Not For 6 Man Rotation

[rickh150]

Earlier in the year, we often brought up a guy to start a game and ship him back to the minors. I’m in favor of doing that instead of boxing the team into this 7 man bullpen.  We already have normal short starts and have to overuse Ashley and Uribe. I think having a little more flexibility in the pen would help us.

Using Drohan in that longer Patrick type role as he was in earlier in the year intrigues me. Bring up Crow to spot start a game here or there when needed.  We also start getting an off day most weeks until season’s end, including an extra arm in September.  If Drohan sees little action in a series, slot him a day or two later.

 

[wildcat2237]

Really funny timing on your post. Earlier today I was thinking the same thing on Drohan. He was really good in that role. No idea why the Brewers removed from that role this season. 

[SomewhereInTime]

Earlier in the year they were using Ashby and Patrick among others consistently in 2+ inning outings.  Lately they haven't been doing that as much so they're burning through the bullpen quicker

[JohnBriggs12]

The problem isn't how many guys are in the rotation.  The problem is this team isn't scoring runs.  Somewhat predictably Mitchell has hit a wall after playing more games than any year in his career.  Speaking of walls, Lara isn't just hitting them on defense, he's hit one in the batter's box.  Lockridge is on the 25 man roster and offers nothing with the bat.  Years of being a full time catcher have caught up with Contreras.  Naylor was a good move in theory, unfortunately he's still not hitting at AAA.  Other than that, Brewers ignored adding hitting at the deadline, when there were useful if not exciting bats that changed teams.

They badly need Pratt and Frelick back in the lineup.

[Thurston Fluff]

I agree the offense has been the problem lately but the pitching was supposed to be the thing that could offset it. It hasn't. I think the six man rotation is because we have so many games in a row. The bullpen is only seven deep but they have managed to make it deeper with more creativity then ever. 

I think the biggest problem right now is the extra day off and only going five innings. Miz and Henderson were the only two to give us more than five inning in their last start. Henderson gave us the longest start with 6.1 innings. If they'd all be giving us 6 it'd be one thing. 6 as the high water mark quite another. If they get the extra day they need to be averaging more innings per start as a group. 

[Ron Robinsons Beard]

13 minutes ago, Thurston Fluff said:

I agree the offense has been the problem lately but the pitching was supposed to be the thing that could offset it. It hasn't. I think the six man rotation is because we have so many games in a row. The bullpen is only seven deep but they have managed to make it deeper with more creativity then ever. 

I think the biggest problem right now is the extra day off and only going five innings. Miz and Henderson were the only two to give us more than five inning in their last start. Henderson gave us the longest start with 6.1 innings. If they'd all be giving us 6 it'd be one thing. 6 as the high water mark quite another. If they get the extra day they need to be averaging more innings per start as a group. 

May literally pitched into the 8th yesterday.

[Outlander]

With this stretch of games they needed to option a pitcher, bring up another reliever until that spot comes up again, bring up Crow for one start and option for another reliever. If they have starting pitching depth then use it, bad roster management that Crow didn't start one game during a 17 game stretch when they are trying to go with a 6 man rotation.

[Jopal78]

3 minutes ago, Outlander said:

With this stretch of games they needed to option a pitcher, bring up another reliever until that spot comes up again, bring up Crow for one start and option for another reliever. If they have starting pitching depth then use it, bad roster management that Crow didn't start one game during a 17 game stretch when they are trying to go with a 6 man rotation.

Easier said than done. Only relievers with options are Megill, Hall, Patrick, Uribe and Ashby. 
 

As for Henderson, Drohan, and Gasser they probably want them using what bullets remain in their arms in the majors than spending 2 weeks in the minors 

[82brewcrew82]

Any thoughts on how the starting pitching depth was built?  I guess Priester would have been an option to pitch more innings but they knew he was toast early in spring training.  That left the rest of what we have and that seemed to be a group of guys either coming off of injury, not having innings built up and/or a signifiant injury risk.  Innings/usage issues should have been obvious early on, no?

[Thurston Fluff]

6 hours ago, Ron Robinsons Beard said:

May literally pitched into the 8th yesterday.

Great. Now what about the past week? 

[tmwiese55]

Only 8-10% of starts go 7 innings these days. And we just had two guys go into the 7th and 8th recently.  5-6 is totally normal, its just the way it is now. Expecting or criticizing that folks don't go beyond is just not in touch with how things are done anymore.

[rickh150]

1 hour ago, tmwiese55 said:

Only 8-10% of starts go 7 innings these days. And we just had two guys go into the 7th and 8th recently.  5-6 is totally normal, its just the way it is now. Expecting or criticizing that folks don't go beyond is just not in touch with how things are done anymore.

But a set 6 man rotation is new to us. That is much more structured and set. To do this, the back half of the bullpen should have options. But as we have seen lately, the chaos of trading for bullpen pieces with no options, along with the Wilson experiment, is making more bullpen issues than our usual.

[Thurston Fluff]

13 hours ago, tmwiese55 said:

Only 8-10% of starts go 7 innings these days. And we just had two guys go into the 7th and 8th recently.  5-6 is totally normal, its just the way it is now. Expecting or criticizing that folks don't go beyond is just not in touch with how things are done anymore.

Six man rotations are not totally normal these days. We'd need our starters to average seven regularly, not do it on occasion, for cost to the bullpen not outweigh the benefit to the starters. 

I think a six man rotation would be good if we did it all season and had six starters who could average 6-7 innings per start. That would limit each starter to 27 starts instead of 32 and limit the bullpen to 2-3 innings a game. I think as it is now we can go with a five man rotation and skip/push back a start for the starters here and there. The starters would still limit their innings and the bullpen wouldn't get overtaxed to do so. 

[StearnsFTW]

They have to keep innings down for the starters.  That's all it is.

 

And they're smart for doing it.

[markedman5]