Seattle Sports Insider

Genius, 2

Posted by

4/10/10

=== ToNIGHT's Ballgame Dept. ===

Aside from simple pitcher-batter-splits ... and Wakamatsu was entitled to use his own intuition on this Saturday, in view of the lack of history to go on ...

We could name 25 additional factors that warped the generic Strat-O-Matic expectations for Saturday night's at-bat.

Here are a few specific-game factors that are, in this case, by no means theoretical. Do Figgins' 108 OPS+ from last year, and/or Griffey's 95 OPS+, adapt under any of the following April 10th circumstances:

What if Figgins is 3-for-this-week? Is he still a .360 wOBA projection this AB, if he's in a slump as we speak?
What if Figgins is shrill, pressing, and swinging outside the strike zone?
What if the guy on the mound can't throw a strike tonight, and you need a hitter who can maintain his strike zone tonight?
What if Ken Griffey Jr. is a flyball hitter -- and a fly is the whole ballgame right there?
What if Chone Figgins is a groundball hitter, and with a catcher on 3B, a grounder doesn't score the runner?
What if Ken Griffey Jr is one of only two Mariners (Gutierrez) who is relaxed at the plate right now?
What if Wakamatsu looks at Figgins' and Griffey's body languages, and intuits that Griffey is about to have a focused AB and Figgins a lousy AB? What are the splits for that?
What if Griffey walked up and told you, "Skip, I can take this guy to left field. I promise." ?
etc.

You want to be an ML manager, keed? Does that mean you're going to ignore in-game variables like the above?

...............

I'll tell yer why Junior pinch-hit. He knew, and Wok knew, and Francisco knew, that Junior was either going to walk, or take the ball in the air to LF, and tie this ballgame up. (That SF to left took the form of a line-drive to left-center, which was also acceptable.)

Figgins, pressing all night (and all week), would have chased Francisco's wild fastballs and had a lousy AB.

We just witnessed genius, a manager three steps ahead of us -- and it worked. Griffey went the other way, in a perfect replication of his Dave Stewart First ML AB, and won the game for us.

The doc synthesized DNA in front of our eyes -- Griffey kicked Francisco's keister -- and we go, "well, it worked this time, but I still wish Don would wear a wire in the dugout." Poor form, mates. :- )

................

But the main problem is: life is complicated. We don't recommend trying to capture it with a three-variable formula.

=== The Joy of Wok, Dept. ===

1. One whale of a gutsy move by Wok, wasn't it? :shaking head:

2. Might have turned April around, too.

3. Think for a second, what that move did for Wok's street cred with the ballplayers. And for their morale, coming back to Safeco.

Your friend,

Jeff

Comments

I immediately thought of the FB argument.

When they pinch hit Griffey for Figgins, four thoughts hit me in about 3 seconds:
1) Wow...this is bizarre! Is Wak crazy?
2) Griffey hasn't looked good at the plate all year
3) But he IS hitting lots of flyballs and we need a flyball here...if Figgins grounds it to a drawn in infield, we lose the game.
4) And Griffey's strike zone is still good...he just can't hit a well placed fastball or a change-up of any kind. Francisco can't throw his fastball anywhere but up and out of the zone right now. Interesting, gutsy call, Wak!

Hello. News Flash! KGJ is the

Hello. News Flash! KGJ is the team DH. Like it or not he's the go to guy off the bench. He's not a publicity stunt, team tickler, or bench coach/mascot. He's actually going to get into some games. The team has stated it's intent with Ken. The media has prepared the fan base for this. Don F'ing Wakamatsu Has said KGJ will be a main cog in this team. He is under contract for 500 PA's. and this team will give him every chance early on to fulfill his end of the contract. The job is his to loose. So be prepared for lots of Griffey. Griffey. Griffey. Griffey. Now!..... if Jr. is hitting .214 in early June, then I expect the team to pull the plug. But until then it's Griffey, Griffey and more Griffey. And for those who don't like it.......Griffey!
Also it was a good AB by Griff. He waited on the pitch and didn't try to do too much with it. End of story.

Then you were quicker than me Matt

Let's celebrate this day next April 10!
;- )

Griffey's AB was a carbon copy

Of his first ML at-bat ever.
On which he also was underconfident -- rather than trying to yank one, his sense of danger caused him to dial back and go the other way, hitting the ball with his legs and staying quick at the plate.
I'll take another 300 of those.

The under-confidence is a really bad sign

he was confident at the plate all season long last year despite hitting .220 or so the whole time. If he's not confident now...he's either not seeing the ball well (temporary) or he's really done.

Oh, am not saying his confidence is collapsed

It's just a choking-up-with-two-strikes type thing. Griff is aware that he's 40. It was time to dial back the glory meter and make sure the run came in.