Brandon Hyde 2024

[LookitsPuck]

11 minutes ago, Fiver6565 said:

I would guess it’s as simple as they are trying not to run him into the ground before the playoffs 

Yeah, I suppose. Just feels like a lot of white flag waving for the division. But that’s my frustration with Kimbrel being used in the late innings. At this point, just pitch him earlier in the game where at least it gives the offense hope later. Kimbrel late deflates the hope balloon immediately.

[Spy Fox]

49 minutes ago, LookitsPuck said:

But the weird thing about Cano is his usage lately. He pitched yesterday (8/31), 8/27, 8/24, 8/20, 8/18. A lot of off days for him. Number of pitches per outing: 8, 16, 19, 20, 18.

He last pitched back to back games/days on 8/17 and 8/18.

He hasn’t pitched 1 2/3 IP in months. But he has pitched 1 1/3 as recent as the 24th when he threw only 19 pitches.

Just very odd usage all around. The Soto and Smith usage makes sense since Soto isn’t great against righties and Smith is abysmal against lefties. But Akin and Cano usage was really poor/odd.

43 minutes ago, Fiver6565 said:

I would guess it’s as simple as they are trying not to run him into the ground before the playoffs 

I think it’s because Cano usually pitches with the lead and we haven’t had as many of those. If we win more games in September he’ll have more back to backs. 

[ShoelesJoe]

This team is starting to remind me of the days when Showalter first started to lose the Orioles clubhouse. It’s not just that the team is playing poorly, it’s how they’re playing poorly. Last night there was a perfect example of what’s wrong. 4th inning Red Sox starter Bello is struggling even with a 4-1 lead. He’s at 80+ pitches, and with 2 outs threw 7 straight out of the strike zone, hitting Mullins on the foot to load the bases and then walking Santander to force in a run making it 4-2. Situationally this is baseball 101 — Bello has lost his control and 31 pitches into the inning is very likely getting tired. The next Orioles batter has to take the first pitch, no ifs ands or buts. 
 

But our next batter is Ryan O’Hearn who incomprehensibly swings at the first pitch — a strike for sure, but on the inside corner where he can’t extend his arms — and he hits a lazy fly ball to LF for the 3rd out. Now, I don’t know who said what to O’Hearn before that critical AB. Maybe Hyde or one of the coaches told him that if he got his pitch to go for it no matter when in the AB it was. But if such a conversation didn’t take place then Ryan O’Hearn is either too stupid or too egocentric to play for this team.
 

I know for a fact that there are managers who back in the day would have pulled O’Hearn out of the game as an act of public shaming to send a message to the rest of the players, and the organization as a whole. I suspect that Hyde lacks the willpower to send such a message to his guys, but if he can’t or won’t do so at this point in the season then maybe he’s not the right manager for this team. 

Edited September 10 by ShoelesJoe

[LookitsPuck]

Not that I disagree about O'Hearn's approach with a struggling pitcher, but he does hit 302 on the first pitch (13 hits out of 44 PA). It does drop off to 227 on an 0-1 count. That said, there's definitely value in waiting Bello out. There's a certain chess game that these pitchers have been deploying against these pressing Orioles. And it's been working. They're getting themselves out.

To me, you could tell it with Mayo's first 2 ABs. 2 pitches, 2 outs. What happens on the 3rd AB? Bello throws a pitch well outside probably assuming that Mayo would hack at it. Luckily he didn't. But by then it was too late in the game.

I don't mind aggression especially against pitchers that live in the strike zone. But going up there and being aggressive against a struggling pitcher is a recipe for failure.

[ShoelesJoe]

1 hour ago, LookitsPuck said:

Not that I disagree about O'Hearn's approach with a struggling pitcher, but he does hit 302 on the first pitch (13 hits out of 44 PA). It does drop off to 227 on an 0-1 count.

The Orioles as a team are hitting .353 when putting the first pitch in play so O’Hearn is actually a below average first ball swinger compared to the rest of the team. The point is that swinging the bat on that first pitch should have never been an option. 

Edited Tuesday at 16:56 by ShoelesJoe

[Too Tall]

There are a lot of questions. Like, why did Gunnar go into a funk after the all star break? Why is Tony so streaky? Why is Mullins so inconsistent? What the hell has happened to Adley? Why do our rookies take so long to adjust if they ever do? Why does Cowser perform so bad with runners on? How in all that's orange are we even in line for a playoff berth? I looked at last night's line-up and decided to watch reruns of CSI. Just a different bloody mess! 

Hyde may have issues, but he is no magician. Houston - we have a problem - but it isn't the manager!

[LookitsPuck]

45 minutes ago, ShoelesJoe said:

The Orioles as a team are hitting .316/ .328 / .522 when putting the first pitch in play so O’Hearn is actually a below average first ball swinger compared to the rest of the team. The point is that swinging the bat on that first pitch should have never been an option. 

I'm not so sure I'd quibble over 302 vs 316. That's a 1.4% difference and over the span of 44 at bats, that doesn't even mean 1 extra hit.

I think in *that circumstance*, however, I really despise hitters going up there hacking on the first pitch when the pitcher is clearly struggling. And O'Hearn didn't have the excuse about facing a lefty. So that should have been O'Hearn's bread/butter.

To me it felt that O'Hearn went up there guessing/assuming he was going to get something middle/middle, and he was very, very wrong. 

[ShoelesJoe]

10 minutes ago, LookitsPuck said:

I'm not so sure I'd quibble over 302 vs 316. That's a 1.4% difference and over the span of 44 at bats, that doesn't even mean 1 extra hit.

I think in *that circumstance*, however, I really despise hitters going up there hacking on the first pitch when the pitcher is clearly struggling. And O'Hearn didn't have the excuse about facing a lefty. So that should have been O'Hearn's bread/butter.

To me it felt that O'Hearn went up there guessing/assuming he was going to get something middle/middle, and he was very, very wrong. 

For some reason my BRef splits page for the Orioles pulled up the 2022 season instead of 2024. The team as a whole is actually hitting .353 /.359/ .610 when putting the first pitch in play this season. So O’Hearn is about 50 points BA worse than the average Oriole when hitting the first pitch. 

 

[HowAboutThat]

1 hour ago, Too Tall said:

There are a lot of questions. Like, why did Gunnar go into a funk after the all star break? Why is Tony so streaky? Why is Mullins so inconsistent? What the hell has happened to Adley? Why do our rookies take so long to adjust if they ever do? Why does Cowser perform so bad with runners on? How in all that's orange are we even in line for a playoff berth? I looked at last night's line-up and decided to watch reruns of CSI. Just a different bloody mess! 

Hyde may have issues, but he is no magician. Houston - we have a problem - but it isn't the manager!

He may not be the ONLY problem. But he’s definitely A problem.

[bpilktree67]

1 hour ago, LookitsPuck said:

I'm not so sure I'd quibble over 302 vs 316. That's a 1.4% difference and over the span of 44 at bats, that doesn't even mean 1 extra hit.

I think in *that circumstance*, however, I really despise hitters going up there hacking on the first pitch when the pitcher is clearly struggling. And O'Hearn didn't have the excuse about facing a lefty. So that should have been O'Hearn's bread/butter.

To me it felt that O'Hearn went up there guessing/assuming he was going to get something middle/middle, and he was very, very wrong. 

It was though a fastball middle of the plate.  It did tail a bit at end but that is a pitch he usually handles.  It wasn’t like he chased out of the zone or even a pitchers pitch.  When your going bad you get under that and if you take it then your thinking now I am behind in the count and might have just let the best pitch go by.  

[Chelsea_Phil]

I keep thinking back to that robbery of a three run home run by that Rays centerfielder against Gunnar, it totally deflated me and maybe the team as well. 

[bpilktree67]

49 minutes ago, ShoelesJoe said:

For some reason my BRef splits page for the Orioles pulled up the 2022 season instead of 2024. The team as a whole is actually hitting .353 /.359/ .610 when putting the first pitch in play this season. So O’Hearn is about 50 points BA worse than the average Oriole when hitting the first pitch. 

 

That still is like 1 or 2 hit difference in just 44 at bats.  If he smacks a double in the gap no one says anything about him swinging at first pitch.    He is .302  on 0-0, .237 on 0-1, and .130 on 0-2.   He is hitting well when ahead in count but if he gets behind he is hitting about .200 

[Ohfan67]

It’s a miracle that the Orioles have the record they do and I think Hyde should get credit for how the team is hung around even after a ton of injuries and poor performance from some critical players. Pretty much every night four of the hitters are almost automatic outs and Hyde has to use cast offs in the bullpen. I think it’s a miracle they’ve held on as long as they have. It’s a disappointing second half but I think Hyde’s positives definitely outweigh his negatives. 

[Brian88]

29 minutes ago, Chelsea_Phil said:

I keep thinking back to that robbery of a three run home run by that Rays centerfielder against Gunnar, it totally deflated me and maybe the team as well. 

They've been deflated for much longer than that

[dystopia]

I saw a post on Twitter about how mediocre we’ve been ever since the HBP-filled series with the Yankees, and speculated that maybe Hyde lost the clubhouse with how he handled that situation. 
 

It’s Twitter so take it with a grain of salt. But the timeline does check out. Pretty weird how we went from clobbering the Yankees to 2+ months of this crap.