We all have our blind spots. Anyone who has read this site for very long can recognize my unflagging support for Darin Gorski – thanks Backman, for screwing him out of a win last night – or half a dozen other players. But there’s a difference between stumping for players who you think can help the team and insisting that a role be carved out, despite all evidence to the contrary.
Sandy Alderson continued his fetish for LOOGYs by DFAing a perfectly acceptable bullpen arm to acquire Eric O’Flaherty, a lefty reliever who hasn’t been both good and healthy since 2012. But anytime you can give up talent to get a guy with a 5.91 ERA and a 1.969 WHIP, you’ve got to do it. We don’t know how much talent this trade will cost but if it’s anything more than Scott Rice, it was too much.
O’Flaherty has limited lefty batters to a .495 OPS this season. He’s very good when he has the platoon advantage. The problem is what happens when he has to face a righty. RHB have a .420/.491/.620 line against him. O’Flaherty dominates lefties but he turns the average righty into the equivalent of 1911 Ty Cobb. With spikes a flyin’, Cobb won the MVP that year with a .420/.467/.621 line. He led the league in 11 offensive categories, including runs (147), RBIs (127) and total bases (367).
One of the nice things about this winning season is how the relievers have not faced many times where they’ve pitched four times in the last five games because they had to make up for the inability of the lefty relievers to pitch to more than a batter or two at a time. But, we’re going back to the model that failed every year from 2011-2015. You almost have to admire such dedication to a principle. Hey, it worked in the 1980s, so we should expect it to work any day now, any day.
So, while the organization insists that nothing is more critical to team success than lefty relievers to retire lefty batters, here’s how the righty relievers currently in the pen have done against the big bad lefties they’ve faced this year:
Tyler Clippard: 3-10
Jeurys Familia: 14-79
Bobby Parnell: 6-17
Hansel Robles: 9-41
Carlos Torres: 14-54
Total: 46-201 (.229)
And for the season, lefties are batting .122 with a .384 OPS against Clippard, so there’s no reason to expect a .300 clip against him going forward. For what it’s worth, lefties are 0-13 versus Logan Verrett and 7-28 against Erik Goeddel. Perhaps Parnell should be managed carefully to limit his exposure to lefty batters but no other righty reliever in the pen shakes in his shoes when a LHB strides to the plate.
OK, Alex Torres has not been as good as we expected this year. But compare his 3.15 ERA and 1.515 WHIP to what O’Flaherty has done. But this Torres has had the misfortune of not performing as well against LHB (.799 OPS) and he’s done against RHB (.655 OPS).
What separates a good manager from the others is his ability to put his players into a position where they can succeed. It’s no secret that Torres was not a dominant pitcher against lefty batters. Yet his manager continued to put him into games specifically to retire a lefty hitter. Instead of being put in a position to succeed, this Torres was set up to fail.
We’re going to see Torres move on to another club, be used properly and be an effective bullpen piece. He could have easily been that for the Mets except for the club’s insistence that because he threw with his left hand that he was useless unless he dominated lefty hitters.
The Mets’ bullpen has been a pleasant surprise this year, especially given all of the injuries that have hit the squad there. And since Jerry Blevins went down with an injury (does anyone give him grief for not returning sooner or is that limited to guys not born in this country? When Blevins went down in April, he was supposed to return in mid-June) the squad has not had a LOOGY. Maybe the success of the pen and the lack of a LOOGY is not just a coincidence, especially given what we’ve observed the previous four years with at least one, and sometimes three, LOOGYs.
All of us are pleased that Alderson is out there trying to improve the club. We needed a middle of the order bat so Yoenis Cespedes is a welcome addition. A late inning reliever was a necessity once Jenrry Mejia was suspended again so Clippard is a gift to have. No one wanted to see more Quad-A hitters, so Kelly Johnson and Juan Uribe were nice pieces to add.
But a LOOGY? Really, you shouldn’t have.
O’Flaherty’s 2015 stats show a major platoon advantage versus Lefties—but he’s not being used as a 1 hitter guy, and he’s getting slaughtered versus RH Batters. His career stats show him as “survivable versus Righties”. He’s a “Statistical Loogy”, if you look at the stats—but he’s never Pitched as a Loogy! There’s absolutely no projection for assuming that he can pop in for a batter and be effective.
Rice’s stat line shows lot’s of walks this year…however, last 10 appearances: 8Innings, 3 Hits, 3bb, 9K’s… No Earned Runs!!!! The stat line and his history tell you that he has had some experience and effectiveness in partial innings—The Loogy Role.
I’m not opposed to the Loogy Concept… But you need to have a tremendously effective pitcher who can perform in that very specific role. Otherwise, your filling a role to fill a role—but you might not have a guy who can do that role.
LOOGY madness said everything worth noting. But that madness will in this case been truly LOOGY. I expect he will be seeing 1 batter per game in strategic situations. That will limit the weaknesses in the numbers you report. Im not thrilled about it in any way, but the powers that be love this stuff. Im happy to bid farewell to Torres.
THe issue you highlight is one of differing philosophy, and so I think it is important to not get confused in assessing the move. It is your philosophy to play people in a manner they are most productive, and fit that together. It requires the skills sets needed to play the game are covered by the personnel. Makes sense to me.
But in the power suites at citifield, they see tasks that need filling, and then place someone in that task, whether or not that person is ideally suited for it (take Flores for example). Here they see a need for a lefty only guy. And that is all he will see. You may not like this approach, not many here do, but thats the deal. They see that need and so are sticking a guy in there only to face a single lefty. Madness to be sure, but thats his role. Hopefully holding a reliever spot for such a crazy specialized need wont impact the bench.
As for Blevins. He just received permission to throw. Comparing him with Montero is simply wrong. Montero has been cleared for ages, with the docs unable to find anything wrong. He’s sat idle for months with clearance…and the situation is dire enough for Collins to take his off day to meet him personally to figure out how to get him going.
Just because doctors can’t find anything wrong doesn’t mean the patient is pain-free. And Collins is going to check on Blevins, too, so let’s not make his trip all about Montero.
as being reported repeatedly on MLB radio and elsewhere, this is a trip about going to see Montero. Of course, there will be collateral interests. The timing of Blevins healing and throwing per physician instruction is a wholly unrelated matter.
Im not considering whether Montero is hurt or not. Im not in his body. But I think patience is being tested.
The comment comparing Blevins injury with Montero’s is a cheap shot. The difference is that Blevins has not been cleared by the medical staff to resume baseball activities while two doctors have examined Montero and could not identify a medical issue with his shoulder. He is medically cleared to throw while Blevins is not.
At first glance, DFA of Alex Torres and his 3.15 ERA looks like a mistake. His role in July was secondary tier reliever to come in when the team was behind a few. His 6.88 bb/9 and 1.5 WHIP was too much of a risk to take during a winning effort because of the possibility he could turn a sure win into a close contest. His DFA was the right move.
I hate LOOGY’s but Chris F makes great points on why we need to accept it. It also gives us fodder to complain about because this is a poor move. LOOGY’s strain bullpens. DFA of Alex was fine, but getting a LOOGY, Oh Really.
Just because someone in power does something sub-optimal or crazy doesn’t mean we need to accept it.
And Torres’ DFA was a complete overreaction to four bad appearances. Thru the end of June, Torres had a 2.52 ERA and a .668 OPS against — more than fine numbers for a non-closer. The average NL reliever has a 3.50 ERA and a .688 OPS. What he did over three months trumps what he did in four games in July.
We released a league-average reliever who could go two innings at a time in order to get a guy having a much-worse year who has to be micro-managed.
Brian, I respect your positions immensely. However its folly to say something like: “Just because someone in power does something sub-optimal or crazy doesn’t mean we need to accept it.”
This is a private business run as an oligarchy, not a government we can change via election. We have to accept it simply because “it is.”
Private businesses are still responsible to their customers.
As far as I am concerned the problem with Torres is the walks. For a reliever ( or any pitcher for that matter) this is a cardinal sin. Look at Robles last night for an example. The difference is that Robles is a rookie trying to harness a tremendous arm. Torres is a known commodity with a long history of poor control.
Whether this was an acceptable risk won’t be known until the Player to be named is identified. But in my opinion losing Torres won’t be noticable.
So, knowing that walks were a problem even before acquiring him, the rational response would be not to utilize him when men are already on base.
Instead, we tried again to fit the square peg into the round hole. Because he throws with his left hand, we were going to bring him in mostly with runners on base and a lefty at the plate.
SMH
Pain is a primary diagnostic tool. When your arm is part of such a talented physical attribute, and throwing has always been a natural and successful thing, Pain is an incredibly useful feedback that something is wrong. Anyone would take extra time trying to figure out whether their primary skill (the thing they Love to do!) is at risk.
“Throwing through the pain” is the last choice…after all other choices and re-diagnoses have been exhausted.
If it was May I’d agree that adding O’Flaherty is a waste of a roster spot if he’s only going to pitch to 1 or possible 2 batters (sandwiched around an intentional walk to a righty) per inning/game. However, I think two facts make this a smart pickup. 1. Mets starters are consistently pitching 7+ innings meaning most of the pen is well-rested. So it won’t hurt to use multiple pitchers in one inning as it would have if we started going to the bullpen earlier. 2. in less than a month, rosters expand, so the pen should have even more reinforcements.
Sometimes you have to wonder why in hell this front office makes certain moves and this is one of them. They have better pitchers at Vegas but instead pick someone else garbage. Watch Beane fleece the Mets again.
I am not a Sandy apologist, but given the FO’s recent pick-ups, don’t they deserve the benefit of doubt? Also, is anyone really going to miss Alex Torres, except for his hemorrhoid seat cushion headgear?
you really gonna miss that AB?
AB? I’m not going to miss Torres. He was hit or miss and seemed useful only when the game was out of hand. I dont think that TC used him correctly, but that didnt seem like it was ever going to change. Giving him up is of little consequence. Given that the FO suddenly seems to have a magic touch, Im willing to wait and see what happens here. Maybe they know something about Torres or this new guy that we don’t.
OMG!!!! I hope “The “Player to be Named Later” is Eric O’Flaherty….and I hope it’s not much later!
He was terrific with the Braves. Just Sandy trying to catch lightning in a bottle again. Typical Met in overexposing him his first outing so he got shellacked.
I’ll forever disagree with you on the LOOGY thing. Ryan Howard in the 7th or 8th inning with the bases loaded? I want a lefty reliever who’s gonna make him look bad.
The problem is that there just aren’t enough of those guys to make it a winning proposition.
In order for the LOOGY strategy to work, you have to use a WPA argument. That is, the value of coming on and facing and retiring the dangerous lefties in key situations makes up for the times when he gets pounded by RHB.
For example, on 7/12/13, Rice came on in a tie game, with runners on the corners in the 9th inning. He retired the lefty-hitting Pedro Alvarez and got a 0.19 WPA for his efforts in that game. And on 5/10/13, Rice came on in a game where the Mets were losing, 6-1, faced 4 out of 5 RHB and gave up a run. Since that outing had little effect on the Mets losing, he did not receive negative WPA credit. Instead, he got a 0 WPA for this outing. Getting hit by righties in a mop up situation had no effect on his WPA.
Scott Rice limited LHB to a .174/.244/.223 mark in 2013, when he was “good.” And that year he had a 0.16 WPA. His contributions over a full season amounted to less than 2/10 of a win when measuring the context of the situations he actually appeared in.
That’s not good.
And that doesn’t even take into account the stress the LOOGY puts other pitchers of the staff under.