Well no **** dude. That’s all stuff that’s outside of our control that you are talking about. I’m literally talking about not doing bonehead **** that unnecessarily decreases our chances of winning that’s directly within our control. It’s not a magic bullet any of what I said. It’s 3/10’s of a percentage point here and there that you shouldn’t piss away for no damn reason when you know the mathematical answer. I’m not at all contending that getting rid of suboptimal strategy will guarantee a World Series win. I’m saying you get rid of that strategy to give yourself an incrementally greater chance of winning. And the point of not having Smith or Maton or a Dubon on the roster should be obvious- it’s to make sure Dusty can’t use them in any kind of leverage situation because it’s a bad idea. Don’t have buy in from the field staff? Better take away their ability to do stupid stuff then.
That’s why he shouldn’t be on the roster. I would literally rather roster 22 guys than risk Maton, Smith or Dubon get play.
Besides be the 13th or 14th best pitcher in the org in a situation where you shouldn’t really go more than about 9 deep? Nothing I guess.
Limited to throwing lefthanded mostly to LHBs while the likely opponents in the postseason crush LHPs. Edit: Caveat - I've not seen Rays or Yankees too much lately so there is a chance these teams can be exploited by a loogy, but generally speaking the better AL teams don't have a combo like Alvarez and Tucker who just absolutely destroy RHPs.
Give up RUNS in 4 of his first 7 games and base runners in 12 of his first 14 games. All in 1 inning or less. Since then, he's been good. I haven't heard anything about fixing a flaw or healing from an injury, so I assume it's normal deviation in results. ie - streaks.
I mean, he did perfectly fine in the playoffs the last 2 seasons despite being cripplingly left handed
I understand some do not even consider the past season performance when they played well in the playoffs even 7 or 8 years ago like they are stepping out of a time machine. It's always been a key point when discussing Springer and Correa or even earlier with Jackson.
He didn't pitch here in the postseason the last two years (post I was responding to stated "here") and for most of his career, Will Smith has been able to pitch well against RHBs until this season. This year, Will Smith has sucked against RHBs whether an Astro or not. The Astros mojo for fixing Smith has been to limit the amount of good RHBs he faces. As an Astro, the average RHB Smith has faced (usually not a heart of the order guy) has performed like a Top 5 hitter in baseball.
In path to winning situations? Nearly 100% of them. You don’t win every game in the playoffs and occasionally have to waive a white flag, which is the point of having Garcia on the roster. But, the path to winning a competitive game for the Astros should rely solely on these guys: JV, Framber, LMJ, Javier, Presley, Montero, Neris, Stanek and Abreu. Urquidy is used in the wonky ALCS if it goes 7 and you have to use a 5th starter because of no off day. You simply cannot craft a path to winning a contested game, especially in light of the 3 inning minimum batter rule, where it makes logical sense to bring Smith in as the best option. If you need to go deeper than those 9 guys (10 in the ALCS if it goes long enough) in a competitive game where some length is required Hunter Brown should be the guy. I don’t care if Martinez is on the roster bc Dusty won’t use him in the wrong situation. He might use Smith and if he gets stuck in a game against a RHH it’s a disaster.
I'm not going to bother looking beyond last year or even beyond the World Series last year, but in the 4 games the Braves won last year in the World Series, they used: Fried Matzak Smith Dee Wright Martin Jackson Anderson Minter Morton So we're at 10 pitchers in 4 games. That doesn't include any pitchers in their 7 other postseason wins or 5 postseason losses. I suspect if you look beyond last year, you'll see the same with most every other World Series winner.
They had a guy go down after 1 inning with an injury and another guy they used as an opener. There are things like 25 inning games. I’m literally not advocating for only carrying 9 pitchers, I’m saying don’t pitch your 13th best dude in the organization in a contested game unless all sorts of other **** goes pear shaped.
