Bullpen Decisions

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CardsofSTL
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Re: Bullpen Decisions

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Jocephus wrote:
May 18 22, 10:41 am
let conan show you old timey baseball!
[SHOW]
There's a league that plays around here with old fashioned rules and uniforms like that. I watched them at one of the local parks for a while one afternoon when I just happened to be walking my dog there. It was kind of neat.

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Re: Bullpen Decisions

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Joe Shlabotnik wrote:
May 18 22, 10:42 am

A manager who makes all the right moves for all the right reasons is still going to see those plans fail a non-trivial amount of times. That's baseball. It's why they play 150+ games a year. The best teams minimize that variability but STILL get beat 1/3 of the time. Sh!t happens in baseball.
160+ games Joey Baloney. This ain't Nineteen-hundred and sixty-one.

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Re: Bullpen Decisions

Post by Joe Shlabotnik »

CardsofSTL wrote:
May 18 22, 11:02 am
Joe Shlabotnik wrote:
May 18 22, 10:42 am

A manager who makes all the right moves for all the right reasons is still going to see those plans fail a non-trivial amount of times. That's baseball. It's why they play 150+ games a year. The best teams minimize that variability but STILL get beat 1/3 of the time. Sh!t happens in baseball.
160+ games Joey Baloney. This ain't Nineteen-hundred and sixty-one.
I should have said "they've played".

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Re: Bullpen Decisions

Post by Big Amoco Sign »

dmarx114 wrote:
May 18 22, 8:48 am
I find it strange that managers are very inconsistent when it comes to decision making with regards to their bullpen. Let's use last night's Cards-Mets game for example. After the game, Oli was asked about why he went to Cabrera to face Escobar with the bases loaded and 1 out. Oli said he actually didn't like that match up, and wanted to use Cabrera against McNeil a batter later, but because Pallante was soooooo wild, he had no choice. So lefty/righty match ups were driving Oli's decision as to when to remove Pallante.

But why does Oli (or any other manager) not use this same logic when making decisions later in the game? Lets look at the 8th inning of last night's game. Was there any thought to take Helsley out to have a lefty face McNeil? (Important note, I am not saying Oli was right or wrong here, I am just pointing out the different ways managers approach their decision making). And once we get to the 9th inning, managers really don't care about match ups. It's just "Gallegos is our closer, and he gets the 9th".

So why do managers care so much about "lefty/righty" in the 6th inning, but not at all in the 8th or 9th?

Now I will interject my opinion:

I think managers should use their best relievers in high leverage situations, and stop focusing so much on the lefty/righty match ups. Use the same approach in the 6th that you would in the 9th. Pallante was 2-0 on Nimmo, walked Canha, then issued a 4 pitch walk to Lindor. But he was allowed to stay in to face Alonso because (and I am paraphrasing) "OMG, it would be way too scary to have Cabrera (a lefty) face Alonso, I need to keep my wild righty in there instead." This mind set is how games can be lost. So memo to Oli and every other manager out there.....make your decisions based on leverage instead of lefty/righty. Manage the 6th like you would the 9th.
Starting to wonder if you know about the 3 batter minimum or not.

Pallante got the first out, messed up the next two. Cabrera needs what, 20-30 pitches to warm up? Typically two PAs of warm up time. When do you warm him up? And if you're operating under "got to have plan B always" then you don't know how bullpen health works.

Where you fail is you don't say when you'd warm them up. And how you handling Lindor/Alonso later in the game when they come back around? Twice potentially. You don't address that. Thank god Oli didn't use Helsley (prone to walks and command issues himself) until a later leverage need, that was predictably going to happen to anyone who watches baseball.

Gallegos is good against both hands, so not sure what your issue is there. And Cabrera, is bad. Cabrera against Alonso would have been a dumb move. Like insanely dumb. Cabrera has a 6+ FIP against righties. Cabrera, a homer giver-upper, facing the biggest homer and you want him facing one of the toughest outs in baseball? Cabrera been giving up bombs all year and has a negative WAR.

Helsley coming in to face Alonso means we have who, Wittgren facing Alonso in a higher leverage 8th inning? 6th inning is a lower leverage because you have more outs to get the lead back. Isn't this obvious to why the logic is there? Unless you're doing 2014-2015 Royals style pen where you have 4-5 studs, this is SOP.

Your "Alonso so scarrry" thing is projection and fake news, as you put it. Cabrera is prone to bombs. 4 already this year in not many innings. Alonso is a dinger smasher. It doesn't compute. Nothing to even do with the handedness.

Lost in all of this is that the Cardinals are a team that sacrifices walks because of ground ball inducers on the roster and take that over big hits all day. Reyes was the best example on this in 2021.
Last edited by Big Amoco Sign on May 18 22, 12:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Bullpen Decisions

Post by dmarx114 »

Big Amoco Sign wrote:
May 18 22, 12:00 pm
dmarx114 wrote:
May 18 22, 8:48 am
I find it strange that managers are very inconsistent when it comes to decision making with regards to their bullpen. Let's use last night's Cards-Mets game for example. After the game, Oli was asked about why he went to Cabrera to face Escobar with the bases loaded and 1 out. Oli said he actually didn't like that match up, and wanted to use Cabrera against McNeil a batter later, but because Pallante was soooooo wild, he had no choice. So lefty/righty match ups were driving Oli's decision as to when to remove Pallante.

But why does Oli (or any other manager) not use this same logic when making decisions later in the game? Lets look at the 8th inning of last night's game. Was there any thought to take Helsley out to have a lefty face McNeil? (Important note, I am not saying Oli was right or wrong here, I am just pointing out the different ways managers approach their decision making). And once we get to the 9th inning, managers really don't care about match ups. It's just "Gallegos is our closer, and he gets the 9th".

So why do managers care so much about "lefty/righty" in the 6th inning, but not at all in the 8th or 9th?

Now I will interject my opinion:

I think managers should use their best relievers in high leverage situations, and stop focusing so much on the lefty/righty match ups. Use the same approach in the 6th that you would in the 9th. Pallante was 2-0 on Nimmo, walked Canha, then issued a 4 pitch walk to Lindor. But he was allowed to stay in to face Alonso because (and I am paraphrasing) "OMG, it would be way too scary to have Cabrera (a lefty) face Alonso, I need to keep my wild righty in there instead." This mind set is how games can be lost. So memo to Oli and every other manager out there.....make your decisions based on leverage instead of lefty/righty. Manage the 6th like you would the 9th.
Starting to wonder if you know about the 3 batter minimum or not.

Pallante got the first out, messed up the next two. Cabrera needs what, 20-30 pitches to warm up? Typically two PAs of warm up time. When do you warm him up? And if you're operating under "got to have plan B always" then you don't know how bullpen health works.

Where you fail is you don't say when you'd warm them up. And how you handling Lindor/Alonso later in the game when they come back around? Twice potentially. You don't address that. Thank god Oli didn't use Helsley (prone to walks and command issues himself) until a later leverage need, that was predictably going to happen to anyone who watches baseball.

Gallegos is good against both hands, so not sure what your issue is there. And Cabrera, is bad. Cabrera against Alonso would have been a dumb move. Like insanely dumb. Cabrera has a 6+ FIP against righties. Cabrera, a homer giver-upper, facing the biggest homer and you want him facing one of the toughest outs in baseball? Cabrera been giving up bombs all year and has a negative WAR.

Helsley coming in to face Alonso means we have who, Wittgren facing Alonso in a higher leverage 8th inning? 6th inning is a lower leverage because you have more outs to get the lead back. Isn't this obvious to why the logic is there? Unless you're doing 2014-2015 Royals style pen where you have 4-5 studs, this is SOP.
Please tell me you're not citing a 37 at bat sample to make your case. You are way smarter than that.

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Re: Bullpen Decisions

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dmarx114 wrote:
May 18 22, 12:15 pm

Please tell me you're not citing a 37 at bat sample to make your case. You are way smarter than that.
4 homers. 3 versus righties. It means something. It means he sucks this year.

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Re: Bullpen Decisions

Post by dmarx114 »

Big Amoco Sign wrote:
May 18 22, 12:00 pm
dmarx114 wrote:
May 18 22, 8:48 am
I find it strange that managers are very inconsistent when it comes to decision making with regards to their bullpen. Let's use last night's Cards-Mets game for example. After the game, Oli was asked about why he went to Cabrera to face Escobar with the bases loaded and 1 out. Oli said he actually didn't like that match up, and wanted to use Cabrera against McNeil a batter later, but because Pallante was soooooo wild, he had no choice. So lefty/righty match ups were driving Oli's decision as to when to remove Pallante.

But why does Oli (or any other manager) not use this same logic when making decisions later in the game? Lets look at the 8th inning of last night's game. Was there any thought to take Helsley out to have a lefty face McNeil? (Important note, I am not saying Oli was right or wrong here, I am just pointing out the different ways managers approach their decision making). And once we get to the 9th inning, managers really don't care about match ups. It's just "Gallegos is our closer, and he gets the 9th".

So why do managers care so much about "lefty/righty" in the 6th inning, but not at all in the 8th or 9th?

Now I will interject my opinion:

I think managers should use their best relievers in high leverage situations, and stop focusing so much on the lefty/righty match ups. Use the same approach in the 6th that you would in the 9th. Pallante was 2-0 on Nimmo, walked Canha, then issued a 4 pitch walk to Lindor. But he was allowed to stay in to face Alonso because (and I am paraphrasing) "OMG, it would be way too scary to have Cabrera (a lefty) face Alonso, I need to keep my wild righty in there instead." This mind set is how games can be lost. So memo to Oli and every other manager out there.....make your decisions based on leverage instead of lefty/righty. Manage the 6th like you would the 9th.
Starting to wonder if you know about the 3 batter minimum or not.

Pallante got the first out, messed up the next two. Cabrera needs what, 20-30 pitches to warm up? Typically two PAs of warm up time. When do you warm him up? And if you're operating under "got to have plan B always" then you don't know how bullpen health works.

Where you fail is you don't say when you'd warm them up. And how you handling Lindor/Alonso later in the game when they come back around? Twice potentially. You don't address that. Thank god Oli didn't use Helsley (prone to walks and command issues himself) until a later leverage need, that was predictably going to happen to anyone who watches baseball.

Gallegos is good against both hands, so not sure what your issue is there. And Cabrera, is bad. Cabrera against Alonso would have been a dumb move. Like insanely dumb. Cabrera has a 6+ FIP against righties. Cabrera, a homer giver-upper, facing the biggest homer and you want him facing one of the toughest outs in baseball? Cabrera been giving up bombs all year and has a negative WAR.

Helsley coming in to face Alonso means we have who, Wittgren facing Alonso in a higher leverage 8th inning? 6th inning is a lower leverage because you have more outs to get the lead back. Isn't this obvious to why the logic is there? Unless you're doing 2014-2015 Royals style pen where you have 4-5 studs, this is SOP.

Your "Alonso so scarrry" thing is projection and fake news, as you put it. Cabrera is prone to bombs. 4 already this year in not many innings. Alonso is a dinger smasher. It doesn't compute. Nothing to even do with the handedness.

Lost in all of this is that the Cardinals are a team that sacrifices walks because of ground ball inducers on the roster and take that over big hits all day. Reyes was the best example on this in 2021.
This isn't true at all. Cardinals win probability was 54% after the Lindor walk in the 6th and was 70% before the bottom of the 8th. The 6th inning at bat to Alonso was much more important to have your better pitcher appear in.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxe ... 5172.shtml

And this is the exact point of why I made this thread, so thank you for highlighting this example. Managers need to realize the 6th inning can be more important than the 8th inning. And if the 8th or 9th inning should be considered "match up proof", than the 6th inning should be as well. Do NOT lose a game in the 6th inning because Pallente unraveled. Bring in a much better option. And I don't care if he's lefty or righty. But get me someone to "save" the game in the 6th, when the leverage can be higher than the 8th.

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Re: Bullpen Decisions

Post by CardsofSTL »

dmarx114 wrote:
May 18 22, 12:36 pm
Big Amoco Sign wrote:
May 18 22, 12:00 pm
dmarx114 wrote:
May 18 22, 8:48 am
I find it strange that managers are very inconsistent when it comes to decision making with regards to their bullpen. Let's use last night's Cards-Mets game for example. After the game, Oli was asked about why he went to Cabrera to face Escobar with the bases loaded and 1 out. Oli said he actually didn't like that match up, and wanted to use Cabrera against McNeil a batter later, but because Pallante was soooooo wild, he had no choice. So lefty/righty match ups were driving Oli's decision as to when to remove Pallante.

But why does Oli (or any other manager) not use this same logic when making decisions later in the game? Lets look at the 8th inning of last night's game. Was there any thought to take Helsley out to have a lefty face McNeil? (Important note, I am not saying Oli was right or wrong here, I am just pointing out the different ways managers approach their decision making). And once we get to the 9th inning, managers really don't care about match ups. It's just "Gallegos is our closer, and he gets the 9th".

So why do managers care so much about "lefty/righty" in the 6th inning, but not at all in the 8th or 9th?

Now I will interject my opinion:

I think managers should use their best relievers in high leverage situations, and stop focusing so much on the lefty/righty match ups. Use the same approach in the 6th that you would in the 9th. Pallante was 2-0 on Nimmo, walked Canha, then issued a 4 pitch walk to Lindor. But he was allowed to stay in to face Alonso because (and I am paraphrasing) "OMG, it would be way too scary to have Cabrera (a lefty) face Alonso, I need to keep my wild righty in there instead." This mind set is how games can be lost. So memo to Oli and every other manager out there.....make your decisions based on leverage instead of lefty/righty. Manage the 6th like you would the 9th.
Starting to wonder if you know about the 3 batter minimum or not.

Pallante got the first out, messed up the next two. Cabrera needs what, 20-30 pitches to warm up? Typically two PAs of warm up time. When do you warm him up? And if you're operating under "got to have plan B always" then you don't know how bullpen health works.

Where you fail is you don't say when you'd warm them up. And how you handling Lindor/Alonso later in the game when they come back around? Twice potentially. You don't address that. Thank god Oli didn't use Helsley (prone to walks and command issues himself) until a later leverage need, that was predictably going to happen to anyone who watches baseball.

Gallegos is good against both hands, so not sure what your issue is there. And Cabrera, is bad. Cabrera against Alonso would have been a dumb move. Like insanely dumb. Cabrera has a 6+ FIP against righties. Cabrera, a homer giver-upper, facing the biggest homer and you want him facing one of the toughest outs in baseball? Cabrera been giving up bombs all year and has a negative WAR.

Helsley coming in to face Alonso means we have who, Wittgren facing Alonso in a higher leverage 8th inning? 6th inning is a lower leverage because you have more outs to get the lead back. Isn't this obvious to why the logic is there? Unless you're doing 2014-2015 Royals style pen where you have 4-5 studs, this is SOP.

Your "Alonso so scarrry" thing is projection and fake news, as you put it. Cabrera is prone to bombs. 4 already this year in not many innings. Alonso is a dinger smasher. It doesn't compute. Nothing to even do with the handedness.

Lost in all of this is that the Cardinals are a team that sacrifices walks because of ground ball inducers on the roster and take that over big hits all day. Reyes was the best example on this in 2021.
This isn't true at all. Cardinals win probability was 54% after the Lindor walk in the 6th and was 70% before the bottom of the 8th. The 6th inning at bat to Alonso was much more important to have your better pitcher appear in.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxe ... 5172.shtml

And this is the exact point of why I made this thread, so thank you for highlighting this example. Managers need to realize the 6th inning can be more important than the 8th inning. And if the 8th or 9th inning should be considered "match up proof", than the 6th inning should be as well. Do NOT lose a game in the 6th inning because Pallente unraveled. Bring in a much better option. And I don't care if he's lefty or righty. But get me someone to "save" the game in the 6th, when the leverage can be higher than the 8th.
Managers don't have the benefit of knowing whether or not the 8th or 9th inning at bats are going to be more important than the ones in the 6th. You can't manage with knowledge gained in hindsight.

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Re: Bullpen Decisions

Post by Jocephus »

CardsofSTL wrote:
May 18 22, 12:38 pm
dmarx114 wrote:
May 18 22, 12:36 pm
Big Amoco Sign wrote:
May 18 22, 12:00 pm
dmarx114 wrote:
May 18 22, 8:48 am
I find it strange that managers are very inconsistent when it comes to decision making with regards to their bullpen. Let's use last night's Cards-Mets game for example. After the game, Oli was asked about why he went to Cabrera to face Escobar with the bases loaded and 1 out. Oli said he actually didn't like that match up, and wanted to use Cabrera against McNeil a batter later, but because Pallante was soooooo wild, he had no choice. So lefty/righty match ups were driving Oli's decision as to when to remove Pallante.

But why does Oli (or any other manager) not use this same logic when making decisions later in the game? Lets look at the 8th inning of last night's game. Was there any thought to take Helsley out to have a lefty face McNeil? (Important note, I am not saying Oli was right or wrong here, I am just pointing out the different ways managers approach their decision making). And once we get to the 9th inning, managers really don't care about match ups. It's just "Gallegos is our closer, and he gets the 9th".

So why do managers care so much about "lefty/righty" in the 6th inning, but not at all in the 8th or 9th?

Now I will interject my opinion:

I think managers should use their best relievers in high leverage situations, and stop focusing so much on the lefty/righty match ups. Use the same approach in the 6th that you would in the 9th. Pallante was 2-0 on Nimmo, walked Canha, then issued a 4 pitch walk to Lindor. But he was allowed to stay in to face Alonso because (and I am paraphrasing) "OMG, it would be way too scary to have Cabrera (a lefty) face Alonso, I need to keep my wild righty in there instead." This mind set is how games can be lost. So memo to Oli and every other manager out there.....make your decisions based on leverage instead of lefty/righty. Manage the 6th like you would the 9th.
Starting to wonder if you know about the 3 batter minimum or not.

Pallante got the first out, messed up the next two. Cabrera needs what, 20-30 pitches to warm up? Typically two PAs of warm up time. When do you warm him up? And if you're operating under "got to have plan B always" then you don't know how bullpen health works.

Where you fail is you don't say when you'd warm them up. And how you handling Lindor/Alonso later in the game when they come back around? Twice potentially. You don't address that. Thank god Oli didn't use Helsley (prone to walks and command issues himself) until a later leverage need, that was predictably going to happen to anyone who watches baseball.

Gallegos is good against both hands, so not sure what your issue is there. And Cabrera, is bad. Cabrera against Alonso would have been a dumb move. Like insanely dumb. Cabrera has a 6+ FIP against righties. Cabrera, a homer giver-upper, facing the biggest homer and you want him facing one of the toughest outs in baseball? Cabrera been giving up bombs all year and has a negative WAR.

Helsley coming in to face Alonso means we have who, Wittgren facing Alonso in a higher leverage 8th inning? 6th inning is a lower leverage because you have more outs to get the lead back. Isn't this obvious to why the logic is there? Unless you're doing 2014-2015 Royals style pen where you have 4-5 studs, this is SOP.

Your "Alonso so scarrry" thing is projection and fake news, as you put it. Cabrera is prone to bombs. 4 already this year in not many innings. Alonso is a dinger smasher. It doesn't compute. Nothing to even do with the handedness.

Lost in all of this is that the Cardinals are a team that sacrifices walks because of ground ball inducers on the roster and take that over big hits all day. Reyes was the best example on this in 2021.
This isn't true at all. Cardinals win probability was 54% after the Lindor walk in the 6th and was 70% before the bottom of the 8th. The 6th inning at bat to Alonso was much more important to have your better pitcher appear in.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxe ... 5172.shtml

And this is the exact point of why I made this thread, so thank you for highlighting this example. Managers need to realize the 6th inning can be more important than the 8th inning. And if the 8th or 9th inning should be considered "match up proof", than the 6th inning should be as well. Do NOT lose a game in the 6th inning because Pallente unraveled. Bring in a much better option. And I don't care if he's lefty or righty. But get me someone to "save" the game in the 6th, when the leverage can be higher than the 8th.
Managers don't have the benefit of knowing whether or not the 8th or 9th inning at bats are going to be more important than the ones in the 6th. You can't manage with knowledge gained in hindsight.
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Re: Bullpen Decisions

Post by dmarx114 »

CardsofSTL wrote:
May 18 22, 12:38 pm
dmarx114 wrote:
May 18 22, 12:36 pm
Big Amoco Sign wrote:
May 18 22, 12:00 pm
dmarx114 wrote:
May 18 22, 8:48 am
I find it strange that managers are very inconsistent when it comes to decision making with regards to their bullpen. Let's use last night's Cards-Mets game for example. After the game, Oli was asked about why he went to Cabrera to face Escobar with the bases loaded and 1 out. Oli said he actually didn't like that match up, and wanted to use Cabrera against McNeil a batter later, but because Pallante was soooooo wild, he had no choice. So lefty/righty match ups were driving Oli's decision as to when to remove Pallante.

But why does Oli (or any other manager) not use this same logic when making decisions later in the game? Lets look at the 8th inning of last night's game. Was there any thought to take Helsley out to have a lefty face McNeil? (Important note, I am not saying Oli was right or wrong here, I am just pointing out the different ways managers approach their decision making). And once we get to the 9th inning, managers really don't care about match ups. It's just "Gallegos is our closer, and he gets the 9th".

So why do managers care so much about "lefty/righty" in the 6th inning, but not at all in the 8th or 9th?

Now I will interject my opinion:

I think managers should use their best relievers in high leverage situations, and stop focusing so much on the lefty/righty match ups. Use the same approach in the 6th that you would in the 9th. Pallante was 2-0 on Nimmo, walked Canha, then issued a 4 pitch walk to Lindor. But he was allowed to stay in to face Alonso because (and I am paraphrasing) "OMG, it would be way too scary to have Cabrera (a lefty) face Alonso, I need to keep my wild righty in there instead." This mind set is how games can be lost. So memo to Oli and every other manager out there.....make your decisions based on leverage instead of lefty/righty. Manage the 6th like you would the 9th.
Starting to wonder if you know about the 3 batter minimum or not.

Pallante got the first out, messed up the next two. Cabrera needs what, 20-30 pitches to warm up? Typically two PAs of warm up time. When do you warm him up? And if you're operating under "got to have plan B always" then you don't know how bullpen health works.

Where you fail is you don't say when you'd warm them up. And how you handling Lindor/Alonso later in the game when they come back around? Twice potentially. You don't address that. Thank god Oli didn't use Helsley (prone to walks and command issues himself) until a later leverage need, that was predictably going to happen to anyone who watches baseball.

Gallegos is good against both hands, so not sure what your issue is there. And Cabrera, is bad. Cabrera against Alonso would have been a dumb move. Like insanely dumb. Cabrera has a 6+ FIP against righties. Cabrera, a homer giver-upper, facing the biggest homer and you want him facing one of the toughest outs in baseball? Cabrera been giving up bombs all year and has a negative WAR.

Helsley coming in to face Alonso means we have who, Wittgren facing Alonso in a higher leverage 8th inning? 6th inning is a lower leverage because you have more outs to get the lead back. Isn't this obvious to why the logic is there? Unless you're doing 2014-2015 Royals style pen where you have 4-5 studs, this is SOP.

Your "Alonso so scarrry" thing is projection and fake news, as you put it. Cabrera is prone to bombs. 4 already this year in not many innings. Alonso is a dinger smasher. It doesn't compute. Nothing to even do with the handedness.

Lost in all of this is that the Cardinals are a team that sacrifices walks because of ground ball inducers on the roster and take that over big hits all day. Reyes was the best example on this in 2021.
This isn't true at all. Cardinals win probability was 54% after the Lindor walk in the 6th and was 70% before the bottom of the 8th. The 6th inning at bat to Alonso was much more important to have your better pitcher appear in.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxe ... 5172.shtml

And this is the exact point of why I made this thread, so thank you for highlighting this example. Managers need to realize the 6th inning can be more important than the 8th inning. And if the 8th or 9th inning should be considered "match up proof", than the 6th inning should be as well. Do NOT lose a game in the 6th inning because Pallente unraveled. Bring in a much better option. And I don't care if he's lefty or righty. But get me someone to "save" the game in the 6th, when the leverage can be higher than the 8th.
Managers don't have the benefit of knowing whether or not the 8th or 9th inning at bats are going to be more important than the ones in the 6th. You can't manage with knowledge gained in hindsight.
Well, I would hope they do. They know that a 1 run lead in the 8th is a 70% win probability, and they should know a 3-2 lead in the 6th with runners on 1st and 2nd is less than this. Maybe they don't have all this memorized, but managers should know when there is a big difference like this. And they need to shift their thinking accordingly. If that means starting the 8th or 9th with an inferior option compared to the 6th, so be it.

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