Rethinking the second half and post season with starters as “openers”

[Scooterfletcher]

I like the game so far with Hall going three and Priester doing well now.   If fully healthy, might this be the way to go team-wide?

Peralta

Hall-Priester

Ashby-Miz

Cortes

Woodruff-Henderson/Myers

This still enables us to deal Quintana in theory while keeping innings down for Miz and Henderson who have been about our best pitchers this year but need their innings watched.

Is this something we could pull off successfully?

i

 

[torts]

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Scooterfletcher said:

Woodruff-Henderson/Myers

Really skeptical we see Henderson again this year with the big club, he's already matched his career high in innings pitched.

[Scooterfletcher]

1 hour ago, Scooterfletcher said:

I like the game so far with Hall going three and Priester doing well now.   If fully healthy, might this be the way to go team-wide?

Peralta

Hall-Priester

Ashby-Miz

Cortes

Woodruff-Henderson/Myers

This still enables us to deal Quintana in theory while keeping innings down for Miz and Henderson who have been about our best pitchers this year but need their innings watched.

Is this something we could pull off successfully?

i

 

Narrowing the scope looking for your honest opinion, did you not like using Hall and Priester only in a well pitched win today?

Secondly, tell me your plans for starters once Cortes rejoins Woodruff as a healthy option and maybe our best (or second best starter).   Demote guys?   Trade guys?   How do you as manager handle it if you don’t like the Hall/Priester method used so well today?

[formerlybis]

On 7/11/2025 at 8:31 PM, Scooterfletcher said:

I like the game so far with Hall going three and Priester doing well now.   If fully healthy, might this be the way to go team-wide?

Peralta

Hall-Priester

Ashby-Miz

Cortes

Woodruff-Henderson/Myers

This still enables us to deal Quintana in theory while keeping innings down for Miz and Henderson who have been about our best pitchers this year but need their innings watched.

Is this something we could pull off successfully?

 

 

I like the discussion, and I like what they're doing with DQ Hallster. Perhaps the issue with too many piggyback combos, however, is how it limits flexibility in how to use your 13 pitchers.

In the above scenario, you have 8 pitchers with scheduled starts/appearances in the 5-game rotation where they would presumably all go multiple innings and not be available between appearances, Let's say the other 5 are Koenig, Mears, Anderson, Uribe, and Megill. In the normal course of the season, there will be days that only 2 or 3 of those guys are available. It's risky to set things up where you couldn't use those long relievers on their non-scheduled piggyback days (or if you did use them, it screws up the availability for the scheduled piggyback start).

OTOH, this may actually be pretty close to how the long relievers get used anyway - just have to be somewhat judicious in too many innings for the long relievers.

[long ball]

I wonder what’s more sustainable: a 6 man rotation or a piggyback set ups. 
 

we have 6 games per week for most of the season here on out. If our starters average 5 IP/game… we need to be able to count on our 8 relievers to be able to contribute 3 IP/week. 
 

if we go to a 6 man rotation and we assume the same 5 IP/game then we need to cover those same 24 relief innings but with only 7 relievers. So that’s about 3.5 IP/reliever. 
 

The rule changes have sorta prevented the bullpen shuttle that we saw in past seasons. So a 6 man rotation might actually be tougher to maintain than a piggyback set up or two. However, you’d need the manager to stick with the tandem start and resist the urge to pull the plug to earlier to go with the “A Pen” guys. 
 

it might be more tenable once we get to September and we get the extra pitcher. 

[Roderick]

I can't see Murphy not being tempted to deviate from the plan in close games and use Uribe/Megill/Mears when he needs to get the innings from the piggyback duo.

[wiguy94]

2 hours ago, long ball said:

I wonder what’s more sustainable: a 6 man rotation or a piggyback set ups. 
 

we have 6 games per week for most of the season here on out. If our starters average 5 IP/game… we need to be able to count on our 8 relievers to be able to contribute 3 IP/week. 
 

if we go to a 6 man rotation and we assume the same 5 IP/game then we need to cover those same 24 relief innings but with only 7 relievers. So that’s about 3.5 IP/reliever. 
 

The rule changes have sorta prevented the bullpen shuttle that we saw in past seasons. So a 6 man rotation might actually be tougher to maintain than a piggyback set up or two. However, you’d need the manager to stick with the tandem start and resist the urge to pull the plug to earlier to go with the “A Pen” guys. 
 

it might be more tenable once we get to September and we get the extra pitcher. 

Piggy back seems way more sustainable because on a piggy back day there's a solid chance you don't even need to use the bullpen. We have piggy backed Hall and Priester 3 times this year and the bullpen only pitched 1 inning in those 3 games.

[long ball]

20 hours ago, wiguy94 said:

Piggy back seems way more sustainable because on a piggy back day there's a solid chance you don't even need to use the bullpen. We have piggy backed Hall and Priester 3 times this year and the bullpen only pitched 1 inning in those 3 games.

It could be as long as Murphy is willing to use Hall (or other tandem starters) for more than 2-3 innings/week. 

We probably only have 50ish regualr season innings left for Misiorowski. That's about a start per week if we assume 5 innings/start. I wonder if they'd entertain matching him up with Nestor Cortes as a set. 

[CheezWizHed]

The opener - I like this idea when the starting lineup is RH/LH heavy and our SP is opposite-handed. No real need otherwise.

Piggyback starters - I think we need to handle that for innings management with some of the players.  I'd rather have Miz with strong innings come playoff time than "hit the wall" innings. 

[Brian]

3 minutes ago, CheezWizHed said:

The opener - I like this idea when the starting lineup is RH/LH heavy and our SP is opposite-handed. No real need otherwise.

Piggyback starters - I think we need to handle that for innings management with some of the players.  I'd rather have Miz with strong innings come playoff time than "hit the wall" innings. 

I actually had the same thought about Piggyback starters to save our bullpen if it is being taxed.