Bullpen Follies

Here is the M's pen by ERA going into the Yankee series. Lets include some other stats as well.

Pitcher      ERA      K/BB Ratio      BB        ARP
Mateo        0.59        8.0           1        9.3
Putz         0.96        2.25          4        3.1
Shiggy       1.29        6.0           1        8.6
Villone      2.61        2.4           5        0.5
Eddie        2.77        3.7           3       -0.5
Nellie       3.68        2.0           5       -0.5
Thornton     4.05        1.46         11(!)     2.6

ARP is Baseball Prospectus' Adjusted Runs Prevented stat (and it's through the first two games of the Yankee series). Interestingly though, all the stats more or less agree! ERA, ARP, even straight walks! The whole bullpen is actually pretty good, but there are three guys who by all of these measures and quite a few more, are clearly outpitching the other 4. Throwing Eddie out, because he is clearly the proven, veteran closer (ugh), the best three M's relievers have walked 6 men. The bottom 3 guys have walked 21!

So which guys pitched when we were down by 3 Wednesday and down by 5 and 3 Tuesday? The guys at the top of the list, Mateo, Putz and Shiggy. Who pitched when the game was on the line Monday and Wednesday? The guys at the bottom, Villone, Nellie and Thornton.

Grover is using the bullpen exactly the opposite of how he should. Exactly the opposite!! The best pitchers in the pen are pitching in the blowouts and the worst guys are protecting the leads! I'm not even arguing that Nellie and Thornton should be pitching somewhere else (which they should), just that they should be the ones pitching in the blowouts. Its not even that much of a stretch, they were the last two guys on the roster after all! Nellie was an NRI who just made the club and by all accounts the last spot came down to Thornton versus Sherrill. Your last two guys are your long relief, blowout guys!

Could I put in few more exclamation points?!?!?!?!??! Could I?

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!