Is this Bochy's worst year as a Giants manager?

[gp956]

The case against Bochy:

1. He ran out of infielders in a nine inning game and was forced to play Aubrey Huff at 2B.

2. Did not have his team ready to play out of spring training, i.e. outfield barely played together before opening day.

3. Consistently starts his worst fielding infield in order to play L-R matchups.

4. Ran Ryan Theriot and Gregor Blanco into the ground.

5. Stuck with a slumping Pagan and Blanco well into deep slumps, alienating his best bench outfielder in the process.

6. Played Pill against lefties and Belt against righties when they have reverse splits for that matchup.

7. A Hit and Run with Lincecum at the plate.

8. He ran out of infielders in a nine inning game and was forced to play Aubrey Huff at 2B.

9. If he got credit for the bullpen in the past, he gets the blame for their collective meltdown this year.

10. Tried to play Huff in the OF out of spring training, when he hadn't had reps out there.

11. Consistently plays one of his worst OBP hitters in the two-hole.

12. By benching younger prospects for long stretches, wastes cheap service time and retards evaluation and development.

13. Has consistently let a tiring starter face the opponent's best hitter in high leverage situations when Romo/Lopez are up and ready to come in.

14. Hitting Crawford 8th at the beginning of the year. He should have been in a protected spot in the lineup.

15. He ran out of infielders in a nine inning game and was forced to play Aubrey Huff at 2B.

 

[sfsportsfan]

you forgot when he ran out of infielders in a 9 inning game and had to play Aubrey Huff at 2b

 

[dredinis21]

I don't agree with #13 or #14 but the rest looks fine.

#13, I don't have a problem with how he handles our pitching staff. I WANT our starters, assuming that they haven't struggled all night, to pitch through jams, not expect the pen to bail them out.

#14, where exactly would you want to put a kid who came into the season hitting about the Mendoza line? I certainly would have rather him figured himself out in the 8 spot where he has a good eye and won't just swing at anything thrown his way while being in a less pressure-packed spot in the lineup. At least until he starts to figure things out.

 

[gp956]

I don't agree with #13 or #14 but the rest looks fine.

#13 I WANT our starters, assuming that they haven't struggled all night, to pitch through jams, not expect the pen to bail them out.

Why? We're talking a starter having gone 7/8 inning @110 pitches facing the opponent's best hitter with the game in doubt, e.g. Bumgarner allowed to face Braun when Romo was ready to go. Gave up a game tying homerun. The next night Bochy did the same thing with Cain - Braun hit a run scoring single.

#14, where exactly would you want to put a kid who came into the season hitting about the Mendoza line?

Sandwiched between two professional hitters. Not in a spot where he has to expand the zone on a regular basis. You think hitting near the mendoza line had anything to do with hitting in the eighth spot? I can't remember whether it was Sabean or Bochy, but one of them admitted on KNBR that it may have been a mistake to start him out there.

I certainly would have rather him figured himself out in the 8 spot where he has a good eye and won't just swing at anything thrown his way while being in a less pressure-packed spot in the lineup.

The 8-hole hitter has to expand the zone. An ideal 8-hole hitter puts the ball in play and has better than average plate coverage.

 

[gp956]

you forgot when he ran out of infielders in a 9 inning game and had to play Aubrey Huff at 2b

You remember that one too?

 

[Freeport 22]

The case against Bochy:

1. He ran out of infielders in a nine inning game and was forced to play Aubrey Huff at 2B.

2. Did not have his team ready to play out of spring training, i.e. outfield barely played together before opening day.

3. Consistently starts his worst fielding infield in order to play L-R matchups.

4. Ran Ryan Theriot and Gregor Blanco into the ground.

5. Stuck with a slumping Pagan and Blanco well into deep slumps, alienating his best bench outfielder in the process.

6. Played Pill against lefties and Belt against righties when they have reverse splits for that matchup.

7. A Hit and Run with Lincecum at the plate.

8. He ran out of infielders in a nine inning game and was forced to play Aubrey Huff at 2B.

9. If he got credit for the bullpen in the past, he gets the blame for their collective meltdown this year.

10. Tried to play Huff in the OF out of spring training, when he hadn't had reps out there.

11. Consistently plays one of his worst OBP hitters in the two-hole.

12. By benching younger prospects for long stretches, wastes cheap service time and retards evaluation and development.

13. Has consistently let a tiring starter face the opponent's best hitter in high leverage situations when Romo/Lopez are up and ready to come in.

14. Hitting Crawford 8th at the beginning of the year. He should have been in a protected spot in the lineup.

15. He ran out of infielders in a nine inning game and was forced to play Aubrey Huff at 2B.

4 , 5 , and 6 are excellent points

Everything else is on the Money

Bochy has used his entire bench 5 or 6x this year in 9 inning games that are close not blowouts , and I have no idea what he is doing with 13 pitchers on the roster .

Bochy also let Burriss rot away on the bench when he could have had Pill or anyone else who could swing a bat there instead .

I would also like to know who is responsible for watching penny pitch and then thinking it was a good idea to sign him ? Bochy , Rags or someone else ??

 

[gp956]

4 , 5 , and 6 are excellent points

Everything else is on the Money

Bochy has used his entire bench 5 or 6x this year in 9 inning games that are close not blowouts , and I have no idea what he is doing with 13 pitchers on the roster .

Bochy also let Burriss rot away on the bench when he could have had Pill or anyone else who could swing a bat there instead .

Yep. I'd have listed that too, but wasn't sure if Burriss being on the roster was Bochy's call, or Sabean's.

 

[msgkings322]

You could make a similar list every year. Also every year including this one you could make a much longer list of the things he's done right. So to really answer your question you'd have to somehow remember and chart every decision every year he's been here and somehow quantify better vs worse.

In reality you can't really evaluate managers that way, other than a general feeling that this one is good and that one is bad and most are in the mediocre middle. I think Bochy is above average but not perfect. We don't have the background details that went into all his decisions either.

I think we're frustrated that we aren't pulling away from this winnable division, but we've had injuries to key personnel (Turns out losing Wilson was a much bigger deal than I thought at first, Casilla seemed to be able to fill in but not so much) and more importantly, Lincecum's first half probably cost us 3-4 games (if he had been just good, didn't need to be an ace). If Tim pitches decently all year, we're 3 up on LA.

 

[msgkings322]

But yeah, the Huff thing was fubar and easily among Noggin's biggest gaffes.

 

[calsnowskier]

But yeah, the Huff thing was fubar and easily among Noggin's biggest gaffes.

Literally almost killed Huff...

 

[gp956]

You could make a similar list every year.

I do. For instance, one of my biggest complaints in 2008 was Bochy letting Rich Aurilia get 82 games at 1B.

Also every year including this one you could make a much longer list of the things he's done right.

Totally irrelevant. I guess you have never had to endure a quality meeting with some QA dweeb spouting "FIVE NINE's" rhetoric.

So to really answer your question you'd have to somehow remember and chart every decision every year he's been here and somehow quantify better vs worse.

But better and worse is a matter of knowing the expected outcomes. And most of my points are pretty much no-brainers - i.e. if you don't play a starting 3-4 outfielders for more than a few innings in the spring, you're going to have mis-communication on balls in the gap. You play your third worst thirdbaseman with a pitcher who does not strike out a lot of hitters, and you're asking to be bit. For a team expected to play a lot of close games, you cannot be giving away outs.

In reality you can't really evaluate managers that way, other than a general feeling that this one is good and that one is bad and most are in the mediocre middle.

I disagree that you can't evaluate a manager by looking at the expected outcomes of his decisions.

I think Bochy is above average but not perfect. We don't have the background details that went into all his decisions either.

This is certainly a legitimate point.

I think we're frustrated that we aren't pulling away from this winnable division,

Not really. But it's true that if we were pulling away then any complaints about Bochy would be mostly moot. 2010 is a good example of that (plus the fact that nearly every move he made in the post season was correct - and the ones that weren't correct did not cost us any games, i.e. letting timmy pitch on one days rest in the NLCS).

but we've had injuries to key personnel (Turns out losing Wilson was a much bigger deal than I thought at first, Casilla seemed to be able to fill in but not so much) and more importantly, Lincecum's first half probably cost us 3-4 games (if he had been just good, didn't need to be an ace). If Tim pitches decently all year, we're 3 up on LA.

We'd be up 3-4 games too if bochy had made the "correct" moves vis-a-vis my list. Having the team with the most talent in a division can cover a manager's mistakes.

 

[Stokes1931]

Sandwiched between two professional hitters. Not in a spot where he has to expand the zone on a regular basis. You think hitting near the mendoza line had anything to do with hitting in the eighth spot? I can't remember whether it was Sabean or Bochy, but one of them admitted on KNBR that it may have been a mistake to start him out there.

The 8-hole hitter has to expand the zone. An ideal 8-hole hitter puts the ball in play and has better than average plate coverage.

We have some of those?!?

 

[calsnowskier]

We have some of those?!?

Naturally, Fish should have been batting between Leche and Gerald all year...


:ss:

 

[dredinis21]

Why? We're talking a starter having gone 7/8 inning @110 pitches facing the opponent's best hitter with the game in doubt, e.g. Bumgarner allowed to face Braun when Romo was ready to go. Gave up a game tying homerun. The next night Bochy did the same thing with Cain - Braun hit a run scoring single.

Ok, point by point. You bring up exact examples, which cripples my argument...damn you logic and reason. =) In all honesty though, wasn't that when Romo had a rough patch serving up taters like it was his job? If the pitcher is struggling to find the strike zone and it's in the 7/8, then yes, bring in the reliever. But Bochy built this rotation's swagger by doing the exact thing you are now chastizing. He's trusting the identity of this team, i.e. our starting pitching, to do what they do best. Sometimes it works great. Sometimes it doesn't. But I typically don't see a problem with it. Maybe Dusty has me still jaded with his rotation/pen and maybe that is why I don't have a problem with how Bochy does it. But the bottom line is that he will never be 100% correct on those calls, but he doesn't do it frequently enough for me to think of it as a problem.

Sandwiched between two professional hitters. Not in a spot where he has to expand the zone on a regular basis. You think hitting near the mendoza line had anything to do with hitting in the eighth spot? I can't remember whether it was Sabean or Bochy, but one of them admitted on KNBR that it may have been a mistake to start him out there.

We have struggled to have ANY professional hitters in the bottom of our lineup for almost a decade (excluding 2010 stretch run) and yet to start the season, you saw a spot to put him? Where? Is Belt a professional hitter yet? Arias? Theriot is the only one that fits but Bochy has entrenched him in the 2 spot most of the season. So where do you put him? Even in our lineup now, it doesn't make sense unless you want Arias in the lineup.

Pagan
Theriot/Scutaro
Melky
Posey
Pablo
Pence
Belt
Craw?

Where do you put him? I know this lineup is different, and I would agree to make Arias when he is in the sacrifical lamb in the 8 hole, but I don't see the logic in bringing a .200 hitter UP in the lineup to kill rallies. "Hey, he's hitting .200, let's put him in the 2 hole." That doesn't make sense to me and we didn't have the hitters pencilled where they probably should be based on injuries, slumps, etc.

The 8-hole hitter has to expand the zone. An ideal 8-hole hitter puts the ball in play and has better than average plate coverage.

And if you have a second year player who is your only true option at SS but doesn't have the offensive ability to be a consistent contributor to start out the season, being in the 8 hole, IMO is a lower pressure situation for him to continue learning how to hit in the bigs. An 8 hitter CAN expand the zone, but doesn't have to. Ideally, you would love that, but in our case, could we afford to move a hitter down? I understand your position on this but I just don't agree with your assessment. For the middle 60 games of the season or so, we didn't really have any options other then to bat Crawford or Arias 8th.

 

[dredinis21]

Sorry about the quote/bolded stupidity, still trying to grasp the correct format.

 

[gp956]

In all honesty though, wasn't that when Romo had a rough patch serving up taters like it was his job?

No. It was in the middle of when he was on fire. Especially against righthanders.

If the pitcher is struggling to find the strike zone and it's in the 7/8, then yes, bring in the reliever. But Bochy built this rotation's swagger by doing the exact thing you are now chastizing.

No he hasn't. Bochy's rep is in the judicious use of his pen. He's always tended to leave his starters in a few batters too long. Seems to always want to coax a 110+ pitches out of Zito, when his effectiveness drops off dramatically at 100+. It worked out once with Zito.

He's trusting the identity of this team, i.e. our starting pitching, to do what they do best. Sometimes it works great. Sometimes it doesn't. But I typically don't see a problem with it.

It's the pen that has made the Giants staff elite. Sure the starters can match up with the best of any staff, but it's the pen, in the past, that has been the separating factor.

Maybe Dusty has me still jaded with his rotation/pen and maybe that is why I don't have a problem with how Bochy does it. But the bottom line is that he will never be 100% correct on those calls, but he doesn't do it frequently enough for me to think of it as a problem.

It's number 13 on my list. It's not a big problem.

We have struggled to have ANY professional hitters in the bottom of our lineup for almost a decade (excluding 2010 stretch run) and yet to start the season, you saw a spot to put him? Where?

7th. With Schierholtz as protection. And it's not hindsight based on the results to date, i.e. I stated my preference in our preseason thread. Not sure what the preamble about professional hitters has to do with it. You got your starting eight and then you arrange the batting order to get the most out of them. Schierholtz is a free swinger who can cover balls off the plate - he's not going to be appreciable better or worse anywhere in the order. Putting a rookie in the 8-hole, who is still learning the pitchers in the league and compounded by a small "hotzone", was simply asking too much. Once he got around the league a couple of times - different story.

Is Belt a professional hitter yet?

At the beginning of the year, no. I would have had Belt hit second to start the year.

Arias?

Arias was in AAA at the beginning of the year.

Theriot is the only one that fits but Bochy has entrenched him in the 2 spot most of the season. So where do you put him?

He's another ideal 8-hole hitter.

Even in our lineup now, it doesn't make sense unless you want Arias in the lineup.

I'm not sure what Arias has to do with me wanting some protection for Crawford at the beginning of the year.

Where do you put him? I know this lineup is different, and I would agree to make Arias when he is in the sacrifical lamb in the 8 hole, but I don't see the logic in bringing a .200 hitter UP in the lineup to kill rallies. "Hey, he's hitting .200, let's put him in the 2 hole." That doesn't make sense to me and we didn't have the hitters pencilled where they probably should be based on injuries, slumps, etc.

You're not getting it. You have to understand how pitchers work an 8-hole hitter as opposed to a 7-hole hitter. And how that difference can have a particularly negative impact on young players learning the league, who don't have great plate coverage to begin with. An 8-hole hitter has to swing at pitches out of the zone in nearly every game. That's not a recipe for staying within oneself, and can really put you into a hole for a while. The point here is that if moving Crawford from 8 to 7 improves his ops by .200 points, while the guy moving to 8 loses nothing, then it's a clear win for the team, and Crawford.

And if you have a second year player who is your only true option at SS but doesn't have the offensive ability to be a consistent contributor to start out the season, being in the 8 hole, IMO is a lower pressure situation for him to continue learning how to hit in the bigs.

No it's not. For the reasons already explained.

An 8 hitter CAN expand the zone, but doesn't have to.

A professional hitter does.

Ideally, you would love that, but in our case, could we afford to move a hitter down? I understand your position on this but I just don't agree with your assessment. For the middle 60 games of the season or so, we didn't really have any options other then to bat Crawford or Arias 8th.

I'm talking about Bochy's decision to bat him 8th from the spring break.

 

[dredinis21]

i'm more jealous of your ability to work the quotes shit correctly then anything else. I marveled at that for like 30 seconds before I even started reading.

Ok, so you would want Nate to bat 8th when he really wasn't in the lineup? When he's there, fine. But Blanco got the lion's share of the ABs so that is kind of a moot point. So I would assume that prior to the season, you wanted Nate to carry the load more or less in RF? Asking because I don't want to put words in your mouth....or keyboard...or whatever.

Bochy has worked with Cain, worked in Lincecum, MadBum, and Vogey...allowing each of them quite a bit of rope as time as gone on and they have proven themselves in this league. Yes, our pen has separated us from the pack and Bochy's MO has been a great feel for roles within the pen, but to say that our starting staff hasn't been our bread and butter is wrong. Bochy allowed Cain, MadBum, and Timmeh to pitch out of their own jams early on in their careers and set the tone. You don't typically see Bochy getting the pen revved up in the 5th/6th unless the starter is getting up there in pitch count and/or is ineffective due to wildness. We saw that more with Durty but that's because Durty is/was/is a mental midget. Bottom line is that Bochy KNOWS his pitching staff. He knows that batters hit .300+ after Vogey throws his 100th pitch, so typically Vogey calls it a night shortly thereafter...and sometimes before. Bochy knows that Timmeh and Cain are bulldogs that can hit 110+ pitches and still be effective. He knows that Zito takes only 3.5 seconds to go from 2003 Zito to 2005-2011 Zito so he warms the pen up when it looks like Zito is starting to unravel. I trust his ability to make decisions with regards to the pitching staff. It IS his strength and he has proven so. Lineup? I tend to agree with you in your assessments of his dumbassness with the exception of Crawford.

As far as Crawford is concerned, I DO understand what your prototypical 8th hitter SHOULD do. I also understand that our offense has been underwhelming for a few years now and our MO in winning games over the course of the last three years has been to keep it close with pitching and get some timely hitting (hopefully). I think it would be safe to assume that the 7th hitter in the lineup would conceivably get more RBI opportunities then that of an 8th hitter. Since runs are at a premium given our team's style of play, I would hate to see Crawford, fresh off his 2011 .210 batting avg (based on memory, which isn't good given the cocktail of malt hops and bong resin that saturated my melon in younger years) in rally killing situations where we would/could have better options. I would have rather seen Nate in those situations then Crawford, using your Nate example.

 

[dredinis21]

GP, give me your Opening Day lineup given the players that were on the roster at that time. Before injuries and lack of production. Were you starting Belt instead of Huff? Was Theriot your pick at 2b? Etc. I don't care about 20/20 hindsight. Obviously Huff imploded but he also had an odd/even year split that made many of us excited about this year given how badly he sucked last year. So give me your lineup so I can see what you would do in that situation with that cast of characters.

 

[gp956]

Bochy allowed Cain, MadBum, and Timmeh to pitch out of their own jams early on in their careers and set the tone.

I've watched nearly every start these players have made, and that's a characterization of Bochy, and his effect on them, that I just can't get on board with. It's a nice thought, but I just don't see anything objective to back that up.

You don't typically see Bochy getting the pen revved up in the 5th/6th unless the starter is getting up there in pitch count and/or is ineffective due to wildness. We saw that more with Durty but that's because Durty is/was/is a mental midget. Bottom line is that Bochy KNOWS his pitching staff.

Remember when he kept bringing in Tyler Walker in high leverage situations? Took Bochy almost a season to admit that was a mistake.

He knows that batters hit .300+ after Vogey throws his 100th pitch, so typically Vogey calls it a night shortly thereafter...and sometimes before. Bochy knows that Timmeh and Cain are bulldogs that can hit 110+ pitches and still be effective. He knows that Zito takes only 3.5 seconds to go from 2003 Zito to 2005-2011 Zito so he warms the pen up when it looks like Zito is starting to unravel. I trust his ability to make decisions with regards to the pitching staff. It IS his strength and he has proven so.

I'd say the handling of the pen is his strength. But, in any case, you ought to hang out in gameday threads and hear us calling for the pen just before the starter loses effectiveness.

As far as Crawford is concerned, I DO understand what your prototypical 8th hitter SHOULD do. I also understand that our offense has been underwhelming for a few years now and our MO in winning games over the course of the last three years has been to keep it close with pitching and get some timely hitting (hopefully). I think it would be safe to assume that the 7th hitter in the lineup would conceivably get more RBI opportunities then that of an 8th hitter. Since runs are at a premium given our team's style of play, I would hate to see Crawford, fresh off his 2011 .210 batting avg (based on memory, which isn't good given the cocktail of malt hops and bong resin that saturated my melon in younger years) in rally killing situations where we would/could have better options. I would have rather seen Nate in those situations then Crawford, using your Nate example.

Crawford's OPS as a 7-hole hitter is .725, as an 8-hole hitter he's at .588. The Giants run expectancy drops from 4.259 to 4.142 when you move him from 7th to 8th in the order. That's about 1.5 wins over the course of a 162 game season. Caveat - lots of hand-waving involved in that calculation, but trust it gets the point across.

 

[gp956]

GP, give me your Opening Day lineup given the players that were on the roster at that time. Before injuries and lack of production. Were you starting Belt instead of Huff? Was Theriot your pick at 2b? Etc. I don't care about 20/20 hindsight. Obviously Huff imploded but he also had an odd/even year split that made many of us excited about this year given how badly he sucked last year. So give me your lineup so I can see what you would do in that situation with that cast of characters.

Here's what I said in the spring:

I've got to go against the grain here, my hunch is Belt makes the opening day roster, probably pushing nate out to the 4th outfielder position - at least to start the season. Also, I have little faith in Huff's ability to bounce back from last year, so I think Belt will eventually win the first base job.

After everything goes through the wash cycle, the regular starting eight, some time in June, will be:

CF Pagan
LF Melky
3B Sandoval
_C Posey
1B Belt
2B Sanchez
SS Crawford
RF Schierholtz

BTW, Nate, at the time, was a career .862 OPS hitter in the 8-hole.