Playoff Bullpen Usage

[Spy Fox]

How do you want to see Hyde deploy the bullpen in this KC series? Who do you trust most and least right now in a late and close situation? These are presumably conversations being held by the O's leadership today. 

For reference, here's how the IP broke down last year against Texas: 

• G1: Bradish 4.2, Coulombe 0.2, Webb 0.1, Hall 1.2, Wells 1, Perez 0.2
• G2: Rodriguez 1.2, Coulombe 0.1, Baker 0.1, Webb 1.2, Flaherty 2, Wells 1, Perez 1, Cano 1
• G3: Kremer 1.2, Wells 1.1, Gibson 3, Hall 1.2, Cano 0.1

Of course, success will start with longer outings by the SPs. After that, what do you want to see? 

[lifelongbirdfan]

I wouldn't mind using Hall and Wells for some innings.=) At least we won't have to watch Brian Baker.

I hope we don't have to use Perez. I would ride Akin, Soto, Coulombe, Cano, and Dominquez. In playoffs, would be nice to have a bona fide stud or two rather than 6 solid arms. Hopefully some guys step up like Hall did last year.

[e16bball]

For me, bullpen strategy in a short series is developing a core principle or two and working backwards from that. That’s usually going to involve how we want to pitch to their best guys.

In this case, there’s really no way to game Witt. He doesn’t have any discernible platoon splits, and in fact he destroyed RHPs this year. He doesn’t even have any particular pitches he struggles against. If you have to pitch to him, power stuff seems to be the way to go — if he has any weakness, it seems like maybe it’s LHPs who can attack him with high velocity and some sort of off speed weapon (Skubal, Framber, Kikuchi, EdRod, Rodon, Sale, Gore). So maybe you’re looking at Soto and Perez there, although you really just shouldn’t be pitching to him at all if you can avoid it.

Beyond him, the other “hero” is Salvador Perez. And that’s from where I’d be building out my strategy. He probably should not see a LHP all series. There’s a fairly meaningful career platoon split there (109 wRC+ to 101), and it’s been more pronounced this year (130 to 110). I would be looking to force feed him ABs against Cano (1/4 with a single), Webb (0/2 with two Ks), and Dominguez. He’s always had trouble with offspeed stuff, which means Webb might be the preferred option.

They’ve faced a ton of LH starters in the last week or so, but it seems like their preferred lineup against RHPs stacks LH hitters like Melendez and Gurriel behind Perez.

Melendez is awful against LHPs, so ideally Perez might be the last hitter that the starters see. They pinch hit very liberally in platoon fashion in the bottom half of the lineup, so if you brought in someone like Akin behind the starter, they might very well hit for him. Forcing them to do that erases a lot of the platoon stacking in the late innings, so you could subsequently bring in a RHP to pitch to Perez without the same concern that they’d be exposed after him. 
 

In sum, I think the ideal attack plan is for Burnes/Eflin/Kremer to see Perez three times, then bring in Akin or Cionel to pitch to the bottom of what will likely be a lefty-heavy lineup. They’ll potentially PH there, but that’s okay because none of those guys are that good. You then go to one of the RHPs for the top of the lineup, which it seems will consist of Pham, Witt (pitch around), and Perez. Then back to Coulombe or Soto for the bottom of the lineup again.

Edited 2 hours ago by e16bball

[OsFanSinceThe80s]

The Orioles starters absolutely have to do better against the Royals. You can't ask this bullpen to pitch most of the game and expect to win. Right now I probably trust Coulombe the most and Soto (which I never would have guessed a couple weeks back).

Perez has been really shaky recently to the point I'm wondering is he nursing a tired arm or minor injuey. Cano hasn't been good as well and O's really need him to get back into a groove. And Akin is usually trustworthy, but only starting the inning clean.

Edited 2 hours ago by OsFanSinceThe80s