Pena Log 07.21.08
Posted: July 21st, 2008 | Filed under: Banny Log, Baseball | 35 Comments »
Appearance No. 1: Vs. Detroit Tigers
Innings: 1
Hits: 0
Earned runs allowed: 0.
Strikeouts: 1
Walks: 0
Homers: 0
Extra base hits: 0.
Decision: ND (0-0)
Number of pitches: 12
Number of strikes: 8
BABIP: .000 (0 for 2)
Season BABIP: .000
No, we’re not abandoning Brian Bannister. Of course not. We’ll get to him in a minute. But first … the Royals got demolished by Detroit 19-4 on Monday night in a game notable for two events.
1. The horrible, awful-to-watch, turn-your-head-away performance of Jimmy Gobble. It was painful, like watching the slow motion replay of Joe Theismann’s leg snapping, like watching Greg Norman lose the Masters over and over, like watching Pacino in “Author Author.” Gobble was reasonably effective in 2007 — his 3.02 ERA was probably a bit misleading, but he struck out 50 in 53 innings, he held lefties to a .241 batting average, he was only 25 and had seemingly a long and profitable career as a LOOGY ahead of him.
And then, this year, it has all fallen apart. I will say that part of the blame falls on manager Trey Hillman — Jimmy Gobble cannot get out righties. That’s a given. Even in his pretty good 2007 season, righties hit .319/.377/.532 against him. He can’t get them out, and if you send him out there to face righties you send him to fail. He’s a guy you send out there to get out one or two batters, that’s his job, that’s his role, get out a lefty, maybe get out a pinch-hit righty, that’s it, that’s what he can do, and if you need more from your designated lefty then you can’t afford to have Jimmy Gobble on your staff.
Well, Hillman — and I think this is often to his credit — does not get as caught up in righty-lefty match-ups as most other managers. I generally like this because it means that Hillman does not just wrestle a game to the ground with pitching changes like, oh, I don’t know, the guy across the state. BUT, while I appreciate a bit more of a laissez faire approach, the overarching truth doesn’t change: Gobble still cannot get out right-handed batters. And so it goes: Gobble was pitching OK, his usual self, until May 22 in Boston when Hillman — and I’ve already mentioned this bizarro decision — allowed Gobble to face righty Mike Lowell with the bases loaded. Lowell, of course, hit the grand slam over the green monster.
A couple of weeks later, in Chicago, the Royals-White Sox game went into extras, and Gobble started the 15th with righty sluggers Carlos Quentin and Paul Konerko coming up. This was probably unavoidable — it was the 15th inning, after all — but it could only end badly, and it did. Gobble walked Quentin. Then he gave up the inevitable walk-off homer to Konerko.*
*Konerko is now hitting .833/.889/2.833 against Gobble. Yeah, I have to post those numbers. Konerko has faced Gobble 9 times, and he has walked twice and been hit by a pitch once. That means he has six official at-bats. He has five hits and four home runs in those six at-bats.
And so on. A week later, he gave up a grand slam — this time to David Murphy, a lefty — but by now it was clear that his confidence was shattered, and Gobble was just gone. He gave up a homer to switch-hitter Brian Roberts. He sat for 12 days, and when he pitched against Chicago his last time out, he looked like a much slower version of Rick Ankiel. He walked Jim Thome, hit Paul Konerko with a pitch, and walked Nick Swisher.
So, after all that, Gobble had a 7.99 ERA. His splits show that his talents might not have been well served.
Lefties off Gobble: 51 plate appearances. 149/.216/.277, 13 strikeouts, 3 walks.
Righties off Gobble: 66 plate appearances .400/.530/.720, 14 walks, 7 strikeouts.
You know, sometimes, slumps are not complete mysteries. You just CANNOT put Jimmy Gobble in situations where he has to face good right-handed hitters. Sometimes, perhaps, it can’t be prevented, you get outflanked by the opposing skipper … but it seems apparent that Gobble has been put in those situations way too often this year. It’s not Hillman’s fault exactly — hey, a pitcher allowing righties to hit .400 off him is not a Major League pitcher — but I do think Hillman has not served Gobble too well.
Anyway, all those numbers are shattered now. Because on Monday, Gobble came into a lost game with the bases loaded and righty Pudge v2.0 up at the plate. Gobble walked him on four pitches, and none of those pitches were close. He did get Renteria to ground out to end the inning. Things were bad. They were about to get a lot worse.
Next inning: Curtis Granderson, a lefty, lined a single to right on an 88-mph fastball up and in … Placido Polanco lined a single to left on a 90-mph fastball up and over the plate … Carlos Guillen smashed a double to left on an 86-mph fastball on the inner half … Gobble threw a wild pitch … Miguel Cabrera, who should NEVER face Gobble, not under circumstances, not even in an exhibition game, not even with the Royals down by 15 runs, singled to right on a 90-mph inside fastball … Matt Joyce (a lefty, finally) lined another Gobble 90 mph fastball to center for a single. … Gary Sheffield, one of the best right-handed hitters of his generation, turned on a 91-mph fastball up and crushed it for a three-run home run.
You would think that would be enough, but there was more. Hillman was, rightfully so, dying to save his bullpen in a lost cause. So he left Gobble out there. After getting two outs, Gobble walked Edgar Renteria on four pitches … Granderson pulled a ground ball through the infield for a single … Gobble walked Ramon Santiago on five pitches. Gobble then walked Carlos Guillen on four pitches. He then, finally, mercifully, thankfully was taken out of the game.
He’s broken. That’s all. He’s broken, and I’m not sure all the Kings’ pitching coaches can put him back together again. I’ve been writing about Jimmy since he was 21, and he’s a good person, he’s a stand up guy, he takes the blame when he struggles. And he’s a lefty who, I think, can get Major League lefties out. It’s sad to watch him like this. But the simple truth is that if you keep sending him up there to get out righties, you’re got to run him out of this game. ‘Cause he can’t get them out.*
*Updated Gobble numbers against righties. They are not hitting .421/.558/.772 against him. If righties could get 650 plate appearances against Gobble this year, they would hit .421 with 68 doubles and 203 runs scored.
2. So, the Gobble fiasco led Hillman to try something goofy in the ninth — he had Tony Pena Jr. pitch. It had been about 10 years since the Royals had pitched a position player in a game. As a fan, I liked the move. Heck, why not? The game was over. Save your bullpen and give the fans a cheap thrill. Plus, Pena seemed an excellent choice — he had been hitting like a pitcher all year.
But here was the thing: Pena was GOOD. I don’t mean he was good in a funny way. I mean he he threw 91 mph from an odd arm angle. I mean his fastball had life and sink on it. I mean he froze Pudge Rodriguez on a curveball. I mean he can probably field his position better than any pitcher in baseball history — he made one dazzling play on a chopper hit back to him. I mean he came side arm on a curveball and got some real movement on it. I mean he did all this even though he hasn’t pitched in YEARS.
I’m not saying that Tony Pena is the second coming of K-Rod (though with his goggle glasses, he had the look). I’m saying that when a guy’s hitting .153 in almost 200 at-bats, and then he goes out without practice or serious warm-ups and throws 91 mph from a low arm angle, and that balls dives down, and he shows the potential to work both sides of the plate … well, you tell me.
OK, so beyond that: I guess I should say something about Banny. He’s now 7-8 with a 5.49 ERA, and there’s no question that he is searching. He seems to think now that his problem is coming out of the stretch — he’s not getting the same kind of movement or the same kind of precision when pitching out of the stretch. There could be something to that. He also is having some trouble putting hitters away … on Sunday, he had Joe Crede down 0-2 and simply could not find a pitch to finish off the job. Crede ended up hitting a three-run homer. Maybe the two issues are connected — he was, I assume, pitching out of the stretch then.*
* I did not actually see Sunday’s game — I was driving back from Cincinnati. That meant I heard the game on the radio, and it was a bit of a surreal experience because I listened to the Chicago radio team of Ed Farmer and Steve Stone. It was surreal for a few reasons. One, whenever I hear another city’s broadcast, I always feel like I’m eavesdropping. I’m just not used to the rhythms, the jokes, the level of homerism, the promotions. The White Sox must have more radio promotions than any other team in baseball. Every double means money for a charity, every homer they have Steve Stone guess the distance, every other inning they seem to have some ridiculous contest going, and everything has some corporate sponsor, everything — this pitching change is brought to you by Acme, this pressing of the cough button is brought to you by Vick’s, this confusion over balls and strikes is brought to you by the Eye Center of Greater Chicago and so on.
And bless Ed Farmer, fine reliever in ‘79 and ‘80, but he just couldn’t quite get that balls and strikes thing together. Maybe it was an off-day, I don’t know, but every other inning, he was like, “Wait, it’s 2-1, I think the scoreboard’s wrong, no, wait, check that, that the scoreboard’s right.” He also kept asking Steve Stone if a pitch was a breaking ball or a fastball. I will say, though, he was funny in that blustery, homerish, Chicago, “Let’s get these guys out already” sort of way.
Another reason it was surreal is that Steve Stone grew up in my town, South Euclid, and listening to him call a game is sort of like listening to one of my old friends from the neighborhood calling a game. He has that punchy Cleveland sense of humor, he has that double-accented Cleveland voice (where sky turns into skee-eye), he gives you some great Ohio bluntness. I always liked him on television, but I think I like him even more on the radio. At one point, he told a great story about Earl Weaver pulling him out of a game after he gave up a long foul ball. Weaver came out, and Steve said: “What are you doing here? That went foul.” And Weaver said, “Yeah, the next one will be fair, hit the showers.”
Anyway, there was some talk about sending Banny down to the minors to work out some things. But several people seem to think Banny’s close to putting it back together, so he’s going to make his next start Friday against Tampa. Obviously, I don’t know what’s the right thing. I’ve had a couple of people in the game tell me this week that Banny thinks too much out there. I don’t know — that seems like such a “baseball” thing to say. He was thinking plenty last year too, and he was just fine. No, it seems to me that Banny’s problem right now is that he’s giving up too many hits and too many runs.
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The White Sox wore their 1983 unis on Sunday. Crede wears No. 24 – which was Floyd Bannister’s number that season. So it had to be kind of weird for Brian to face him.
TPJ striking out Pudge was one of the highlights of my LIFE. No joke.
There is some real potential in the idea of TPJ: The Reliever. I would very seriously love to see that explored, because I don’t ever want to see TPJ: The Batter ever again, in any situation.
Can Banny play short? He can’t hit any worse than Pena that’s for sure.
The top of the ninth was the… fifth greatest moment of my baseball-fan life, behind Brett’s homer in the seventh inning of game three of the 1980 ALCS, Jim Sundberg’s triple in game seven of the 1985 ALCS, Dane Iorg’s single in game six of the ‘85 series, and, well, ALL of game seven the next night.
Seriously, did Pena have an entire rosin bag in his mouth as he was pitching? That was some serious chew. But whatever. The curve ball that completely baffled Rodriguez was no doubt the highlight of the game for the 17 fans that remained for the ninth. Beautiful!
[...] note, the great thing about the Tigers playing the Royals is we got a JoePos blog about it. Not to be missed! He also writes about Jimmy Gobble, the Royals reliever who gave up 10 [...]
Almost all pitchers, even LOOGYs, face more righties than lefties. Look up Rheal Cormier, Ricardo Rincon, anyone…they all faced WAY more righties than lefties. In Rick Honeycutt’s first year as a reliever, with Tony “eight pitching changes a game” LaRussa as his manager, Honeycutt faced twice as many righties as lefties. So yeah, it’s not that weird for Jimmy Gobble to face more righties than lefties (though he actually faced a few more lefties last year, kind of an anomaly). Outside of Mike Myers, all the LOOGYs do.
“Lefties off Gobble: 51 plate appearances. 149/.216/.277, 13 strikeouts, 3 walks.”
I sincerely hope the Royals do give up on Gobble. And then I hope the Angels, who are desperate to have a guy who can get out Big Papi, Jason Giambi, Jim Thome, and the like, could trade for him cheaply, and have one of the two missing pieces I hope they get before the playoffs begin. Because the other missing piece, a hitter who can actually protect Vlad Guerrero, is going to cost them a lot.
Seriously, though, some managers just don’t get it with some players. Reminds me of poor Mike Kinkade, who was absolutely ruined by Jim Tracy. Yeah, he wasn’t any great player, but he did have one superb talent: his OPS versus LHP for his career (such as it was) was .948, OPS+ was 152. Versus RHP, .582, 56. I mean, it was absolutely clear cut: he destroyed lefties, righties destroyed him. Then in 2003, after he batted mostly against LHP in 2002, Tracy put him in 122 PA against RHP versus 69 versus LHP. What was Tracy thinking? OPS versus LHP that year was 1.155, versus RHP was .441, but he got almost twice as many at bats versus RHP. Meanwhile poor old Fred McGriff, OPS versus LHP of .661, still got 91 at bats Kinkade deserved; poor old Rickey Henderson (OPS of .528 versus LHP) had 45 PA Kinkade deserved; even Jeromy Burnitz (.748) ate up some at bats Kinkade deserved. How does a hitter get a split OPS of 1.155 his final season and then get released at the age of 30?
I know, that’s a pretty narrow specialization. But if 1/5 of all pitchers are left handed, so you’d face roughly 32 LHP starters per year, and you got 3 PA per starting pitcher, plus some other pinch hit at bats, Kinkade should have had easily 100+ PA versus LHP. Instead, he got 122 PA from his wrong side, 69 from his good side. Man, I killed to trade for Strat-O-Matic cards like that, back when I was in a keeper league. You don’t think a not fully healthy Shawn Green (who still played 160 games) could have used a bit of rest, with his .773 OPS versus LHP, and 238 PA? If a mediocre LHB that year like Shawn Green still got 238 PA versus LHP, don’t you think Kinkade could have had half that many? But I’m beating a dead horse, I’m sure.
There have been idiot managers for, well, forever. And there have been some pretty decent managers who had blind spots. And there have been Gobbles and Kinkades who, in the hands of Earl Weaver, would have had long and productive platoon careers, who wind up shell shocked and less than they could have been. I bet Kinkade even today (only 35 years old) would be a better platooner with Garret Anderson than is Juan Rivera (OPS .400) or Gary Mathews (OPS .681). Heck, maybe the Yankees or Red Sox could use him too. And I am sorry for the Gobbles and Kinkades of the world; they could do something extremely well, well enough to deserve a place on a major league roster, but they run into a clueless manager and disappear forever.
“The curve ball that completely baffled Rodriguez ”
well, baffled him more in the sense of “Why am I seeing a curveball from a shortstop?” than in the sense of “How do I hit this?”
TPJ as a pitcher does make me feel better about him. Even if he sucks as a hitter. He might be slightly old to be making a conversion to pitching (he’s 27).
They should give out replicas of his sunglasses on Hispanic Heritage Night. But hopefully that night doesn’t get so bad that Trey puts TPJ to pitch.
I was lukewarm about Teahan as a leadoff hitter, but this I can get behind. Get with the program Hillman, TPJ: The Reliever is the future!
Pitch by pitch summary for The Penacutioner’s major league pitching debut
v. Raburn: 90, 88, 91, 91 (2 strikes, 1 foul, 1 in-play out, grounding to Pena)
v. Rodriguez: 90, 90, 91, 75, 77, 76 (2 called strikes, 2 balls, 2 foul balls, Rodriguez took one curve/slider for a ball, fouled one, and struck out looking on one
v. Renteria: 91, 76 (1 called strike, 1 in-play out)
So in his first time pitching, Tony Pena Jr, who is having the worst hitting season for a regular in modern baseball history, was able to throw 7 pitches over 90mph while using a curveball.
Jimmy Gobble’s fastball was averaging 90mph as well. Gobble has been pitching in the majors/minors for 9 years. Pena hasn’t pitched in an organized game (and who has a very casual pitching motion). And their fastballs were the same speed.
don’t read too much into Pena’s success, I’m sure the Tiger lineup was a little tired after feasting on Gobble in the 8th and less than motivated except to get to the clubhouse.
“don’t read too much into Pena’s success, I’m sure the Tiger lineup was a little tired after feasting on Gobble in the 8th and less than motivated except to get to the clubhouse.”
Yeah, because we all know that a tired Tigers line-up is the ONLY reason Pena threw 90MPH with life and a nice curve to go along with it. Pffft.
Holy crap. Just watched TPJr.’s 9th inning. This is going to be a great story. He’s got a MUCH greater chance to stick as a reliever than as a SS. Send him back down to get some innings!
The diagnosis that someone is “thinking too much out there” makes me want to take a flamethrower to random buildings. If Banny started chasing butterflies across the infield or walked over to first to talk to Gload about his homerun trot, then I’d say he was thinking more than pitching. Of course, since Banny throws pitches at all the appropriate times and even backs up bases, I’d say he’s got the amount of thought thing figured out. Does Maddux think too much?
Someone needs to tell Banny to “Don’t think Meat”
The Red Sox had considered using Dave McCarthey (McCartney?) as a 1B/OF/mop-up pitcher. I thought it was a great idea. I don’t understand why there aren’t more guys who can come in and get three outs in the 9th inning of a blowout. I’m talking, like, 6 times a year.
I liked how Pena looked like a dog with his tail between his legs for the first batter. He got that high chopper, made a great play on it, and his confidence soared. His whole pitching motion changed, it was great. Then he struck out Ivan and he got a little too confident, and almost left a pitch over the plate for Renteria. All in all, good appearance and it’s too bad he’s out of options to send down, after this I would think someone would try to claim him.
Joe, I still haven’t forgiven Ed Farmer. Do you remember, I think it was the 79 season, when Ed single-handedly derailed another division title for the Royals? He hit Al Cowens, and somebody else (I wanna say Frank White?) in the same game, and BOTH guys were hurt and out for a long time, thus swinging the race to the Angels. In fact, I think he hit Cowens in the face, and Al was never the same again.
That 9th inning was one of the highlights of this season. I’m talking league-wide. I couldn’t wait to read reaction on this blog this morning.
My question is, can Jimmy Gobble play short? Seriously, just for one batter?
Can you see situations with Gobble pitching where you would bring in Pena to face a righty, moving Gobble to SS, and then bring Gobble back to the mound to face a subsequent lefty?
The Pirates memorably did something like this in 1979, sending Kent Tekulve to left field for one batter. Bobby Cox has done it too.
Those are NL rules of course. Not sure how the DH would be impacted by those kind of shenanigans.
No radio broadcast can be more oversold than the Yanks on WCBS. It’s not logistically possible.
My personal favorite (this is real):
“That pop-up to end the top of the third was the fifteenth out of the game….and a fifteen minute call could save you 15% or more on car insurance!”
Adding to the list of games of pitchers playing in the field, on July 22, 1986, the Mets for a few innings alternated between using Jesse Orosco and Roger McDowell, with Mookie Wilson playing wherever one of the pitchers wasn’t.
And since this sort of involves repeated position switching… only May 2 and 5, 1988, Cecil Fielder played second base and third base, swapping positions with Kelly Gruber every few batters. The experiment ended when this happened:
FIELDER CHANGED POSITIONS (PLAYING
2B); GRUBER CHANGED POSITIONS (PLAYING 3B); Lansford singled to
third [Gallego to second]; Canseco doubled to second [Gallego
scored, Lansford scored]
Mikey, the DH wouldn’t be affected if the Royals switched Pena and Gobble for a hitter. It would only be affected if the Royals put their DH in the field–then they would lose the DH and the pitcher would have to bat (or be pinch-hit for).
I just hope the Royals never have a game situation with Pena and Gobble in at the same time…
As I’m sure some of you have read already, Sam Mellinger, in his BallStar blog today points out that:
“TPJ’s OPS would be…28th among National League pitchers with 30 or more plate appearances.”
Awesome.
If Pena becomes the set-up man for Soria, Pena could move to shortstop for the ninth inning …. ‘course then I think they’d lose the DH.
Joe,
I am a little surprised with you on this one. You like managers having a hands off approach and playing hunches with relievers? Then you go on to explain several different disasterous hunches played by Hillman this year. I also thought that without your developing “statistical” background would lead you the other direction. If a manager just plays hunches and ignores the stats it’s kind of like hitting on 16 in blackjack no matter what. you’ll win some, you’ll lose some and in the end the odds (and statistical evidence) are probably against you when you do something different every time.
Mike Williams:
May 8, 1979. Farmer nailed White with the first pitch of the game. Frank missed 33 games, Cowens 21. Just horrible. The worst part? He still didn’t even get ejected after taking Cowens out; two batters later he threw a wild pitch, and Pat Corrales finally yanked him for Jim Kern.
Royals went 13-9 without Cowens; 18-16 without Frank.
http://drivelinemechanics.com/2008/07/22/is-tony-pena-jr-the-next-rafael-betancourt/
Joe, unfortunately I think you may be seeing the world through Banny-colored glasses. Among the 59 AL pitchers with 80+ IP, Banny is 56th in ERA (5.49) and 44th in OPS against (.776, which means that his overall body of work is turning every batter he faces into Adrian Beltre). An ERA+ of 73 doesn’t help either.
There are only so many excuses that one can come up with before coming to the conclusion that he’s just not that good.
Good call Jon Morse.
And good stats! I still remember Cowens returning to the team with a clear plastic shield guarding his jaw for the rest of the season (couple that with the big ‘fro and the glasses, and he was an unusual looking guy on the baseball field that season). I think it was the same season that Gary Roenicke had the half-quarterback-facemask (think of Jim Plunkett’s old facemask, then cut it so that it only covers one side of his face) guard on his batting helmet protecting his jaw. It (a ball player with a broken jaw) seemed to be too rare a problem to have two completely different solutions.
My favorite involving a non-pitcher pitching…
1988 – the 19 inning Atlanta-St.Louis game.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/SLN/SLN198805140.shtml
Jose Oquendo pitched 4 innings and took the loss, giving up 2 in the top of the 19th.
Jose DeLeon played 4 innings in the OF, swapping between RF and LF with Tom Brunansky 11 times over those innings.
DeLeon’s box score read:
J DeLeon LF-RF-LF-RF-LF-RF-LF-RF-LF-RF-LF-RF
Regarding Gobble, I don’t deny for a second that Hillman has misused him to the point of heresy. With that said, he is just plain not good enough against righties as they are hitting like the ‘41 version of Ted Williams on a hot streak. The big difference between this year and previous years and why he should be released/traded is that we have other lefties in the bullpen who are fully capable of getting lefties out. The difference with those lefties (H. Ramirez and Mahay) is that they can also get righties out with a similar amount of success. We are no longer in a situation where we are pressed to find simply one lefty for the bullpen as we have been in the past.
The problem with all this is that they have now put him on the DL for reasons that I question which has prevented him from being traded by the deadline if I’m not mistaken. I believe that he was placed on the DL to enable us to retrieve Peralta who we had just sent down. It appears that the Royals have totally given up on Neal Musser as they refuse to use him.
With Pena, I’m going to assume that we can put him on waivers and when he clears them, we can then put him down on the farm and turn him into a pitcher. He’ll never be a major league ball player except for the Royals. Normally, I would laugh at this idea and all the excitement being shown over his night on the mound but he showed somethings that you just don’t see normally. Some position players have a neat little curve they throw or get a little movement on their fastball but I don’t think I’ve ever seen one who gets a good breaking pitch, a fastball with movement, and does it all while throwing that fastball in the 90s.
Facing the first batter, he looked like he was just sort of tossing it up there and you could see it in his velocity which was only about 88mph then. After that first play off the mound, he started using more of a windup it appeared and his velocity increased by 3-4mph.
I was saying get rid of him a couple of months ago. Now we have to get him to the minors to see what he can do. My only worry is that we are able to do that without another team moving in as he is out of options. It is clear that his value as a position player is non-existent and that the Royals believe this themselves. Other than 3 games he played in at the beginning of July when Aviles looked like he was cooling off drastically, he has played in two games since June 25. Those two games were a 9-1 win and a 19-4 loss. We have played in three one run wins that he did not play in at all. We have played three other games that were save situations and he did not play in those either. Therefore, it appears that the Royals feel he isn’t even worth his value as a defensive replacement.
“Well, Hillman — and I think this is often to his credit — does not get as caught up in righty-lefty match-ups as most other managers.”
The problem with most managers doing this is that they just go “Lefty batter, so I need a lefty pitcher” then grab their lefty pitcher, even if he’s the kind of pitcher who allows a .900 OPS against lefties.
If managers would just take FIVE SECONDS PER PLAYER to study their statistics, and realize, “hey, Pitcher A is significantly better against lefties over a significant sample size, so I need to use him against lefties!” then we’d all be perfectly happy about “playing the matchups.”
Trey Hillman doesn’t do this, but he apparently doesn’t have ANY system at all. I think he just brings out the guy whose name he remembers at that point.
(which, by itself, is still a better system than what Dusty Baker runs, which is “make shit up to justify my idiot moves.”)
I was at the game in Chicago on Sunday. The scoreboard was messing up balls & strikes all day. We were playing “this pitch,” and the hungover scoreboard operator was definitely screwing with our game.
Ed Farmer surely does blow at his job, but this wasn’t his fault.
*If someone calls “this pitch” when the scoreboard says 2-1, but it’s actually 3-0 and the hitter is taking all the way…do you get your “this pitch” call back for that inning?
‘Jimmy Gobble’s fastball was averaging 90mph as well. Gobble has been pitching in the majors/minors for 9 years. Pena hasn’t pitched in an organized game (and who has a very casual pitching motion). And their fastballs were the same speed.’
You have to remember that Pena is five times a better athelite than Gobble. Saying that Pena is the best fielding pitcher is baseball is not a streach.