Blue Jays Discussion: End of the Hand

[The Nemesis]

Makes no sense to add a scrub and not just let Smith try and find his footing

Plus now Charlie can play both Valera and Lamb if he wants to.

 

[Cloned]

Wasn’t Overton pretty decent in limited time?

 

[MS]

Wasn’t Overton pretty decent in limited time?

Didn’t allow a run.

I mean, there was probably some luck involved. But it’s a bit odd to be getting rid of this guy over Thornton when he’s actually thrown strikes and been effective in both AAA and MLB.

 

[canucksfan]

Does anyone else find it annoying they are picking up scrubs?

 

[Radiohead]

Vancouver with an early game today. Orelvis HR again. Closing in on 30 HR in A ball as 19 year old. Can’t confirm, but I think Joey Gallo was the last player to do this back in 2013.

 

[TGB]

All of April, May and June nothing of significance was done to the bullpen until we acquired Cimber on June 29 and then Richards a week later.

They signed Edwards on May 14th. That's pretty early. That does not suggest they were doing NOTHING to help the bullpen. And June is still fairly early for making trades. And what difference did it make? The bullpen still kept blowing games, including Cimber. Like I said, what's going on this year is mind boggling.

Just because you're unwilling to recognize that they tried doesn't mean they never did. And remember, 29 other teams in the league looking for pitching. Chances are the Jays could have gotten a lot of nice pitchers, but then we'd have no prospects.

And yes, I'm well aware the injuries were a huge blow. The bullpen was actually pretty good early on.

Wasn’t Overton pretty decent in limited time?

He had not given up a run; however, we've had a lot of relievers who started out great only to fall apart later.

 

[stickty111]

Management has some answering to do on how this team just callapsed down the stretch.

 

[Canada4Gold]

Saw your ninja edit. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen that clause used. That situation is often referred to as vulturing a win. Though the specific situation I’m thinking of is often late in the game, you blow a save and then your team walks it off so no pitcher follows you to get the win. In the case where you’re the road team, blow it in the 8th and then your team takes the lead in the 9th and someone replaces you for the bottom I’d assume you get the win and the final pitcher gets the save, but I guess it’s not automatic.

I don’t really care too much about wins so perhaps it’s happened and I haven’t noticed but Ive never seen it

It’s just some weird fun stuff that at some point in our history was hashed out and agreed upon, and if we ever actually see it it’s like “Huh. Well how about that?”

What Romano just did, is a perfect example of vulturing a win

 

[TGB]

Looks like that theory Vladdy had a sore hip might have been true. Suddenly he's getting on top of those away pitches.

 

[aingefan]

Orelvis with another jack .

Trent Thornton with a 3up 3k save. Obviously not used in high enough leverage situations in TO. And a clean inning and a Julian Merryweather sighting.

 

[zeke]

Orelvis getting back up to sea level now as a 19yr old in A+ , even though he's still rocking a sub-.200 babip.

Power numbers are all the way back now, and walk rate is mostly back to. A little bit more babip normalization and he's back rocking elite overall numbers again.

 

[Cor]

Welcome to the AL East.

Wait until you see what the Yankees and Red Sox do this offseason with such a stacked free agency.

Good thing is it sounds like we'll be spending more money than some people think.

I just hope we finally spend some money on the bullpen.

 

[TGB]

I just hope we finally spend some money on the bullpen.

That's the thing. The Jays already have some killer relievers, they're just injured. The Jays are in this weird place where they could spend the money, but they don't really have to. At the same time, if they don't, and someone gets injured, they're screwed...unless the people they sign suck and the people they already have manage to regain their form which is entirely possible.

Bullpens are major headache.

 

[The Nemesis]

I just hope we finally spend some money on the bullpen.

The Jays bullpen, as it was constructed to start the season, would've been top 10 in the league in terms of how much money was allocated to it. And that includes a bunch of teams that have super expensive bullpens because they've replaced one high-priced failed closer with an equally high priced closer who could fail at any moment.

They spent money. And then everybody got hurt. Which is kind of the advertisement for why you probably shouldn't spend lots of money in your pen because bullpens are weird magical nonsense that are subject to the random whims of chance and fate. You're probably better off to not drop stacks of cash on pricey bullpen arms and instead build up a big list of like a dozen misfit toys with some potentially interesting aspect to them and let them all Thunderdome it out during spring training for the 7-8 spots in the pen while hopefully keeping the others in the system for when you inevitably need them. That way you get the best talent you can at a reasonable price and have redundancies in place for when someone gets hurt. Unless you're the 2021 Blue Jays and everybody gets hurt at which point you're probably screwed.

 

[MS]

The whole season would look completely different if Merryweather had stayed healthy and the team consistently had Romano-Merryweather for the 8th-9th innings. Holy hell did he look dominant in April.

 

[dredeye]

Soria did well tonight LOL

 

[canucksfan]

The whole season would look completely different if Merryweather had stayed healthy and the team consistently had Romano-Merryweather for the 8th-9th innings. Holy hell did he look dominant in April.

The most bizarre situation with the bullpen was Chatwood. He went from extremely reliable to dog shit. It wasn’t an injury either.

 

[kb]

The Jays bullpen, as it was constructed to start the season, would've been top 10 in the league in terms of how much money was allocated to it. And that includes a bunch of teams that have super expensive bullpens because they've replaced one high-priced failed closer with an equally high priced closer who could fail at any moment.

They spent money. And then everybody got hurt. Which is kind of the advertisement for why you probably shouldn't spend lots of money in your pen because bullpens are weird magical nonsense that are subject to the random whims of chance and fate. You're probably better off to not drop stacks of cash on pricey bullpen arms and instead build up a big list of like a dozen misfit toys with some potentially interesting aspect to them and let them all Thunderdome it out during spring training for the 7-8 spots in the pen while hopefully keeping the others in the system for when you inevitably need them. That way you get the best talent you can at a reasonable price and have redundancies in place for when someone gets hurt. Unless you're the 2021 Blue Jays and everybody gets hurt at which point you're probably screwed.

Yessir!

*Looks for like button.....looking, looking....*

LIKE

 

[Kurtz]

The Jays bullpen, as it was constructed to start the season, would've been top 10 in the league in terms of how much money was allocated to it.

Where did you find that data - it doesn't sound right, and doesn't line up with the numbers at Spotrac:

MLB Relief Pitcher Spending - Cap

 

[zeke]

Where did you find that data - it doesn't sound right, and doesn't line up with the numbers at Spotrack:

MLB Relief Pitcher Spending - Cap

Even if it was true, it would just mean that they misspent spectacularly.

 

[zeke]

I don't really get Nemesis' point anyways - the bullpen was an obvious glaring weakness from the start. Made up of a bunch of guys with zero track record, plus a few old injured guys, and then some AAAA fodder.

 

[The Nemesis]

Where did you find that data - it doesn't sound right, and doesn't line up with the numbers at Spotrac:

MLB Relief Pitcher Spending - Cap

Those numbers are current. I'm talking about the pen that started the season if you sub out Payamps for Yates (because he obviously wasn't signed to get hurt before he could throw a pitch of meaningful baseball.)

Obviously some if those current numbers would be different at the start of the season too (hello, White Sox) but a lot of them wouldn't b materially changed and iirc with the ideal opening day pen the Jays would've slotted in just behind I think the Cards on that list.

Point is that it's not that the team didn't spend money. It's that the things that usually make or break a pen aren't where the most money gets spent. Big money pen arms are usually closers and that's where the Jays have been fine. The problem is that they gambled on a bunch of middle relief guys that either got hurt or faltered and came up ridiculously short through a combination of bad luck gambles and an unprecedented rash of injuries.

The way to build a good pen is to not spend deeply, but rather broadly. Get as many fungible pen arms as you can get your hands on and let them go through the attrition meat grinder until you make a strong pen with the survivors. And hopefully have some spares left over because there will almost certainly be injuries.

Secondary point is that there's been people who complain that they cheaped out on the pen when that's not true. It might not have been good roi, but money was spent. It wasn't just dumpster diving, it was gambles that didn't work out (Yates, Chatwood, Dolis' 2nd year being the main culprits)

 

[Canada4Gold]

Phelps is the injury that annoyed me the most. Yates and Merryweather had injury history. Phelps was more of a safer bet without huge upside but then he came out pitching amazing to start the year. Then he got hurt too. Who knows, without the injury maybe he goes full Chatwood, but that one was the straw that broke the camel's back for me

 

[zeke]

Yates - 34yrs, only 4.1ip in 2020
Phelps - 34yrs, only 20.2ip in 2020, only 34.1ip in 2019
Dolis - 33yrs, only 70ip career, only 24ip 2020
Chatwood - 31yrs, only 18.1ip 2020

Merryweather - 29yrs, only 13ip mlb, only 13ip 2020, 6ip 2019, 0ip 2018
Romano - 28yrs, only 30ip MLB, only 14.2ip 2020
Mayza - 29yrs, 0ip in 2020
Borucki - 27yrs, 16ip 2020, 6ip 2019
Murphy - 26yrs, 6ip 2020, 6ip mlb

and then the pile of AAAA crap sp like thornton/kay/zeuch/roark.

 

[theaub]

I don't really get Nemesis' point anyways - the bullpen was an obvious glaring weakness from the start. Made up of a bunch of guys with zero track record, plus a few old injured guys, and then some AAAA fodder.

I generally agree with this. The Jays have been unlucky with how the bullpen played out but they haven't been that unlucky.

The Jays signed/depended on a bunch of guys who usually get hurt, and they got hurt. And then they spent over a month with legitimately 1.5 guys who could come close to getting outs before they tried to replace the guys who got hurt.