The Mets have been known to abuse the lefty relievers and have them pitch very often, but not a lot when they do. The seemed to have slightly solved the problem this season by bringing in three lefty relievers into the bullpen allowing each to be stretched out for more than one batter and still have someone to use in an emergency situation. Jerry Blevins was lights out against lefties this season. In 14 plate appearances, he did not walk a batter or allow a hit, and struck out four batters. Alex Torres has been pretty good against lefties and came in twice during the series and struck out Christian Yelich and limiting the damage. He managed the save on Saturday and prevented a big sixth inning for the Marlins after throwing a wild pitch to allow a run to score. Gilmartin has been okay against lefties mainly due to the fact that he gave up a two run home run to Chase Utley last week.
Three of the Mets relievers are sporting some not so great ERAs right now. It is still really early in the season and one earned run can skew a relievers ERA drastically. Buddy Carlyle was pitching really well until this past Sunday. Prior to Sunday, he had only given up one hit in three innings of work. On Sunday, he gave up three consecutive hits to Giancarlo Stanton, Martin Prado, and Michael Morse and then proceeded to get two sacrifice flies and a strikeout to end the inning. He worked well to prevent even more damage from occurring, but shrunk the Mets lead from three runs to just one.
Torres as well had not given up a hit in his six appearances through ten games this season until Saturday. The inning led off with a Morse home run which shrunk the lead from 5 – 1 to 5 – 2. Over the next five batters he allowed three singles, got two strikeouts, and threw a wild pitch. The wild pitch put the two runners on base into scoring position, which allowed Dee Gordon to drive both of them in. Torres was then taken out and replaced by the lefty Torres.
Erik Goeddel has not had much time to display what he is capable of yet in just 1. 1 innings this season. Rafael Montero was not great either before being sent down with sporting a high walk rate and a high hit rate, but did manage seven strikeouts in 4. 1 innings. Jeurys Familia is a different story. He was thrust in the closer’s job after Jenrry Mejia was placed on the disabled list and then subsequently suspended for 80 games from performance enhancing drugs. Bobby Parnell has not come back yet, so it defaulted to Familia and he has taken it with gusto. He is currently leading the league in games, games finished, and saves. Only two of his appearances did he allow a run to score, one which was not a save opportunity. He has also recorded nine strikeouts and one walk.
Out of the Mets 13 games so far this season, the starting pitchers have only failed to go six innings in three games. Two of which are attributed to Dillon Gee, and the other was Jon Nieses’s start in Atlanta. With the Mets starters going deep in games, the Mets are second in the National League for appearances by a reliever. They have had 42 relief appearances, but the bullpen also holds the fourth lowest runs allowed per game in the Major Leagues. It is fine since it is so early, but as the season goes on it will be increasingly taxing on the relievers if they are continually managed this way. It has worked for Collins so far, but the relievers need to be able to go more than one or two batters per appearance.
The bullpen has worked really well so far, but how long can they keep it up for. If Alex Torres and Gilmartin are taxed against lefties every night, how long can they keep going before they throw up a meatball to a lefty and he knocks it out of the park for a game winning home run. Goeddel and newly added Hansel Robles do not have a ton of major league experience and are virtually untested. Carlyle is 37 and not getting younger and Carlos Torres is used heavily by Collins. The Mets have been playing a lot of close games during this eight game winning streak, which has led to Familia being used almost every day earning six saves in this time. Vic Black does not seem to be on his way back as he had neck and shoulder soreness after an inning in Binghamton on Saturday. Parnell has allowed two hits in each of his appearances in St. Lucie so far and given up two runs and walked a batter. Who knows when either of them will be back? The Mets are lucky that the starting pitching has been as strong as it has been through the first 13 games and prevented even more taxing on the bullpen.
Its not time to panic. Familia looks great as our closer. C Torres and Carlyle have had one bad outing each, they are entitled. A Torres had two bad outings to start but has had two good outings since and has hopefully righted the ship. Göedel will need to step up to a more prominent role, but he’s looked good in 1 outings I think Gilmartin is the wildcard and possibly moves into the long relief role (pending a decision on Gee in the rotation) given his history as a starter and Robles ability to get out lefties. Although Robles is unproven at the MLB level but will certainly get his opportunity in the coming weeks, lets hope he has brought his best with him from LV. This year proves the axiom that you can never have enough good pitching.
I wonder why the Mets did not promote lefty, Darin Gorski? He has pitched as both a starter and a reliever and seems willing and capable of being an okay reliever, long relief type of guy. I like that the Mets called up Robles but I know that they are really going to need a lefty reliever and they really do not have anyone in the minors other than Gorski that might be able to step up to the role to fill a desperate Mets void. They could also consider bringing up Scott Rice as he can get one or two lefty batters out but is not able to retire righties. I just don’
t see Gilmartin being able to keep lefty batters at bay for much longer? I think the Mets FO needs to consider moving Mike Conforto up to Binghamton because in my mind he is just a much better prospect than Brandon Nimmo will ever be. Which brings me to Kevin Plawecki whom I really think will be a decent backstop and a Paul Lo Duca type of hitter. What the Mets need to do is have someone work with Johnny Monell as he can hit and catch but has great problems throwing runners out, If I was S.A. I would hire Ivan Rodriguez to work with Monell to improve his throwing. I would also give him playing time at 1B. The guy can rake so they need to find somewhere where he can play because playing time will not be available once d”Arnaud is back and Plawecki establishes himself (fingers crossed).
I believe the Mets brought up Robles instead of a lefty is because they already do have Gilmartin and Torres and trust that they can get the lefties out. Robles has had five good appearances so far in Las Vegas. Robles was a starter for most of his career and if he can transition to the bullpen well, then he can go out there some days and throw two-three innings and give the others guys a break. They are still testing Gilmartin out and unless he is really bad, he will be on the team until Blevins is returning and at that point the front office will decide if Gilmartin is worth keeping.
After Mejia got suspended, I believed that the Mets could and would be fine. The loss of Blevins is a devastating blow for the bullpen. Torres now is in risk of becoming a Pedro Feliciano, Tim Byrdak or Scott Rice as he will be given a ton of confidence to get the difficult NL lefties out. Hopefully Terry doesn’t overuse him, and let’s see if Gilmartin can get those lefties out.
Devastating? Hardly.
Carlyle, Familia, Goeddel and C. Torres have allowed two hits (both singles) in 20 ABs against LHB so far. Familia, who had so much trouble last year against lefties, has not allowed a hit in 10 ABs and has 4 Ks.
It’s a good point, I like Blevins a lot, since he has had successful years in the past. I don’t trust Carlyle in a big role over an extended period of time, even though he has pitched well so far this season. Haven’t seen too much of Goeddel, so I cannot put too much stock in him. I like Torres as a long reliever, but it will be interesting to see what he can do in a bigger role. As for Familia, I’m glad to see he’s improving against lefties. As of now it looks good against lefties, but I feel a lot more confident if Blevins and Alex Torres were both available to come in against left-handed hitters.
Brian has a man crush on MDM, so he’s not able to recognize Blevins as an asset.
You’re mistaken.
I don’t believe in going bananas over every little thing. Blevins retired 15 people, 14 of which he had the platoon advantage. That’s impressive and I’ve never said otherwise.
But it’s not nearly as impressive as the quartet I mentioned above retiring 18 out of 20 people without the platoon advantage.
The default position of the people running the Mets since 2011 is that it’s absolutely critical to have lefty relievers. They’ve never presented any evidenced that this is true – they just proclaimed it from on high and the vast majority of people have accepted it with zero critical thinking.
Management has acted like righty relief pitchers are incapable of retiring lefty batters. And as we’ve seen numerous times in the last four-plus years, it’s simply not true.
I quite like Gilmartin and didn’t we stash Rice in triple A?
Scott Rice pitched horribly last year and went on the disabled list in June and stayed there for the rest of the season. He also bombed this spring pitching 5 innings and giving up 5 earned runs. Hitters hit .300 off him as well. I am okay with not seeing Scott Rice on the Mets this season. He was a nice story and decent lefty in 2013, but there are better options.
The Met bullpen is a cause for concern. Last year the Mets had Mejia, Familia, Black and Edgin to come in from the 7th inning on. This year they have Familia. Last year Carlyle and Carlos Torres had good years and now they have to step up into set up roles. Alex Torres needs to step up big time because of the way TC manages the bullpen, with his propensity for the lefty matchup. Blevins was a perfect fit for a manager like TC and Blevins injury will be difficult for TC to adjust to. The Met bullpen should survive this but the players that are being asked to do more may not be capable of the added responsibility for an extended period of time. It is concerning but unless they can get a strong setup man for the 8th inning via trade the Mets will have to weather this storm. Your point, “…but as the season goes on it will be increasingly taxing on the relievers if they are continually managed this way” is the real concern.
When it is prediction time, I look at the team and ask, “What happens when the injuries hit?” In the past, the answer was: the excrement hits the whirling blades. This year my overall answer was that this team was exceptionally suited to dealing with injuries. I did think that Montero would become a key to the pen — and that’s not ruled out in the future — but the advantage to stockpiling all these young arms is coming into play. Robbles is a great case in point; and if he can’t get it done, the Mets will move on to the next guy, and the next. I love Blevins, he was exactly what this team needed — a steady veteran, been there, done that kind of guy — but now at least TC won’t be able to burn him out by July. BTW: Alex Torres is getting a bad rap in some places. Yes, he has a propensity to walk batters, but he’s very tough to hit. My hope is that TC doesn’t revert him to the LOOGY role, which would be a mistake.
Terry will almost certainly revert either Torres or Gilmartin to being a LOOGY. At this point it will probably be Gilmartin. Blevins up until the injury only faced one right handed batter and fourteen left handed batters. Torres last year actually had reverse splits and showed he could get righties out. He is much more valuable giving the Mets a full inning of work, then coming in for just one batter. Gilmartin is still untested and he is likely to be on the line when Blevins comes back unless he pitches well.
In the meantime, good old Jack Leathersich — whom I’ve never been high on — is throwing strikes and striking out hitters in Vegas. Can he give the Mets 6 good weeks?
It’s become one of the new SABR-inspired baseball cliches, the new accepted conventional wisdom, that relief pitchers are unpredictable from year to year and therefore, on the whole, unreliable.
Of course, there’s some truth to that. But to me a significant contributing issue is about sample size, luck, accident, and all the variables that go into each appearance. What’s the situation, who does he face, on what amount of rest, and so on. A couple of bad outings can screw a guy’s numbers for the season. And likewise, even a bad RP can have a solid stretch at the ML level.
At a certain point, you have to trust what you see, trust what you (or they) know about baseball. The numbers are important, but when it comes to bullpen arms, more so than any other position (besides backup catcher), the signal can get lost in the noise.
This bullpen is good, not great. They are pitching well overall, and I hope that continues. If things do unravel, I imagine they would do so rather quickly. But the Mets have lots of young arms to throw at the situation if necessary.