After blown saves in back to back games, people are talking about how the Marlins have 14 blown saves on the season. This is about 3 times the number from last year in fewer games. People are saying that Ng doesn't know what she is doing and the "revamped bullpen" is all bull shit.

The pen had a 5.50 ERA last year. They had a 1.55 WHIP. The allowed a batting average of .269. The pen this year has been miles better with a 3.73 ERA, 1.16 WHIP, and .227 avg. They have walked about half the number of batters and given up a third the number of homers. If you jump to blown saves, you are either looking for a reason to be negative or are overly inserting emotion into the equation.

Blown saves is the dumbest stat in all of baseball. Yes, it is worse than W/L. You can get a blown save at virtually any point in the game, not just the last couple of innings. Cimber got one in the 5th inning of the 3rd game. Should we only ever have the closer pitch in the middle innings of a close game and have him pitch 3-5 innings to avoid the dreaded "blown save?" The majority of blown saves will occur in situations that wouldn't ever have a chance to become saves anyway. 9 of the 14 blown saves were by guys who clearly weren't going to finish the game. You can get multiple blown saves in a game and still win. The extra innings bullshit bonus baserunner adds a new wrinkle into blown saves. Yimi's BS in Washington earlier this year wouldn't have been one without that rule. The Marlins only took the lead in the 10th because of the runner on 2nd. Kyle Schwarber's homer would have been a walk off solo homer in a tie game and thus not a BS without it. A pitcher can come into the game with a runner on 3rd and no outs in a 1 run game. More than likely the run will score and he will get a blown save even though he didn't allow the runner to get to 3rd with no outs. You can get a blown save because the defense lets you down. If all of that was not enough, let this be the final nail in the coffin. Prior to last night's game, the Marlins had 13 blown saves in 11 games. They won 5 of them. That means they had a 5-6 record (.455 win %) in games with a blown save and 19-24 (.442 win %) in games without one. A BETTER record in games with blown saves! So obviously, blowing saves helps the team win games, right? Get over yourselves. Rant over.

Bullpen ERA is another overrated statistic.

Leverage is all that really matters for a bullpen, and the bullpen’s high leverage ERA stinks. 

Bullpen is better than last year (we got lucky last year), but it’s still meh overall.

15 minutes ago, Erick said:

How many innings have been pitched in high leverage situations? Also this seems like a biased stat. It will be a higher leverage situation when you allow the first 3 runners of a 1 or 2 run game AFTER allowing those runners. And you will have less good results when you start the inning that poorly as you were not on your game at that point. Seems like the impetus should be on the manager to recognize those spots. It is kind of like the stat for 1st, 2nd, or 3rd time through the order. A pitcher might have better numbers 3rd time through the order not because he gets better over time, but because he doesn't even face the lineup a 3rd time unless he has his best stuff in those games.

3 minutes ago, FishFan95 said:

How many innings have been pitched in high leverage situations? Also this seems like a biased stat. It will be a higher leverage situation when you allow the first 3 runners of a 1 or 2 run game AFTER allowing those runners. And you will have less good results when you start the inning that poorly as you were not on your game at that point. Seems like the impetus should be on the manager to recognize those spots. It is kind of like the stat for 1st, 2nd, or 3rd time through the order. A pitcher might have better numbers 3rd time through the order not because he gets better over time, but because he doesn't even face the lineup a 3rd time unless he has his best stuff in those games.

Regardless of the metric you use, this bullpen has sucked in situations that actually matter.

Win Probability Added is another metric for bullpens. We’re at -2.57 which is 2nd worst in baseball (only the Astros are worse). We have 34 meltdowns.

The bullpen has been great in irrelevant situations. Of course, the biggest problem is the offense, but this bullpen isn’t nearly as good as the overall ERA indicates. Not to mention Yimi’s Statcast numbers which have been talked about here, and indicate that he might regress. He’s definitely not a sub-2 ERA closer, which he had before coming in to the game the other night.

The bullpen is pretty average. Bender is an exciting arm, hopefully he gets more of a chance in high leverage situations soon.

2 minutes ago, Erick said:

Regardless of the metric you use, this bullpen has sucked in situations that actually matter.

Win Probability Added is another metric for bullpens. We’re at -2.57 which is 2nd worst in baseball (only the Astros are worse). We have 34 meltdowns.

The bullpen has been great in irrelevant situations. Of course, the biggest problem is the offense, but this bullpen isn’t nearly as good as the overall ERA indicates. Not to mention Yimi’s Statcast numbers which have been talked about here, and indicate that he might regress. He’s definitely not a sub-2 ERA closer, which he had before coming in to the game the other night.

The bullpen is pretty average. Bender is an exciting arm, hopefully he gets more of a chance in high leverage situations soon.

I would also note that the offense has been responsible for a lot of that. If you constantly give the team a 1 run lead because you can't score any more than that, then every time the bullpen gives up a run, it will move the bar a hell of a lot on WPA. Ultimately, "clutch" stats tend to regress to the mean. I don't like relying on fluky numbers unless all of the underlying metrics are pointing the same way. Not saying the pen has been lights out, but I have to see more to be convinced that they are bad. As far as Yimi, I have never really been comfortable with him as the closer. Hopefully Bender does get a more important role soon.

9 hours ago, FishFan95 said:

I would also note that the offense has been responsible for a lot of that.

And this is where my disappointment with the front office and Don comes in. It isn't the bullpen for me. The front office (whoever is responsible) did little to improve the offense in the off-season and continues to do nothing now. Jesus Sanchez is just left to die in AAA for absolutely no good reason. Maybe he would not make a difference in the lineup, but we sure should have at least tried. Don does his own dirty work on top of it with poor lineup construction or pinch-hitting decisions.

11 hours ago, SonOfJack said:

And this is where my disappointment with the front office and Don comes in. It isn't the bullpen for me. The front office (whoever is responsible) did little to improve the offense in the off-season and continues to do nothing now. Jesus Sanchez is just left to die in AAA for absolutely no good reason. Maybe he would not make a difference in the lineup, but we sure should have at least tried. Don does his own dirty work on top of it with poor lineup construction or pinch-hitting decisions.

The Marlins are kind of stuck in a limbo state where no position is a definite black hole (over long periods). Also note that I am referring to the starters, not the depth- which clearly needs addressing. No one is horrible, they all can do damage in spurts, but they don't jump out onto the page either. I really thought that having an average hitting team across the board would actually work out since there are no real drop offs and no superstars to pitch around. Kind of a sum of the parts greater than the whole kind of thinking. However, injuries and inconsistent starts from Coop and Andy have not helped.

As far as Jesus, I feel like it is a matter of circumstance. The Marlins need offensive help, but more from the infield, than the outfield. I truly think that if Sanchez was a middle infielder, he would be up by now. In order for him to get up and play everyday, you would have to give up on 2 of Cooper, Duvall, or Dickerson. The obvious solution is to trade 1 or 2 of them, but they would be wasting resources to force a move now rather than letting the market develop in July. It is part of the business of baseball. And I really think the team will be better off in the long run and worse off in the short run (this year) by holding out a bit longer. Further, we have already been snake bitten by Isan who was awesome in AAA in 2019 only to suck in the big leagues. Don't want to give up on Duvall and company and then possibly find out that Sanchez wasn't the answer all along.

Add another one.

This time with a 3-run lead. Lol.

1 hour ago, Erick said:

Add another one.

This time with a 3-run lead. Lol.

That one's on Mattingly to be honest.

2 minutes ago, FishFan95 said:

That one's on Mattingly to be honest.

It's on the actual pitchers too. They're not very good when it matters. 

I was taking a look at the splits tool over on fangraphs in High leverage spots and I came across this player and his numbers from 2014-present. So I want to play the guess this player game. Remember, this is in high leverage spots:

On 6/5/2021 at 9:57 PM, FishFan95 said:

I was taking a look at the splits tool over on fangraphs in High leverage spots and I came across this player and his numbers from 2014-present. So I want to play the guess this player game. Remember, this is in high leverage spots:

I gave it some time. The pitcher is Jacob deGrom. No one is going to say that he is a bad pitcher in any regard. I am going to stick to my guns and declare from this point on, the Marlins bullpen ERA in high leverage spots will be better than league average as the numbers even out. I will come back at the end of the year to check this. I am using Fangraphs for defining high leverage, btw.

Edited June 7, 20215 yr by FishFan95