14-16 at the midpoint

[Tony-OH]

38 minutes ago, DrungoHazewood said:

Pros: It's a competitive balance leveler.  Who needs five or six good starters when they're basically there to get you to the 4th or 5th inning without being down four runs? 

Cons: What kind of baseball do you want?  Would anyone actually choose a style of baseball where you use seven or eight anonymous pitchers a game, and the best starters don't even throw 200 innings?  Also, exacerbates the three true outcomes style (or I suppose improves it if you're really into Ks and homers).

How is that different from what baseball has basically become even before this year? 

 

[wildcard]

3 minutes ago, Aristotelian said:

I am sure a pace for 28 wins would be on the very high end of most preseason predictions, even here on OH. Two wins under .500 has to be seen as a massive (over)achievement. All the national media had us 30th in the power rankings, and most of us would have too. Plus this has been without Iglesias, Harvey, and Hays for the most part.

More importantly, Elias/Hyde have given auditions to a number of guys and identified several pieces that could become important long term pieces, namely Santander, Sulser, Alberto, and Scott, plus to at least some extent Nunez, Sisco, Lakins, Ruiz, Eshelman, Valaika. We have a lot more to build on now than we did a year or two ago. 

Plus we have also enhanced trade value of Cobb, Severino, Givens, perhaps Castro. Remains to be seen whether we will get anything of note but we might. 

Finally, I am actually interested in watching games, both because we have a shot at the playoffs and I feel the games are competitive again. In short, tremendously successful first half IMO.  

I doubt Severino is shopped until AR is ready.

[survivedc]

23 minutes ago, Frobby said:

I don’t think Castro will get $4 mm in Arb 2.   Just for comparison, Brad Brach got a raise from $1.25 mm to $3.05 mm in Arb 2, following an outstanding season in which he pitched to a 2.72 ERA over 79 innings.   Given made $2.15 mm in Arb 1 and after a mediocre 2019, got $3.225 mm in  Arb 2.    I’d see Castro falling short of $3 mm next year.    

I agree, was pointing out that a 3mil raise would be pretty historic and is very unlikely but even if that’s what he got he wouldn’t be too expensive to keep.

[DrungoHazewood]

16 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

How is that different from what baseball has basically become even before this year? 

 

I guess it's not, it's just (pro)(re)gressed. They started boiling the frog about 1880, and he's not quite cooked yet, but we're to the point where a starter goes four innings.  When my kids are 40 they'll list the nine scheduled pitchers for today's game in the preview.

[Sports Guy]

21 minutes ago, wildcard said:

I doubt Severino is shopped until AR is ready.

If true, this makes zero sense.

[Philip]

1 hour ago, wildcard said:

Another thing that Hyde does is anticipate matchups and pull pitchers before they get into unfavorable matchups.   It causes a lot of short appearances for the starter and relievers. 

I don't know how Hyde will manage in a 162 games season but there is a notable difference now.

That’s interesting. In the later innings, Hyde seems more aware of the 3-batter rule and seems to favor specific matchups, but it sure looks like he’s letting his starters linger too long. So his bullpen use might be ok, but his starter usage is not. If he had a real bullpen and a real 162-game season, he’d be at sea.

[makoman]

2 minutes ago, Philip said:

That’s interesting. In the later innings, Hyde seems more aware of the 3-batter rule and seems to favor specific matchups, but it sure looks like he’s letting his starters linger too long. So his bullpen use might be ok, but his starter usage is not. If he had a real bullpen and a real 162-game season, he’d be at sea.

It's hard to say he's giving the starters too much leash when they're pitching 4 1/3 innings a game. Even with a big bullpen I don't know that you want to have a quick hook in the 2nd inning.

[Philip]

30 minutes ago, wildcard said:

I doubt Severino is shopped until AR is ready.

Severino is gone as soon as someone makes an offer Mike likes, and I doubt it will take much. We have three serviceable catchers. only one is potentially a long-term piece, but that doesn’t matter one whit.

[Can_of_corn]

33 minutes ago, wildcard said:

I doubt Severino is shopped until AR is ready.

You don't think Holaday and Sisco can man the position?

[Frobby]

22 minutes ago, DrungoHazewood said:

Pros: It's a competitive balance leveler.  Who needs five or six good starters when they're basically there to get you to the 4th or 5th inning without being down four runs? 

Cons: What kind of baseball do you want?  Would anyone actually choose a style of baseball where you use seven or eight anonymous pitchers a game, and the best starters don't even throw 200 innings?  Also, exacerbates the three true outcomes style (or I suppose improves it if you're really into Ks and homers).

I definitely don’t want to see anything that causes strikeouts to increase over where they are currently.   For what it’s worth, even though IP/start is down from 5.2 in 2019 to 4.7 in 2020 (largely due to the larger rosters), strikeouts are actually slightly down (from 8.81/game to 8.69) in 2020.   Of course, that’s probably because the “runner on 2B in extra innings” rule has cut the average length of a game from 8.94 to 8.72.   So on a per inning basis, strikeouts are up from 8.87/9 IP to 8.97/9 IP.   Not too drastic, in any event.   

[Philip]

1 minute ago, makoman said:

It's hard to say he's giving the starters too much leash when they're pitching 4 1/3 innings a game. Even with a big bullpen I don't know that you want to have a quick hook in the 2nd inning.

I understand that, but that’s just the limitations of the pieces hyde has. If a guy is doing badly, you can’t continue to let him do badly until he’s done so badly the game is out of reach, and you know your guys limitations. You can’t give the guy another inning when he’s already thrown 70 pitches and he turns into a pumpkin after 50. You have to prepare for what is most likely. It’s difficult, but that’s just the way it goes.

Wojo is the most disappointing. I keep expecting him to have more success than he does.

[Philip]

5 minutes ago, makoman said:

It's hard to say he's giving the starters too much leash when they're pitching 4 1/3 innings a game. Even with a big bullpen I don't know that you want to have a quick hook in the 2nd inning.

Edit: if the starters can’t go deep into games, Hyde should plan for that and use the opener system. He knows the limitations of his guys, it’s up to him to work with those limitations. if we need three long guys, well we have extra spots in the pen and starters in Bowie who are ready.

[Can_of_corn]

Just now, Philip said:

Edit: if the starters can’t go deep into games, Hyde should plan for that and use the opener system. He knows the limitations of his guys, it’s up to him to work with those limitations. if we need three long guys, well we have extra spots in the pen and starters in Bowie who are ready.

Why?

You still need to cover the same innings.  How does using an opener help with the starter?  So they pitch from the 3rd to the 7th. 

[wildcard]

9 minutes ago, Philip said:

Severino is gone as soon as someone makes an offer Mike likes, and I doubt it will take much. We have three serviceable catchers. only one is potentially a long-term piece, but that doesn’t matter one whit.

The long term piece is AR.   But Severino and Sisco allow Elias not to rush AR.   Holaday  and Wynns will not even be on the 40 man roster come December.

[Frobby]

Just now, Can_of_corn said:

Why?

You still need to cover the same innings.  How does using an opener help with the starter?  So they pitch from the 3rd to the 7th. 

It has them start with a weaker part of the lineup and so maybe you can stick with them for a few weak batters the third time through the lineup.