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As y'know, we live to serve. :: shower of crumpled Dixie cups ::
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THEORY, Dept.
My first thought on the Seattle Mariners bullpen is that the Mariners have a lot of draws at the holds deck -- at least 6-7 really good draws. But these are lottery tickets, not established (minor) stars. It's a little bit philosophical, how comfortable you are with a Stars & Scrubs team in which the bullpen consists of scrubs. Back in 1995-1997, I argued that bullpens aren't as big a deal as Seattle fans thought. The evidence came in against me on that one.
Full disclosure: I dislike the idea that star-studded bullpens are a must. For the same reason that I dislike it when they change James Bonds, I dislike it when a ballgame has five pitchers per team. The coherency of the story and flow of action.
But despite my bias against the idea that you need major playas in the bullpen:
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Era of Seattle Baseball In Which they Seriously Threatened to Advance in the Playoffs |
Key Relievers |
Remark |
1995-1997 |
Ayala, Sanders, other tragedies |
6 local and national HOF'ers + weak pen = embarassments |
Gillick |
Daimajin, Nellie, Rhodes, etc |
Scared the spit out of everybody |
All other eras |
Draws at the deck; occasional AC/DC closers |
4 decades of cruddiness |
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You combine the above EXPERIENCES with the recent trends on the Royals bullpens, the Boston/Yankee bidding war ... it's hard to resist a VISCERAL impression that you need stars in the bullpen. Not good pitchers you came up with, but --- > setup men that the other dugout buys into.
I'm sure that can be proven wrong, and I hope that a Denizen does levy a convincing argument against. Just saying it's my visceral reaction. Since 1995, I've been electroshocked into the idea that when the other team loads the bases in the 7th, you gotta bring in your stud setup man.
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PRAXIS, Dept.
What the Mariners HAVE is this:
(9th) A wonderful young closer ... that the ballclub deems fragile
(8th) An extreme platoon RHP and a very extreme platoon LHP
(6th, 7th) Three quite-talented kids who "sit 96-100 with wipeout sliders," none of whom have ever done diddly SQUAT
(Appendix) Nick Vincent has been fairly good but is now old and throws 88 MPH
So make of it what you will. From a SABER perspective it looks pretty decent. But from the standpoint of my operant conditioning, it dain't. Even if they were good, they wouldn't be comfortable.
But, as you are well aware, one more Edwin Diaz pull from the deck and this is a different conversation. You like Altavilla for that better, or Shae Simmons? Maybe Tony Zych will be even better than he used ta be and leap to the next level? It ain't easy to do Edwin Diaz out of your own org, but those three kids have remarkable upside.
Enjoy,
Dr D