Sciossia (sp?) pitching to Votto....

[Sea Ray]

As a Reds fan, I want Votto up there in that situation vs Downs or anyone this side of Aroldis Chapman. The previous night I wanted Votto up there instead of Heisey and Jay Bruce instead of bunting Brandon Phillips.

[smixsell]

Exactly, many forget that the pitcher is just as competitive as the batter, the other team is just as competitive as your team. It's not always chess, sometimes it's two goats running at each other full speed to see who prevails.

No it IS always chess.

Unfortunately if you don't understand the strategic/tactical "chess" aspect of the game, you've got nothing left but the "two goats" strategy.

[westofyou]

No it IS always chess.

Unfortunately if you don't understand the strategic/tactical "chess" aspect of the game, you've got nothing left but the "two goats" strategy.

If you say so

[PuffyPig]

I would have walked Votto but I understand why Sciossa didn't. Lefty/lefty matchup with Phillips on deck.

I would have had a righty in the bullpen warming up, and faced BP instead, the double play king.

So, you would have essentially used 3 pitchers in the 9th (no way you let Bruce face a RH pitcher) for a game you were hoping you could get into extra's?

I'm not sure many managers would have burned through their bullpen quite that quickly.

Down is as good vs. LH batters as any pitcher in baseball. Most managers would have certainly left him in their to (potentially) face Bruce.

To me the question was whether to pitch to Votto or Bruce. But I wouldn't have planned on using 3 pitchers.

[PuffyPig]

Lets reverse it, if you're the Reds, who do you want facing Downs?

Votto or Phillips?

Dusty chose Phillips. Mikey chose Votto.

They both chose incorrectly.

Actually, Dustly left the choice up to Mikey. He didn't choose either.

[Brisco]

No it IS always chess.

Unfortunately if you don't understand the strategic/tactical "chess" aspect of the game, you've got nothing left but the "two goats" strategy.

I totally disagree. In chess the outcome of a given matchup between pieces is 100 percent certain. If two pieces occupy the same square, the moving piece takes the non moving piece. That is chess. Even the most diehard statistician in the world would not claim that baseball management is chess.

In the real world the variables are always infinite. Therefore there is no such thing as certainty, only differing levels of probability.

That said, looking purely statistically, taking into account the back of both the pitchers and the hitters baseball cards, I think both managers made the right decision.

Downs was a phenomenon last year. He gave up a total of 16 hits to left handed batters all of last year and a double was the only extra base hit. Also, the argument that Joey is just so good does not help unless you think he is two or three levels of goodness better than the very best left handed hitters in the AL.

The top ten left handed batters in the AL went a combined 2 for 19 against Downs last year. 2 for fricking 19 and these were the best left handed hitters in the American league. If Joey is twice as good as those guys against Downs, he is still only barely beating the Medoza line. Sluggers like Bruce were totally helpless against him. ( side note, oddly, Downs never faced Choo last year)

So, based on that, Scoscia has to love the idea of Downs vs Bruce and feel pretty darn good about Downs v. Votto. Downs v. Phillips? Not so much. If he walks Votto, he has to replace Downs with a RHP and he totally loses the Downs v Bruce automatic out. Btw, Downs vs LHB was n anomaly for the Angels last year... Their bullpen was a weakness.

Pitching to Votto, even if we say he is twice as good as the top ten AL left handed hitters, still means that there is only a 1 in 5 chance he gets a hit... followed by a walk to Phillips and then all that is left is about a 1 in 15 chance for Bruce,if that. Walk Votto and BP has about a 1 in 4 chance to come through and Bruce would then face a righty and also be about 1 in 4. Yes, there is a 1 in 35 chance BP does a DP, but that is no where near enough to close the delta in the two probabilities.

Joey showed it wasn't Chess though... He should not have gotten a hit... But he did.

[blumj]

Stupid human trick to help remember how to spell LAA MGR's name: split in half, it's the same other than swapping the o for the a, scio+scia.

[Sea Ray]

If you say so

You know, it's posts like this that make me wish for another box next to the "like" one...

A box that says "worthless"

Have some substance before wasting bandwidth please

[Tom Servo]

You know, it's posts like this that make me wish for another box next to the "like" one...

A box that says "worthless"

Have some substance before wasting bandwidth please

yeah woy stop using up all the internet

[westofyou]

You know, it's posts like this that make me wish for another box next to the "like" one...

A box that says "worthless"

Have some substance before wasting bandwidth please

When you are a moderator I'll care what you think about my posts until then you are just wasting all of our time with your opinion on my opinion

[Sea Ray]

When you are a moderator I'll care what you think about my posts until then you are just wasting all of our time with your opinion on my opinion

That's just it. You didn't even bother to state an opinion.

[smixsell]

I totally disagree. In chess the outcome of a given matchup between pieces is 100 percent certain. If two pieces occupy the same square, the moving piece takes the non moving piece. That is chess. Even the most diehard statistician in the world would not claim that baseball management is chess.

In the real world the variables are always infinite. Therefore there is no such thing as certainty, only differing levels of probability.

That said, looking purely statistically, taking into account the back of both the pitchers and the hitters baseball cards, I think both managers made the right decision.

Downs was a phenomenon last year. He gave up a total of 16 hits to left handed batters all of last year and a double was the only extra base hit. Also, the argument that Joey is just so good does not help unless you think he is two or three levels of goodness better than the very best left handed hitters in the AL.

The top ten left handed batters in the AL went a combined 2 for 19 against Downs last year. 2 for fricking 19 and these were the best left handed hitters in the American league. If Joey is twice as good as those guys against Downs, he is still only barely beating the Medoza line. Sluggers like Bruce were totally helpless against him. ( side note, oddly, Downs never faced Choo last year)

So, based on that, Scoscia has to love the idea of Downs vs Bruce and feel pretty darn good about Downs v. Votto. Downs v. Phillips? Not so much. If he walks Votto, he has to replace Downs with a RHP and he totally loses the Downs v Bruce automatic out. Btw, Downs vs LHB was n anomaly for the Angels last year... Their bullpen was a weakness.

Pitching to Votto, even if we say he is twice as good as the top ten AL left handed hitters, still means that there is only a 1 in 5 chance he gets a hit... followed by a walk to Phillips and then all that is left is about a 1 in 15 chance for Bruce,if that. Walk Votto and BP has about a 1 in 4 chance to come through and Bruce would then face a righty and also be about 1 in 4. Yes, there is a 1 in 35 chance BP does a DP, but that is no where near enough to close the delta in the two probabilities.

Joey showed it wasn't Chess though... He should not have gotten a hit... But he did.

As usual there are some who don't even understand the comment/quip.

And no, I won't explain the comment and document it with advanced stats.

If you don't get the quip, I ain't explaining it.

[Raisor]

yeah woy stop using up all the internet

is that why my connection is so slow?

[Sea Ray]

I totally disagree. In chess the outcome of a given matchup between pieces is 100 percent certain. If two pieces occupy the same square, the moving piece takes the non moving piece. That is chess. Even the most diehard statistician in the world would not claim that baseball management is chess.

In the real world the variables are always infinite. Therefore there is no such thing as certainty, only differing levels of probability.

That said, looking purely statistically, taking into account the back of both the pitchers and the hitters baseball cards, I think both managers made the right decision.

Downs was a phenomenon last year. He gave up a total of 16 hits to left handed batters all of last year and a double was the only extra base hit. Also, the argument that Joey is just so good does not help unless you think he is two or three levels of goodness better than the very best left handed hitters in the AL.

The top ten left handed batters in the AL went a combined 2 for 19 against Downs last year. 2 for fricking 19 and these were the best left handed hitters in the American league. If Joey is twice as good as those guys against Downs, he is still only barely beating the Medoza line. Sluggers like Bruce were totally helpless against him. ( side note, oddly, Downs never faced Choo last year)

So, based on that, Scoscia has to love the idea of Downs vs Bruce and feel pretty darn good about Downs v. Votto. Downs v. Phillips? Not so much. If he walks Votto, he has to replace Downs with a RHP and he totally loses the Downs v Bruce automatic out. Btw, Downs vs LHB was n anomaly for the Angels last year... Their bullpen was a weakness.

Pitching to Votto, even if we say he is twice as good as the top ten AL left handed hitters, still means that there is only a 1 in 5 chance he gets a hit... followed by a walk to Phillips and then all that is left is about a 1 in 15 chance for Bruce,if that. Walk Votto and BP has about a 1 in 4 chance to come through and Bruce would then face a righty and also be about 1 in 4. Yes, there is a 1 in 35 chance BP does a DP, but that is no where near enough to close the delta in the two probabilities.

Joey showed it wasn't Chess though... He should not have gotten a hit... But he did.

Stats are funny things. They can be manipulated to show whatever you'd like. If the top ten LHBs went 2 for 19 against Downs then the rest of the LHBs hit .215 against him. If you're willing to consider that Votto is 2x better than the top 10 in the AL then let's say he's 3x better than the rest of them. So that'd mean that he's a .600 hitter against Downs...

Or we might notice that his BABip vs LHBs last year was 65 pts lower than vs RHBs so he must have been "lucky" vs LHBs...

[PuffyPig]

I totally disagree. In chess the outcome of a given matchup between pieces is 100 percent certain. If two pieces occupy the same square, the moving piece takes the non moving piece. That is chess. Even the most diehard statistician in the world would not claim that baseball management is chess.

The reference to chess is that in baseball (like chess) you need to think 2 and 3 and 4 moves ahead.

Walking Votto and bringing in the RH pitcher to face Phillips means the manager would have had to have the RH pitcher warming up when Choo was at bat.

Walking Votto and bringing in the RH pitcher to face Philips means you need to bring in a LH pitcher to face Bruce otherwise you've lost the advantage of bringing in the RH to face Phillips.

That's why it is similar to chess.

At the end of the day, I think the Angels' manager decided to go with one pitcher in the 9th, and not play the matchups. His choice was defensible, even if you don't agree with it.