Chances Dusty attributes the bullpen implosion on Diaz and will never use him to be a late inning offensive replacement ever again...?
Lower than the chances that people make up weird fantasies in their head to feed their needs to hate Dusty.
McTaggert: When asked about Yainer Diaz's lack of playing time, Baker said, "You've got to field the best team for that daily basis. Plus, Maldy, I mean, these guys love throwing to Maldy. That's the most important combination that there is on the field, your catcher and your pitcher."
Agreed completely. He’s not at all a strategic nor tactical thinker, but people love him, and they play hard for him, and there’s not any bullshit that seems to be any issue. Everyone rows in the same direction, which is pretty much #1 job of a skipper.
Maybe so but how does he explain foregoing the set up man and closer? After a great rookie performance he pulled his starter an inning too early. When it was time to put the game away he put in his two coldest relievers and left them in long enough to let the game get out of hand. This loss is entirely on Dusty. No excuses. The bullpen was mismanaged plain and simple.
As opposed to literally making up scenarios of things that haven't happened just to complain about Dusty?
Trying hard not to be a pure Dusty apologist but boy I think some people here are just really hard on the guy. If players are not in the Dusty dog house, he likes to push peoples’ limits and see what he gets. (E.g. Chas playing righties so much last year). I get y’all wanting to put in the sure bets and bank the win. It’s far enough into the season where banking wins is a consideration. One could argue putting in two cold relievers into a higher leverage spot is giving them an opportunity to show they deserve higher leverage opportunities. That sort of trust in your players isn’t a small thing. The gambit failed and Dusty takes all the blame. Not unfairly either. But say they had come in and shut down the M’s, I don’t get the sense y’all would be running to say “good thing dusty saved some wear and tear on Abreu/Pressly’s arms” or “now we’ve got more options in the late innings”. think we’re all just frustrated the stros gave up a winnable game.
I’m frustrated he has a below average hitter at leadoff, a disaster of a catcher at 75% playing time and the titanic in the cleanup spot. All that **** is suboptimal and slightly lessens our chances of winning. All that said the lineup just isn’t good enough and we don’t have enough pieces/what we do have isn’t performing well enough at the moment. That should get rectified offensively in a big way shortly (next month or so). Pitching needs to hold on. I don’t believe Dusty manages the staff so whatever happened Saturday night isn’t likely his fault. I don’t generally blame managers for stuff like that because we as fans just don’t know who tells him “my arm isn’t great right now” or the like during a 162 game season. There’s just too much information we don’t know. but, the decisions at the beginning of the game are where you have a chance to lay out everything mathematically correctly and to not do that right is aggravating, even though it’s not as impactful as people think. not as impactful as people think also doesn’t mean meaningless, so that’s where my frustration is. I’d rather Dusty every day than a guy like Valentine or Collins that players don’t like. id rather AJ Hinch than Dusty.
Dusty's skill is essentially replicating the ability in making sure Jeff Kent and Barry Bonds didn't have a daily brawl. The front office has done a good job during the Crane era to limit the malcontents from being on the roster with a few exceptions eg CarGo, Fiers, etc.
Have you ever seen a human inside of an orbit costume look at you, turn around and watch what just happened, look back at you and shrug shoulders and frown?
Would it take sloppy play behind the plate? Passed balls? Poor frame rate? What if Maldy only got 15 hits every 100 at bats?
He already is getting on only 17 or 18 hits every 100 at bats, so that's not it. I assume they'll stop starting Maldy when the pitchers stop asking to play with Maldy.
From objective stats: Diaz has been better at blocking balls. Framing has been really bad for both. Diaz has been even better than Maldy at controlling the running game as much as a catcher can. Maybe Maldy would get replaced by Diaz if he started batting less than 0.100 and/or DIaz starts hitting. I think it is going to take a catcher to be available at the trade deadline for Maldy to be replaced. Even then, Dusty will probably protest again. Not sure if Crane will side with him 2 years in a row over 2 different GMs if there is a catcher avaialble. More likely than not, Maldy is replaced in the offseason (or kept solely as a backup). Not sure if it will be internal or external.
I'm pretty sure he is going to. He has caught a lot of innings and he knows he is no longer a spring chicken. He also knows he can basically name his own position and salary in the Astros front office or development organization. Lets send he and Dusty off with back to back rings !!
