Well, Chris Sampson couldn’t find the strike zone very well tonight – 31 balls of 76 pitches. He hung 3 pitches – 2 went out, 1 went 400′ (NICE catch by Lane) for a sac-fly, and the rest were singles to Lee and Berkman. Lee hardly gets to ANY balls – reminds me of Biggio out there, I swear. Anyhow, I can’t even really scream at the infielders this time. Sampson was pulled after 74 pitches for a pinch hitter, Chris Burke, in the top of the 5th with 2 on. AND Chris came through with an RBI single. Well, they didn’t trade him, they won’t play him, and there he is, wasting his career on the bench.
Sigh
I was happy to see McLemore in there, actually getting some innings, instead of being wasted as a *(%^&#! LOOGY. He zipped through the 5th, getting 1,2,3 out on 10 pitches. He gave up a homer to Frenchy in the 6th, but heck, that ball wasn’t even in the strike zone – way inside and just below the knees, so it wasn’t exactly a bad pitch. Interesting – I didn’t know that Frenchy could hit the low inside pitches like that – seems to me I remember him being an outside high ball hitter. He then got 3 more outs without giving up any more runs. Palmeiro pinch hit for him in the 7th, so Matt Albers replaced him.
Matt had had 2 great outings in a row, so I guess – uh, things even out. Like Sampson, he couldn’t find the strike zone. Single, walk,walk, sac-fly, FO to the warning track in deepest center, HR over the CF wall, single, blessed groundout to end the Jenningsing. HEY!!! a new word!!! Kind of the opposite of Clemensing, hunh…
Hitters? Loretta, hitting .196 in July, went ofer, as did Lee and Lane. Bruntlett walked twice and made THREE errors, and was thrown out at the plate trying to score on a couple of throwing errors. I don’t blame him for trying to even it up and yeah, I know the safer thing to do was to stay at third. Sometimes, an aggressive play that succeeds like that can swing the direction of the game.
Wigginton went 2 fer 4 and Munson went 1/4 – he was robbed of an RBI single, maybe even double, by a Web Gem catch by Larry Jones.
And speaking of hitters, the Braves managed to score 12 runs without Texiera, who, best I know, should be in the lineup tomorrow.
Wandy will pitch tomorrow – he’s never started at Turner Field – pitched 2/3 of an inning of scoreless relief, but he’s not had real good luck away this year. And it sure looks as if we are NOT going to try to let Scott and Burke just play. I’m not surprised – Phil is NOT going to let go of his musical fielders ideology or his lefty/righty platoon thingy.
Sigh
So, to end on a happy note, Biggio hit a 2 RBI double to right center – career #662, and he needs 3 more to tie George Brett on the all-time list.
Tags: Atlanta Braves, Houston Astros
Rough game tonight. And interesting outing by Albers just shortly after I said that he needs to be in the rotation. I told you he’s not a reliever. They need to stop trying to turn him into one. It’s almost as frustrating as them trying to make Nieve into a starter when his only success came as a reliever. Sometimes I just don’t see why these guys don’t see things that seem so obvious to me…
I sure hope we won’t need to start referring to Wiggintoning.
Austin,
Do you have any other evidence besides one bad performance against a team that seriously manned up? I think you’re jumping the gun. And believe me, I know something about jumping the gun.
Highlight of the night to me was Biggio’s double. Oh, and Berkman’s homer.
I like Bruntlett a lot, and I think he should keep playing every day even after Everett comes back.
But, that said, he’s no Adam Everett.
If Burke doesn’t work out (it doesn’t look like we’re going to have any idea until next season) I think we should stick Bruntlett at second base. Between Everett and Bruntlett, we’d hardly see a ground ball get past the infield.
Steve, it’s not exactly the same as starting. Coming into the game in the middle of the action, even if it’s at the start of an inning, is a very different mentality. When starting, you have a clean slate. It’s comfortable for pitchers that don’t like pitching under the gun. For some, the pressure of either needing to hold a lead or needing to hold the opponent so you can mount a comeback isn’t something they can handle. I don’t know if that’s the case with Albers, because I really hesitate to assume to know any kind of mental situation with a player. However, it does appear that whatever the case, he’s not as good in relief. I merely brought up pitching from the stretch because it’s something definite that I can put my finger on. I don’t want to make assumptions about a pitcher’s mentality.
And I totally agree with you on the middle infielders. One of them has to be a hitter, especially if we’re going to have at least one catcher that doesn’t hit particularly well. If you do that, you’re still looking at four really easy outs (when you include the pitcher) at the bottom of the order. That’s exactly what’s been killing us the last couple of years. We need one of our middle infielders to be a hitter.
Yeah, Andrew, I know from watching Albers numerous times. As I said before, he doesn’t pitch well from the stretch. He’s getting better, but when the Astros first called him up, he’d do just fine until runners got on, and then he couldn’t get the ball over the plate. His ability to pitch from the stretch is improving, but he still struggles, and you can’t have a guy that struggles pitching from the stretch coming out of the bullpen.
But, if personal observation isn’t enough, I’ve also got numbers. He has 8 starts and 10 relief appearances. Here are the numbers:
As a starter: 5.54 ERA, 1.49 WHIP, .343 OBA, 1.50 K:BB, 3.46 BB/9, 9.92 H/9.
As a reliever: 5.65 ERA, 1.67 WHIP, .369 OBA, 1.10 K:BB, 5.65 BB/9, 9.42 H/9.
As you can see, his ERA is a little higher as a reliever, as are his WHIP and OBA, his BB/9 is MUCH higher and his K:BB ratio is worse. Admittedly, his SLG is lower as a reliever (.436 versus .487 as a starter), his BAA is marginally better (.273 versus .279) and his K/9 is better. However, the best indicators of a pitcher’s performance (WHIP and K:BB) are quite a bit better as a starter. And you really can’t ignore the way his walks explode as a reliever. You just can’t have that from guys coming out of the ‘pen.
jack
and i wonder how long they are going to give burke. especially if they re-sign loretta
bruntlett is a better glove at second than short
and they had BETTER keep everett. bat or no bat
Well, I agree that relievers can’t walk people, but you don’t want to walk the first few people when you start a game, either. Albers’ bad relief performances all occurred when he started the inning — so he wasn’t pitching from the stretch until he gave up walks and hits, and then it’s his fault. Same as starting.
As for the infield, we can’t have two banjo hitters (Adam, Bruntlett) up the middle. One of the two has to have pop.
Scott Barzilla posted a sensible analysis of the trading deadline, so I share it with you in its entirety.
In the span of a couple of days, the Astros managed to trade two very important parts of their 2005 pennant winning team. The result? Ty Wigginton. If you feel a bit underwhelmed I wouldn’t blame you one bit.
Of course, I have nothing against Ty Wigginton. The worst thing any fan can do is hold his contempt for management against the incoming player. By all accounts, Wigginton is a good guy that works hard and plays the game right. He can play a number of positions and is under club control for two years beyond 2007. The Astros brass say he is the new third baseman and his first two games are clear indications that he will swing the bat.
So, what can we expect out of Wigginton? The past seems to indicate that we will get someone that will hit between .260 and .280 with around 20 home runs. Wigginton will swing the bat as he has never drawn as many walks as Ensberg in any season. One analyst called the move to Wigginton more of a “tantrum” than anything else. Wigginton is consistent even if he is mediocre. Ensberg could be brilliant with both the bat and the glove, but the consistency was always elusive.
Naturally, people will ultimately compare the two players from now on. Unless the Astros change their tact and choose to move Lamb to third and Wigginton to second, both players can’t help but be compared. As everyone knows, I love to delve into the numbers, so let’s delve.
Games PA AVG OBP SLG HR SO BB
Morgan Ensberg 673 2435 .266 .367 .475 105 395 319
Ty Wigginton 624 2384 .267 .326 .448 81 427 173
Now, think about the common complaints about Ensberg. His batting average is too low. Well, you’re not going to like Wigginton that much. Well, um, he strikes out too often. Well, you’re definitely not going to like Wigginton that much. He’s too timid. Okay, fine you’ll like Wigginton just fine there. Granted, the career numbers don’t show what they’ve done this year, but small sample sizes create bad decisions.
Obviously, the Astros know what they want and they hated watching Morgan Ensberg watch strike three go by as many times as he did. Fine, there are times when all of us screamed at our television. So, the Astros went about trying to mold Ensberg into the player they thought he should be rather than the player he really was. Hopefully he’s gone to an organization that will appreciate the player he really is.
As for Wigginton, I don’t mean to be too rough on the guy. Truth be told, Wigginton is really quite valuable. He’s cheap and he can play a number of positions. Still, if you know that third base will be manned by someone that is mediocre and cheap then you can spend more money on other positions to man them with good players. You can’t man every position with an all-star unless you are the Yankees. Good luck Ty and good luck Morgan. We wish you the best. Hopefully, someone in the Astros organization will learn from what has happened to Morgan Ensberg.
I found someone who likes the Wheeler/Wiggy trade. Just incase it makes anyone feel better.
“They sure didn’t give up much for an everyday third baseman who has some pop. Dan Wheeler, remember, was a scrap-heap reliever. A good move for the future and a deal that likely locked up Brad Lidge’s future in Houston.” -Eric Mack, CBS
http://cbs.sportsline.com/mlb/story/10275986/rss
Austin,
Before last night, Albers’ ERA was 3.39 or somewhere in that area. So that appearance likely skewed the numbers.
Personal observation is nice, but it doesn’t prove anything to me.
I saw that article as well, Joel B. It may not have any relevance to this discussion, but Mack is a die-hard Yankee sycophant. I tend not to trust much of what he says because it’s so clogged up by East Coast bias.
Yes, to be fair, his ERA in relief prior to last night was 3.39. However, I don’t get to ignore last night just because he had a really bad outing. That happens sometimes. The numbers to this point still suggest that Albers is better as a starter than as a reliever. The only way they don’t say that is if you ignore a bad outing. It wouldn’t be fair if I ignored one of his three really bad starts in May in order to make my point, so you don’t get to do the same.
The reason I used personal observation to talk about him pitching from the stretch is because I didn’t feel like looking up numbers. But, if you want his numbers when he has runners on base (http://houston.astros.mlb.com/stats/individual_player_splits.jsp?c_id=hou&playerID=458006&sitSplit1=All&statType=2&splitSet=2&statSet=2)
His 1.60 WHIP with bases empty isn’t great, but it’s 2.63 with a runner on second, and 4.00 with runners on second and third. His on-base average with bases empty is .348, versus .390 with a runner on first, .467 with a runner on second, .364 with runners at first and third, and .571 with runners at second and third. Batting average shows similar increases, as do BB/9 (3.14 with bases empty, versus 6.75 with a runner at first, an astounding 10.12 with a runner at second, and an off-the-charts 18.00 with runners at second and third). However, in the concern of fairness, I should point out that some of those stats are small sample size, such as 2 walks in 1 inning with runners at second and third.
However small the sample size, however, I believe it demonstrates my point that he tends to lose control with runners on. And while that’s NEVER a desirable trait with any pitcher, it’s something that, in my opinion, it’s a lot easier for starters to deal with. Those numbers do not speak well to his ability to handle high-pressure situations that relievers usually face.
By the way, I should also say in my defense, that I’m really not jumping the gun on Albers. It’s not like I came to the conclusion last night that he shouldn’t be a reliever. I’ve been saying it since I saw him last year, and I said as much on these very boards before the game last night. It’s the last comment on the article “Switching Wiggington For Ensberg.” I said:
“As for the pitching situation, I
Good one! “Jenningsing”!
I like “Heep Seop Choied” for when you ruin a patient hitter simply b/c he strikes out looking. Ensberg was Heep Seo Choied. I think De Podesta and co. can save what’s left in San Diego, but he’ll have to be healthy and play. The latter of these conditions was lost on Phil “Scrap Heap” Garner both were lost on the fans and the media.
i have never EVER understood why so many people have such a problem with a guy walking instead of making an out swinging at balls out of the strike zone
i’ve been looking at hits vs outs and balls that are out of the strike zone that are swung at. astros and opponents, that is. so far, out of all the hundreds and hundreds of swings, i count exactly five hits
i also can’t understand what is the difference between striking out looking and striking out swinging. same result.
Austin,
I wasn’t suggesting that you ignore it, just that you recognize that it could skew the numbers.
I think if the sample sizes are as small as you say, it might benefit him to have a few more outings as a reliever before judging him.
Of course, I read that Justice thinks he should be a reliever for the rest of this season, which makes me lean toward saying that he should be a starter, just to contradict him.
lol…I appreciate you contradicting Justice outright. I don’t know that anyone will be this reactionary, but after Albers’ outing tonight, I wonder if I got anymore supporters.
austin,
i’m thinkin i’m with you
Well, that’s two bad outings in a row for young Matt as a reliever.
I think I’ll save myself the trouble and just agree with you, Austin. Now I’m thinking with my noodle…heh.
Interesting that Jennings got in and still stunk. Maybe “stunk” is a tad strong…he didn’t do well.
Yes! Haha…all it takes is a little obnoxiousness disguised as persistence.
Hmmm.
I can’t really argue with that either. Haha.