I’m glad to hear that you’ve ordered The Book. Tango, Lichtman, and Dolphin do some excellent research based on solid principles that, at times, goes against traditional belief. I’m still running through all of the chapters myself.

There’s an excellent chapter in The Book regarding leveraging of relievers. It’s very well written by Tango I believe and deals with the current usage patterns and how they may be improved. Some things that managers do right now are well off in terms of maximizing efficiency, and I think one of those things is the strict usage of “closers’ in the ninth inning rather than using them when necessary. There’s also another discussion on wear-and-tear that suggests that relievers can probably work more than most managers give them credit for, though I’ve yet to read through all of that section’s work.

I hope you enjoy the Book, it’s an excellent read.

Great comments (as always). A few other thoughts.

A manager also needs to bear in mind how easy it is wear out his bullpen. I don’t know if I am the only one that remembers the 2007 bullpen, but we had 7 guys throwing pretty well. They brought them all back in 2008 and one by one they just fell apart-victims of overuse.

I remember in Girardi’s year they brought up Tankersly and he was lights out for a while. But as everybody else in the bullpen was terrible, Girardi overused him. I remember he had Tank pitch four games in a row and Tank has never been the same since.

One other thing is that in some ways the closer has an easier job than the middle reliever. The closer generally knows when he is coming in ahead of time and has plenty of time to prepare himself. Also the closer generally starts the game with nobody on base.

The middle reliever is often thrown in the game with little notice and time to prepare with men on base. I think there are some effective closers who simply don’t seem to function when they come in with men on base. They used to say that about Billy Wagner. In other words not all great closers are also great middle relievers.

Yes the most important influence of the manager could well be how he manages his bullpen which could be why so many managers are ex-catchers. I would give Freddi a B on his bullpen management. I thought Griardi deserved a D minus.

I am ordering The Book:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/1597971294?tag=tangotiger-20&camp=14573&creative=327641&linkCode=as1&creativeASIN=1597971294&adid=0A7JZCJM236XC3EHDFP1&

Can’t wait to get started.

I think as most fans know, middle relief is important because important situations happen all the time, not just in the ninth. I think these sorts of things could be dealt with if managers were more intelligent about bullpen use. Like, it’s OK to pitch your “closer” in the 7th with 2 on and 1 out in a tie game, for example. It’s an important situation, and if you think it’s the most important, you should go ahead and use your best guy. Too many times that situation happens and all of a sudden, your manager has saved your best reliever for a future situation that never happened because your “7th inning guy” gave up two runs.

Managers already don’t do much. And the few things they do have an impact on, especially bullpen leveraging, they fail at almost universally. The late innings are always frustrating as fans. I just don’t get as frustrated at the mediocre relievers who turn up and fail in these situations as much as I get mad at the managers who put them there in the first place.

I can’t resist adding my two cents here that I agree with you that both Martinez and Wood have the potential to be quite serviceable middle relief pitchers. I would say both of them showed some character last year being called up suddenly from the minors and thrown into tense games. Both showed good backbone with the ability to come back a few days after a rough outing and pitch well.

Of course, Beinfast will be combing the scrap heaps for another Kiko Calero.

Glad to see you paying attention to middle relief. Much ignored but for a fan in the ballpark with a tense game on the line, for a few moments the middle reliever with the ball in his hand is the most important guy in the world.

The 2004 and 2005 seasons were ruined by awful middle relief pitching.

First off, welcome to the MM comments section! I’m glad we’re usually in agreement.

The way I see it, I agree that having more options isn’t necessarily a bad thing. On a minor league deal and a Spring Training invite, I’ll take a veteran to see how well he does. I don’t mind digging through the scrap heap for bullpen help. What I do mind is going after a MacDougal or even a McClung or someone like that on a major league deal that will basically guarantee him time on the roster. For something as unpredictable as the pen, we might as well go with internal options in that case.

Basically, we shouldn’t be dropping extra payroll on guys who aren’t likely to be marginally better. Even spending $800K and a major league deal would be a poor method of spending. And if it came to that choice, I’d go with Martinez or Wood over a McClung, MacDouglal, Gregg, or Walker on a major league offer. I think what you’re referring to is more like what the team did with Meyer last year, grab him at essentially no cost. At that point, we probably agree.