coolhandluke121

Agreed. I thought that situation was begging for Hader. They're not going to pull Pederson, Muncy, or Bellinger (I don't think). They're probably not going to pull Grandal, who is better as an LHB. But if they do, then you have more RHB's for Knebel, JJ, and/or Soria.

Gotta pull him. Know why other teams haven't discovered this formula and milked ~10 extra wins out of an unspectacular rotation? Because they always think you can get one more inning out of a starter who's "cruising". It's a total fallacy and I'm glad the Brewers are one of the only teams smart enough to consistently take advantage because it won't be an advantage anymore when other teams start doing it.

I agree. Played with fire there and got away with it. That situation with a 1-0 lead is exactly what you have Hader for.

I really hope Chacin can have a clean inning here. Then bring Hader in on a double switch for their LHB's at the top of the order - and probably Bellinger and Grandal (who's significantly better as an LHB) in the following inning if everything goes as planned.

Dumb play by Machado. And it doesn't matter if it was after the throw; it still affects the throw when you know someone is about to hit you. Machado stinks. Could have had an infield single Saturday if he had hustled. Kind of a lazy, overrated fielder without good range too. Rather have a puncher's chance without guys like him than have a little more talent without as much soul.

Isn't there a Packer thread here? Anyone who wants to could follow that.

I vote against Packer updates too. Always resented how much I had to hear about them when I stayed with family in NE Wisconsin, even when the Brewers were in a playoff chase and the Packers were still in preseason. There were a few times the local news didn't even give the Brewers score when they were in first place because they spend the whole segment talking about who's going to be cut from the Packers.

At this rate they'll have to pull him before he even gets 15 strikeouts.

Love it. Probably means Chacin goes 6 scoreless, because baseball. It could certainly happy but it's unlikely. The reason anomalies seem so common is because they make an impression on us when they happen, whereas we don't mentally tally all the times that an expected outcome occurs. I'd give Granderson a start against the RHP. Braun was hot to end the season, but hot streaks end fast. He's a negative WPA player for both series so far and hasn't looked particularly dangerous or unlucky.

I'm so cynical it hurts, but with guys like Aguilar and Thames being so dominant for several months and then tailing off so much, I automatically start to think PEDs. Tests are less frequent in the off season and that's a time when guys might be more willing to take the chance. Then they come out hitting way above career norms but can't sustain it. I wouldn't bet on them being on PEDs, but I'd also be pretty reluctant to bet against it. That said, I don't think I'd trade Aguilar+ for Goldschmidt. Just too short-term. I'd probably give Thames more starts at 1B next year in an effort to keep him sharp and give Aguilar more off days.

I don't think that's the plan. I think Gio or Woodruff will get the "bullpen" start on 3 days rest Tuesday, with the other one coming in early to get favorable match-ups before the Dodgers start bringing in PH's. After throwing ~75 pitches Saturday, I think Miley will get the game 5 start on 3 days rest. I think Guerra, Peralta, and Burnes could all get turns in long relief to follow up the LHP starters and get favorable match-ups. I just don't see them saving Miley, who's such a good match-up for the Dodgers, until game 6. He doesn't need 5 days rest, and they might be fighting just to get to game 6.

Exactly. I don't want to be grouped in with anyone suggesting they bench him or that he's all of a sudden not a good reliever. I didn't call for JJ to come out of the game after the walk to Barnes, for example. Not even in hindsight. He had the right to finish that inning and he's a great ground-ball pitcher. But when a reliever sits for half an inning and you bring him back in against the top of the order after he labored like that, you're asking for trouble. He may have worked multiple innings on many occasions this year, but not against the best hitters from the best offense in the NL when he's been struggling a lot in the playoffs already. I am very confident that the statistics on relievers in their 2nd inning of work are similar to stats on starters working their 3rd time through the order.

I think the schedule was a huge factor. They want him to be able to go 2 times through the order on 3 days rest on Wednesday. ~75 pitches was probably a number they had in their head, and a reasonable one at that. Third time through the order, seeing a perennial MVP caliber RHB, is a big factor too. And look at Ryu; he was just as unhittable as Miley, if not better, until all of a sudden he wasn't. There's just too many good, evidence-based reasons to pull him. You can't deviate from good strategies on hunches all the time. He had to get Taylor out if he wanted to go 6. It was a fair chance but it wasn't meant to be.

I agree, but that strategy involves trusting the depth of the pen, not just riding JJ and Hader all the time. In that sense, they're not sticking with what got them here, and it's not just Saturday. It's letting Hader hit just so he can pitch a 3rd inning with a 5-1 lead. It's giving JJ an extra inning with a 4-0 lead against the Rockies when you have a golden opportunity to get someone else some work. It's putting JJ and Hader out there in the 9th on a wet mound with a 6-0 lead against the Rockies. Each one of those moves is fine on its own, but all of them combined constitute a strain on your best relievers and a definite deviation from their year-long strategy of making it a 25-man team where you rely on contributions from everyone.

It's not really like that, in my opinion. Relievers are supposed to be utilized that way. And regardless of how many times JJ successfully worked over multiple innings this year, I'm sure there's plenty of evidence showing that, like most relievers, he's best in his first inning of work and against the first few batters he faces - let alone against a team like LAD and the top of their order. That's just how bullpens go. And the accumulation of innings and appearances throughout the year is a factor, too. He's got a ton of miles on him right now. It's not the same as pulling Yelich at all, in my opinion. Also, hitters had a BABIP of .249 against him this year. He was good, but more of a candidate for "luckiest good reliever" than "best reliever". There, I fixed your quote for you, in my opinion. We could do this all day. Comparing pulling a struggling reliever in his 2nd inning of work to benching an MVP hitter is a reach at best.

It's not really like that. Relievers are supposed to be utilized that way. And regardless of how many times JJ successfully worked over multiple innings this year, I'm sure there's plenty of evidence showing that, like most relievers, he's best in his first inning of work and against the first few batters he faces - let alone against a team like LAD and the top of their order. That's just how bullpens go. And the accumulation of innings and appearances throughout the year is a factor, too. He's got a ton of miles on him right now. It's not the same as pulling Yelich at all. Also, hitters had a BABIP of .249 against him this year. He was good, but more of a candidate for "luckiest good reliever" than "best reliever".

I just crunched some numbers in a spreadsheet and by my calculations that would put them in the driver's seat.

I'm not sure I'd go that for. There's a cost of warming up and getting ready to appear in a game. Once you're out there and you're cruising, it's not hard to go 7 or 8 innings. The downside is not arm injuries, which happen to relievers too. It's just that most guys can't do it and be effective. You could probably get a few more games out of Scherzer, but I think he's at the point where you'd have to accept less total innings if you did that. It's not like you have 200+ innings to play with there. Clearly the best relievers can't pitch 100 games with 2 innings each game. It's not a simple linear relationship between appearances and innings per appearance.

It sure is. It just means scrapping traditional roles. No more starters going every 5 days. No more relievers making 80-90 appearances. It's 11-12 guys going 2-3 innings at a time with typically 2 days rest each in between. There are 1458 innings plus the occasional extras to cover in a 162 game schedule. That's 121.5 innings per pitcher on a 12 man staff. An end to 200+ innings on an individual arm is a good thing. I've been on this train since this time last year. I mistakenly called it "piggybacking" which unfortunately caused a lot of people to dismiss my ideas completely. Strict, scheduled piggybacks are now what I was advocating. I merely wanted to blur the lines between starters and long relievers more, and I provided evidence for why it would work. Starters were working too many times through the order and relievers, who are often just failed starters, often have better stats despite ostensibly not being as good. This shows that the balance of workload between the two groups is not in the sweet spot. It also shows that guys don't really have to know exactly when they're going to pitch, because relievers never really know when they arrive at the park if they're going to work. And lest we forget, you often waste a plate appearance by letting a pitcher hit for the 2nd or 3rd time. I think guys could routinely start on 3 days rest if they're capped at 60-70 pitches, with more long relief. I think relievers could give you more innings total if you ask for multiple innings spread out over fewer appearances. And of course you can use shuttle guys to make it work for staffing. I do think more of this is sustainable when you have enough guys with options, which the Brewers do. I truly believe this is the start of a revolution and I'm thrilled that the Brewers are spearheading it. I said at the beginning of the year that there would be a lot of doubters, but that it would be adopted as common practice once everyone else saw how well it worked - and I had faith that it would.

No problem with his response as long as he isn't outright calling the HR lucky. The other hits were lucky, and he has a right to remind people of that. The walk to Barnes was nearly unforgivable and I don't see how you bring him back for the next inning after that. I get that he and Hader work over multiple innings a lot, but I don't think it's ideal - especially when it looks like they might be laboring. I'd like to see their batted ball stats after sitting a half inning and coming back in, but my gut tells me their dependability goes down in cases like that, especially after ~3-4 batters for JJ and ~5-6 for Hader. And again, it's not like everyone else in the pen is Drake and Albers. This was a 35-man effort to get here. Don't turn it into a 20-man team now that you're here. By not giving them work when you have a chance (game 3 against the Rockies for example), you're just ensuring that the rest of the pen won't be reliable when you finally have no choice but to use them in a higher leverage situation. I think it's a case of managing scared to ask so much of Hader, Jeffress, and Knebel when you have other options.

They're pitching around him and he's doing what he's supposed to do - take walks and let someone else be the hero. That's why OBP is more important than SLG, because it's doing what's right for the team instead of looking for individual glory. A .458 OBP with an .833 OPS is more valuable than some of the .325 OBP with a .900+ OPS crap people go gaga over (Javy Baez for example).

Exactly! You know you're going to have to use them in a 7-game series, so you may as well use them when it would normally be their turn. Otherwise they don't get enough work and they're rusty when you need them. Meanwhile you're pushing your best relievers to the point where they're arguably no more effective than anyone else - or they're only more effective because everyone else has been riding the pine for a week or more. And it's not just appearances that cover multiple innings in consecutive days; the cumulative workload of a 163-game season is a factor too. And it's not like it's Drake and Albers in the back of the bullpen. I love the Brewers' management and I always qualify it every time I question them by acknowledging that they've been 1 or 2 steps ahead of all the critics all year. However, this seems to be a case where they've reverted to some baseball dogma instead of continuing to make this a 25-man effort, which is what got them here. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy when you won't trust any other relievers with 4 or 5 run leads like Friday or last week against the Rockies, because the lack of work causes them to be as bad as you feared when you finally have to put them out there with a smaller lead.

Was pretty lucky this year with a .249 BABIP. Would have been decent anyway, but not the type of guy you gotta leave out there at all costs and act like he's prime Mariano Rivera.

I was fine with that. They want to start him Wednesday I assume, as they should. I have more problems with constantly acting like you have no bullpen depth, which is a self-fulfilling prophecy. You get a less effective version of your best relievers (even Hader gave up a lot of hard-hit balls in his 3rd inning yesterday) and then you get a less effective version of your other relievers because they're rusty. You are going to need most of the staff so just use them when your best guys have faced several batters or you have some other reason to believe their performance might suffer (for example, if they walk Austin friggin' Barnes with the bases loaded).

They did. They trust Cedeno yesterday. They trusted Burnes today. They stunk. Only because they absolutely had to, and they didn't give other guys much work against the Rockies even though they could have. I don't buy that JJ is so much better than the other guys that you have to get more innings out of him even when he's laboring and walking scrubs like Barnes. I don't buy that you needed 3 innings from Hader yesterday, or needed multiple innings from the best relievers to close out the Rockies. Yes the other guys have struggled. Relievers often do when they've had too many consecutive days off. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy.