side, we still haven't used our pen as much as the Cubs so far.

[logan82]

I wish we wouldn't have had to bring him in tonight, but he came in and got the save. Our bullpen is getting burned up by the game. It's going to melt down in July again if our starters can't go deep into games. On the bright side, we still haven't used our pen as much as the Cubs so far.

The difference this year is we have many guys who can go multiple innings in a close game instead of one(Villanueva) plus a bunch of one inning guys. Should help our pen over the course of the year.

[TuesdaysWithRillo]

Yeah it should help, but starters going 5 innings a game isn't going to cut it.

[pitchleague]

I'll agree with the "thrown too many pitches" stance. I'm guessing he's "out" for tomorrow's game. Hoping that it doesn't matter.

[endaround]

I wish we wouldn't have had to bring him in tonight, but he came in and got the save. Our bullpen is getting burned up by the game. It's going to melt down in July again if our starters can't go deep into games. On the bright side, we still haven't used our pen as much as the Cubs so far.

Did you miss the one out saves Yost gave to Cordero last year? Yost believes that any time it becomes a save situation the closer must pitch. Riske should have been fine

 

[Ennder]

I think the fact that more of our RP can go 2 IP this year will keep the bullpen on task. While we have had to use a lot of innings in the bullpen so far i don't feel that it is particularily overworked because we have had so many 2 IP outings with 2 days rest afterwards instead of back to back 1 IP outings with 1 day of rest.

[orca1963]

"appears to be struggling, his body language is just awful"

 

This made me think of something I saw him do at the Cincy game earlier this year...it looked like he was reading something written in his hat between batters...anybody know anything about that?