Official. Reds add Sonny Gray to Roark & Wood Added.

[CJD]

(01-22-2019, 07:59 PM)Circleville Guy Wrote: This concept makes no sense to me and throws off the starter knowing exactly when he’s inserted into the game. The players union would hate it and fans would too if it back fired. Everyone wants to be revolutionary and change the game. It would make as much of a dent as hitting the pitcher 8th wins tons more games. The starter is still gonna pitch as long as he’s pitching well. A setup or closer isn’t going to “open”. That means that you start a guy every game that wasn’t good enough to be in the starting 5 or be a setup guy or closer. It sounds like a great plan to get a coach and manager fired. That’s called outsmarting yourself.

The root concept, in my understanding, is preventing the hitters from gaining a familiarity with the starting pitcher.

If you look at starters' paths through the opposing line up, across the board, their 3rd time through the lineup is when they start ceding hits and runs.

If you have a pitcher open the game, typically a person who is favorably matched with the opposing team's top 3 to 5 hitters, you can get that first go through out of the way, ideally in the first 2 innings, and then your starter can reach the 8th inning without seeing a 3rd run through of the line up. Then you can hand the ball to the closer and never hit, or risk hitting, the fated 3rd time through the lineup for a single pitcher.

I don't know if it has a significant impact compared to, say, having your starter go through the line up twice and handing the reigns to a reliever then a closer (rather than this order of reliever, starter, closer) but it certainly helped Derek Johnson distinguish himself and I don't see why he'd stop now.