Thursday, September 1, 2011

The Genius Maker #81

I had all sorts of comments to make about the game last night, but I will boil this down to the 6th inning and a horrible decision by Girardi that greatly reduced our chances of winning the game.

Phil Hughes started off throwing well (but I had a lot of issues with the pitch selection and it might have been Cervelli or Hughes as Hughes shook him off sometimes) as he threw 94 and had a sharp bite on his curve. They did not use the curve enough and the change-ups he threw were very bad.

First perspective: This game was a huge mismatch with one of the ERA leaders (Beckett) at home going against one of the ERA bottom dwellers (Hughes). Hughes had just allowed 4 runs in the last 3 innings and was throwing only 91-92 at this point. The Yankees offense did a great job and put the team in the lead by scoring 3 runs in the top of the 6th to take a 5-4 lead!

So what does the foolish manager do? He struts Hughes back out for the bottom of the 6th inning! I was furious and it got worse when Hughes started Crawford out 3-0. After throwing a 91 MPH strike down the middle, we got VERY lucky as Crawford pulled a HR foul. I was so sure this was a terrible move that I would have taken him out with a 3-2 count on him that was how sure I was Hughes was done. Hughes then threw another meatball down the middle of the plate, but Crawford flew out to CF. Whew! I wrote in my notes to eat crow and say that I would not have let Hughes pitch but we got an out. After seeing your pitcher have nothing left, I have no idea why Girardi didn’t make a move. He decided to wait for Hughes to walk the next guy and then allow a double before finally taking him out. It was one of those moves you would expect a rookie manager in KC to make. It cost us the game and Girardi should be embarrassed. He is so lucky he has a talented team because he simply is not good enough because he does not have a good feel for a game and does not put the team in the best position to win!

We had a chance to win a game we had no right to win and Girardi blew it…I am really annoyed today and all my other comments will have to wait.

2 comments:

  1. On Thursday, Girardi, didn't make the same mistake. He pulled Burnett early, and thereby won the game.

    I wonder if Girdardi was concerned on Wednesday about overusing his best relievers. The combination of Logan, Soriano, Robertson and Mo has been terrific, but they can't pitch every day.

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  2. Sure, this is why he doesn't allow them to pitch 3 days in a row...but the question still surrounds the inconsistency he applies his odd rules. Then yesterday, he lets Robertson pitch 30+ pitches and 2 full innings. It is as if he cares more about non Boston games

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