The multi-inning save
Yesterday, Mike Hargrove asked J.J. Putz to get five outs to save the game. In his last appearance, he was asked to get four outs. Both times, he succeeded without any problem, shutting the door and ensuring the Mariners get a win against a divisional rival. For his part, J.J.’s willing to work multiple innings, but it apparently isn’t high on his wish list:
“It’s something you don’t want to have to do on a consistent basis,” Putz said of his five-out save. “But I’ve said this before, when I talked to Mariano [Rivera] last year he said, ‘Sometimes the biggest outs are in the eighth inning, and that’s when you may need to come in and save a game.’
Hooray for Mariano Rivera’s understanding of leverage! When Putz entered the game last night, the leverage index was 3.90. Keep in mind, leverage is a scale built around 1.00 being average, and anything over 2.0 is considered a very important situation. Most closers have leverage indexes in the 2.0 to 2.5 range, so while the 9th inning is indeed a higher pressure inning than most others, it doesn’t even hold a candle to the huge effect the 8th inning had on yesterday’s game.
In Monday’s game, when Putz was brought on in the 8th inning, the leverage was 4.71! That’s about as high leverage a situation as you’ll ever see.
We’ve given Hargrove a lot of crap for the way he runs his bullpen, living by strictly defined roles and putting guys in positions where they are very unlikely to succeed. But on his willingness to use Putz as a multi-inning closer, he’s ahead of the curve. J.J. got at least 4 outs in 15 different games last year, and that he’s already been asked to do it twice this year is a good sign.
When the game is on the line, you should have your best available reliever to try to get the outs. In almost every situation, that guy is going to be J.J. Putz. The 8th inning is often a very high leverage situation, and Hargrove’s willingness to use Putz to get more than the standard three out save is going to help this team win games.
Unless he’s behind or tied, right? I mean, don’t get me wrong, I applaud Hargrove on that decision as much as the next guy, but he’s taken a beating here (rightfully, I would surmise) because of his unwillingness to use J.J. in a tie game late, instead waiting to use him until it’s a save situation.
Which can’t happen in a home game in extra innings, anyway.
And hooray wins!
I agree, it seems Hargrove is doing a better job of managing. Giving Morrow 3+ innings before was good I thought. Not using Mateo yesterday was good. And of course as you mentioned, using Putz to get 5 outs.
As much as I wanted to fire Hargrove before, if he manages like this, I won’t mind as much.
regarding JJ’s splitter, from Drayer yesterday:
Hargrove has also basically abandoned the sac bunt and has limited WFB to 11 plate appearances in 17 games. It’s as if he’s coming around.
Yes, Hargrove’s unwillingness to use Putz in a tie game is still an attrocious misuse of resources, and will continue to drive me insane. He’s still a bad manager, and he still handles his bullpen poorly.
But he does this one specific thing – using Putz for more than 3 outs in high leverage situations – pretty well, so I figured I’d point it out.
It’s funny how people tend to tie usage to innings rather than pitches for relievers. Reitsma threw 23 pitches in his 1 inning of work, while Putz threw 22 pitches in his 1 2/3 innings of work. There’s little doubt that Reitsma will be available tonight, but Putz’s availability is a question mark.
Just a bit odd.
My question is this… Hargrove seems to manage differently when his job is on the line. It’s like he knows the best way to win, but completely ignores it until he has to. What’s up with that?
Hey man, where’s the vitriol? This post would make me think ya’ll are Mariners fans.
However wise Grover’s decision may be to use Putz before the ninth, I am concerned about the kind of wear this will put on his already tender elbow. What I would really like to see from Hargrove is a willingness to not only send Putz out in the eighth (or seventh, if need be), but also to relieve him should he run up a high pitch count.
Couldn’t agree more, Dave. I’ve bashed Hargrove pretty good in the past for being inflexible in his managing style. This is a positive thing. Torre’s been using Rivera for more than three outs forever; it hasn’t seemed to ruin his arm or anything.
Kudos to him for getting this one right.
I can’t say I was paying attention– any idea how much Putz got up & threw without coming in the last few days?
That is a little odd. They both pitched parts of two innings, and Putz hadn’t pitched since getting that four-out save on Monday.
I do remember him getting up in Washburn’s CG.
My real argument with Hargrove yesterday was using Morrow to start the eighth, rather than stay with Sherrill. He had Piazza opening the inning, a right-hander, followed by two lefties. Morrow started by allowing the first two runners to reach before getting the next guy and leaving the mess to Putz. There may have been no need for a five-out save by letting Sherrill pitch the eighth.
13: especially considering Hargrove ostensibly didn’t want to even use Morrow.
Dave – you’ve got to be pretty happy about yesterday’s outcome: M’s win, Putz is used reasonably and Morrow (from what I read) didn’t look like he had any business being in the bigs yet.
I am not sure if this has already been discussed yet this year, but what happened to the run happy approach Mariners of last year? They finally realize they didn’t have the team for it after 162 games and spring training?
OK, Dave. The stats evolution/revolution is moving way too fast for me. I get the gist of it, but what specific factors determine “leverage”?
Here is a roster construct thought that my friend and I have playing around with: The “stopper” concept and the “closer” concept rolled into 1, but with 2 players on a roster to fit the role.
For instance, in the M’s case– both Putz and Morrow were starters in a past life (and ideally one will be again.) While it is unreasonable for a pitcher to “rear back and hurl” for a starter’s level of innings, why not in a situation such as the M’s, have 2 multiple inning guys?
Morrow with his limited pitch capacity and lack of secondary pitches could still go 2-3 innings– one time through the lineup– 1-2 times a week. And why couldn’t Putz do the same thing?
Forget about a “closer” who comes in during the 9th. Have 2 longer/strong arms to come in from the 6th on. Or if you must have one, pick up a Doug Jones-type closer for relatively cheap for that 9th and lengthen your bullpen primary arms out a little.
Without the Doug Jones closer, Putz and Morrow would take turns with the high leverage situations– be they in the 7th, 8th, or 9th. And the remainder of the bullpen can play “closer by committee” on the days when both are spent or only one is available and goes earlier for a couple innings.
Obviously they would only pitch on high leverage situations unless they needed innings and weren’t getting them. But they should be available in shorter inning scenarios with only a slightly longer turnaround time than a normal 9th inning closer would face.
(Typically a closer needs a day off, the 2 pitcher scenario I’m touting here would probably need 2 days off on occasion.)
Of course, Putz would get the tougher situations and the shorter ones as well, with Morrow being the secondary, and then burn through the lesser arms when needed.
Seems it could grant Morrow the experience we want him to have, lengthen him out a little, and give the M’s more chances to win presently as well.
Dave, I have a question about pitches.
If a guy throws say 100 pitches what’s more tiring: all fastballs, all curves, all changeups, all sliders, a mixture of some?
Basically my question is, starting pitchers are usually taken out after 100 pitches, but if they throw a lot of slow pitches like changeups or curves (or maybe if they’re just Moyer and their fastball just isn’t thrown too hard), what pitch is hardest on the arm, and does mixing up pitches make it less hard on the arm because you have different movements, speeds, and form?
OK, Dave. The stats evolution/revolution is moving way too fast for me. I get the gist of it, but what specific factors determine “leverage�
While it’s not the easiest reading ever, Tango’s Crucial Situations article is a great starting spot for understanding leverage.
Basically, what leverage index tells us is how dramatically the results of this next play will alter the win expectancy of both teams. For instance, with the bases loaded in the bottom of the 9th of a one run game and two out, each team is going to have a pretty decent chance of winning – the home team just needs a base hit for the win, while the road team just needs one out. So both teams are going to be around 50% in terms of win expectency.
That next play is going to push the WE heavily in one team’s favor, and has a large potential to end the game right there. So the change in win expectency from this play is going to be huge. That’s what the leverage index measures.
Basically, the best way to think of leverage is a quantifiable number that tells us what we inherently know – which situations have a huge impact on teams winning and losing.
Understanding leverage, and how to use it to your advantage, can be a big asset in the W/L column. For instance, Sean White has been a pretty bad pitcher so far, giving up 8 runs in 8 1/3 innings of work. Without leverage context, we’d look at his spot as one where an upgrade could really help the Mariners. However, since his leverage index is so low (0.17 – again, 1.0 is average), the runs he’s allowed have had basically no impact on the M’s wins and losses. He gave up runs in games they were going to lose anyways.
By understanding what situations are really impacting team wins and losses, a manager can far better utilize his bullpen. Using Putz in the 8th inning in his last two appearances was clearly the right call when you look at the leverage of those two situations – they demand your best reliever in the game at that point.
For all his weaknesses, Hargrove clearly understands that part of leverage, anyways.
Dave, I have a question about pitches.
If a guy throws say 100 pitches what’s more tiring: all fastballs, all curves, all changeups, all sliders, a mixture of some?
This is a tough question, because the actual pitch type doesn’t have much to do with how fatigued a pitcher gets throwing it. A pitch has more to do with grip and spin than arm speed. However, there almost certainly is a correlation between pitch type and fatigue because of pitching patterns – most pitchers will throw many more fastballs when “coasting” with a big lead, while busting off breaking balls in high stress situations that require outs. So, the answer is almost certainly “all fastballs”, but it’s not the act of throwing the breaking ball that tires out the pitcher, but instead the circumstances that require he throw the breaking ball in the first place.
Lantermanc, there was a Curt Schilling post, I believe on SonsofSamHorn a while back that was a fantastic look into the mind of a pitcher. He talked not about ‘type’ of pitch, nor pitch count, but on intensity and leveraged situations.
For instance, you can throw 130 pitches and breeze through a game, or you can throw 85 and be exhausted. He spoke of “going to the tank” and only being able to do that 1-2 times per game– any more and he wouldn’t be able to go past the 7th. Going into the tank would be his metaphor for getting into trouble and needing to pitch out of it.
But from an arm stress standpoint, curves and sliders put far more strain on the arm, and change ups the least.
Is it possible that JJ’s arm isn’t liking the short work… and he wants to put more time between saves and longer throwing sessions. Longer throwing sessions and more time between stints will give more time for the arm to heal.
Back to #6, Dave:
Perhaps the break in between innings matters to a pitcher? That is, Putz threw X pitches at max effort in the 8th, and then 22-X pitches (too lazy to look up X) in the 9th. Reitsma got up, threw his pitches, and then iced his arm. Does that make a difference to fatigue and availability?
Forget about a “closer†who comes in during the 9th. Have 2 longer/strong arms to come in from the 6th on. Or if you must have one, pick up a Doug Jones-type closer for relatively cheap for that 9th and lengthen your bullpen primary arms out a little.
Generally, this would actually reduce the leverage of your best relievers and increase the leverage of your worst relievers. In most close games, there are a few very crucial situations, but not generally four innings worth of crucial situations. By extending your “relief ace” types (not that I think Morrow is one, by the way) to a role where they usually throw several innings, you’ll be placing them in situations where they’re almost certainly pitching some high and low leverage situations in every game.
You’ll also run the risk of having them be unavailable for a high leverage situation in scenarios where teams play multiple close games in a row, as well as essentially punting all matchup scenarios that could give you an advantage. There are a significant portion of left-handed hitters who are great against RHPs but much weaker against LHPs – by allowing them to face RHPs in every high leverage situation, you’re enabling the opponents best hitters to hit at their full potential.
I think there are problems with the modern bullpen setup, but I’m not sure this would be much better.
Anybody think McLaren has anything to do with this new approach to managing by Grover?
Anybody think McLaren has anything to do with this new approach to managing by Grover?
This isn’t new – Hargrove did this with Putz a lot last year as well.
Dave, I’m confused…you praised Hargrove. Does this mean that you like the Ms again?
dang…my /sarcasm tag didn’t show up on the last post…
I would argue that bullpen management is one of the few things Hargrove does relatively competently. On top of doing the multi-inning save, he doesn’t stay stuck on one player (note that he swapped Guardado out with Putz pretty quickly and used Lowe in high-leverage situations last year), and has been willing to integrate in minor leaguers like Sherrill pretty quickly.
He doesn’t keep track of GB/FB tendencies overall, which does lead to comical scenarios (‘Hey, let’s bring in Mateo for a DP’), but Hargrove does manage to put together a decent bullpen. The problems he tends to have on roster management and ingame decisions lie elsewhere.
Does Mac have a bullpen philosophy we can compare to Hargrove?
I don’t necessarily want to hijack this thread – but since we are talking about something Hargrove has done adequately, how does he compare to those managers assumed to have a measurable impact on a team’s success? Further, how does he compare to the most reasonable interim replacement?
And frankly, I’m finding the “Dave is angry, Dave likee/no likee” comments to amazingly tiresome.
I wonder how much of this is the manager and how much is the pitching coach?
I would argue that bullpen management is one of the few things Hargrove does relatively competently. On top of doing the multi-inning save, he doesn’t stay stuck on one player…
Um. Julio Mateo says “Hello!”
Okay, Hargrove didn’t use him yesterday when he likely normally would’ve. Let’s see in the here on out what Hargrove does with “Motato Head” as my 5-year-old likes to call him…
Dave, I understand your counter argument, particularily in regard to the lefty/right match up. My thought on that, on some levels, is that these “2nd half” pitchers would essentially be shorter range upper tier starters.
Instead of hoping lower tier starters (of which we have a plethora) will push to 7 or 8 innings, we have them for shorter range but higher energy innings, then bring in these “2nd half” pitchers for the 2nd half of a game, to pitch as often as we can get them to, as many innings as possible.
Again, I can understand how you would view Morrow as NOT being ready for that burden of expectation, but I say what do we have to lose by trying it?
Essentially I’m not saying Putz would HAVE to come in for 3 innings, but when the primary “stop” spot is in the 7th, have him come in then and pitch the game out if possible. And if it is the 9th, even if it was the 9th the game before, chances are he wouldn’t be available anyway.
In this format, he takes primary duties, Morrow takes secondary (or someone else, but I love the movement on that fastball, looks “cut”) and we go from there.
I suppose I am starting from the “stopper” vs “closer” argument and working out from “what would happen next.” Well, to me what happens next is Morrow gets more high leverage innings. In an ideal “arms to spare in the pen” environment, multiple guys are prepared to take multiple innings.
I know it is a different environment, but in HS coaching, I often employed this sort of philosophy, and the pitchers knew, when my equivalent of HoRam or Weaver were on the mound, they were going as deep as possible, then my other guys were ready for a extended innings ahead of time. And I planned my pitchers throwing/bullpen/game action around the anticipation that some starters can go longer than others.
Also, I’m about tired out of the LOOGY concept. I want better multi-inning guys. I would rather a stronger pitcher face the other team’s better hitters– split be damned.
One thing we forget is most hitters that have noticeable splits earn those higher numbers against weaker pitchers. A stronger pitcher regardless of handedness is more likely to get a hitter out, a weaker one will not.
Zumaya’s 100mph+ fastball is harder to hit than some random lefty. So get better pitchers and forget splits. And take advantage of the concept of pitching around guys a little more.
Obviously those arms are in short supply, but upper tier arms are out there and the goal should be to find them and/or draft them– we just gave one up for HoRam after all.
I just get tired of “the book” and am more than willing to burn it and start over. While my concept may not be perfect, my gut tells me it is a better modification than the present structure.
It’s funny how people tend to tie usage to innings rather than pitches for relievers. Reitsma threw 23 pitches in his 1 inning of work, while Putz threw 22 pitches in his 1 2/3 innings of work. There’s little doubt that Reitsma will be available tonight, but Putz’s availability is a question mark.
Just a bit odd.
Haven’t you answered this yourself in other posts in this thread? High leverage situations are more tiring, therefore 22 pitches at a leverage of 3.90 are going to be more tiring than 23 pitches at (I don’t know what the leverage was during Reitsma’s work, so I’ll go with average leverage) 1.0.
Doesn’t seem that odd to me at all.
Um. Julio Mateo says “Hello!â€
I sort of noted him in my post. Please also note that Hargrove was willing to use a rookie from A ball in high leverage situations late in ballgames last year (while Lowe was healthy) instead of an “established veteran”.
Yes.
As much as we bag on Hargrove’s bad decisions, we’ve got to point out when he makes good ones. Last night’s call for J.J. Putz was a very, very good call. Even the call for Morrow to start the 8th wasn’t necessarily a terrible call, in terms of taking the kid out of the Matt Thornton Kiddie Pool and testing him in a close situation… even if it didn’t work out.
18. I remember the Reds doing something like this in the 90′s with the Nasty Boys. It’s a great idea and if teams didn’t have a thing for the save statistic, I’m sure we’d see winning teams use it more.
Also, I remember the old Front Page Sports Baseball games. Some of the computer teams would have a standard closer and setup guy, but most teams would just allot two setup/short guys, either of whom would come in during the late innings and lock down the ballgame, and no closer. Of course, the AI also did weird crap like leaving SPs out to die and throw 180 pitches when getting shelled, or using position players to pitch for 4 innings despite fresh arms in the pen, but you see my point.
Didn’t Epstein try the “no closer” approach in Boston a few years back? That experiement was abandoned quickly.
em,
Only because the Red Sox had no good relievers at the time.
12 – I was at the game on Wednesday night sitting near the M’s bullpen. Putz got up in the eighth and started to throw. He proceeded to throw till the beginning of the ninth and then stood on the bullpen mound and waited. No big deal really, though. He didn’t pitch Tuesday, has had few outings this season, and it doesn’t appear to me that warming up in the bullpen approaches the same stress level on an arm that throwing in the game does. By no means am I saying that warming up isn’t stressful on the arm, just not as stressful as throwing in the game.
Back in the BoMel/BP days, Melvin was being interviewed about his lucky pens & stuff, but one of the things I remember him saying about relievers getting up in the bullpen was that he would count 3 warm-ups and not going into a game the same as actually going into a game. Make your own comparisons to the present regime.
I think Hargrove doing this is great. I think he gets leverage to some degree (even if not statistically speaking), everybody does, in part- i.e., this situation may lose me the ball game more than others, so I gotta do something here. We will not see Putz at the end of the 7th in a must-win game, because he is hoping Putz will be able to close it out, but if we are talking about 4 or 5 outs instead of 3, I am happy to see he understands what is on the line. I actually said “sweet” out loud when I heard that Putz was coming in. Sort of embarrassing because I was at work, but what the hell. I don’t get to say that with Grover much, so it was kind of like finding a five dollar bill in my jeans that I didn’t expect.
See, guys, Dave’s not a mean guy – where’s your praise for him giving credit to a guy “on the USSM black list?” huh? Just saying . . .anyone? Maybe they all decided never to come back after yesterday?
Since this discussion has considered the potential impact of bullpen throwing vs. high leverage throwing on shoulders/elbows, perhaps some of you might find the current state of scientific knowledge to be an interesting read.
I had the impression last year that at some point during the season Hargrove started using Putz in late-inning tied situations at home where no save was possible.
High leverage situations are more tiring, therefore 22 pitches at a leverage of 3.90 are going to be more tiring than 23 pitches at (I don’t know what the leverage was during Reitsma’s work, so I’ll go with average leverage) 1.0.
Where’d you come up with that? High leverage situations are more critical to the game, and I can certainly see where they might be more emotionally/mentally draining. But I’m not sure they have any effect on fatigue.
Re #46: Adam S, if you want to know where he came up with that, go back up and look at the Schilling post referenced above . . . for that matter, go back and look at pitchers’ comments throughout the years, at least as far back as Christy Mathewson’s Pitching in a Pinch. You’ll find clear testimony that high-leverage situations do indeed have an effect on fatigue, because pitchers work harder during such situations (to get more on the fastball, etc.).
If you don’t think stress has an impact on your stamina, you need to be edumacated.
It doesn’t compare to Box refusing to use anything but mop-up guys whenever the M’s were trailing, but riding his best relievers to protect any lead, now matter how great.
46: There was a long thread here within the past week or so that addressed exactly this, I think in reference to Morrow’s learning curve. And there’s plenty of the same idea in this very thread. I really didn’t think it was that big a leap, which is why Dave’s post #6 surprised me.
Take a look at post 21, for one example.
One might also consider that runners on base = throwing from stretch, not full windup.
higher stress, higher adrenaline, higher fatigue poisons.
Wow. Mike Hargove is getting some love from this blog.
What’s next, the USSM starts selling “I HEART Hargrove” t-shirts?
Extreme polarization and related jokes are really tiresome. I wish saying so made a difference.
So is pitching with runners on and down in the count, PlanB. Causes arm fatigue.
Now that Morrow has his second win….anyone think he might be used maybe as a starter so Jeff Weaver can ummm get some rest?