I think the easiest way to discredit the Pujols theory is the simple fact that he started sucking about a week before the Pujols HR. That was just the tipping point - but he started struggling before that.
Are you? Whether you are or not, they are more qualified than both of us combined (several times over) because they: Have actually played competitive baseball at a high level Work with the guy day in and day out, knowing his habits, his general disposition, his work ethic, etc. Know the difference between a guy who's lost it mentally and a guy who's embroiled in a slump, even an extended one I can't believe you even asked that. Holy crap. Do you think so? I kinda liked Wallace. Lidge had his best sucess under different coaches; some guys respond differently to other guys; there are those who believe the pitching coach doesn't make much difference at all. The point was that mechanics are an issue *every* pitcher deals with. Many pitchers watch video on their own and draw their own conclusions, some with some success (Mr. Oswalt, if I remember correctly, being a good example). But forget everything I just said, because "mechanics are mental".
okay, i admit that was arrogant, but still, I don't think they are qualified to just dismiss the mental aspect
the era two games before the pujols disaster 1.29, the era the game after 1.13, then bam pujols, he had three saves in the three prior outings.
The season-long ERA is your argument? Dude had two or three terrible outings the last week of the season, and one shaky one (IIRC) in the Braves series.
his era was 1.13 before pujols, his season era was consistently around 2.3, go look up the stats yourself. his era at the end of August and Sept was lower than at the end of may and june, and july. go look up the stats yourself
I remember incorrectly. He had one blown save the last week of the season, was solid in the Braves series, and gave up one run prior to Game 5 in the Cardinals series. There seemed to be however, quite a few more baserunners as I looked at old box scores. The month-by-month WHIP numbers would interest me very much.
Going into the STL series, he had been utterly unhittable against them in his career - something like 1 hit in 10-15 innings. In the two games before the Pujols bomb, he gave up a run in one of them and then was only saved from a blown save by the miracle "no one else could have done that" double play. He had already gotten shaky and allowed multiple baserunners in each of those games. Then the Pujols game happened - there, the problem wasn't the HR so much as it was the 2 baserunners he allowed before that. For three straight games, he had struggled and it culminated with the Pujols HR.
his outing before he didn't give up any er or runs. he gave up one run on one hit the outing before. if you want to say he wasn't completely dominant like the previous games, well that's statically true. he gave up a few hits and walks against atl
I have no opinion on what caused lidge's problems, but while he didn't give up a run or blow the save in game 4 he was extremely lucky to get out of that game before blowing the save. he was bailed out by brunlett and everett.
He didn't look nearly as dominant either. In the game immediately before the Pujols game, he had men on 1st and 3rd with 1 out and got a miracle double play that even the announcers were stunned by. He basically got lucky not to get a blown save in that game. And in the game before, he gave up his first run ever against STL. And in the Pujols game, he put two men on base before the HR. He started showing the signs that his "unhittableness" was gone before the Pujols HR - that was the most visible single part of it, but you could see before then that something had changed.
Thanks for these. I had the impression that he just hadn't been as good, but obviously what I remembered was completely incorrect. As far as the constant talk of ERA, I think ERA is even more dependent upon the defense than WHIP (although WHIP depends on defense to a lesser extent). For instance, if you walk two, but your catcher throws one out stealing and your SS bails you out with a great play, you get away with some bad pitching. WHIP shows it, ERA does not. As such I like to look at WHIP for relievers more so than ERA.
the only argument that i personally accept for brad lidge's troubles other than mental is that he wasn't that good to begin with. he had one dominant year, one good year.
Adam Everett is batting .189, but I'm sure his fielding is helping the Twins win games. Sure, our current SS is batting .332 and has scored 43 runs, but he only has a .978 fielding percentage and has 5 errors (less than 1 every 10 games) so the people who said Everett makes up for his average in the field and the Astros would be doomed without him were clearly right. I, for one, am happy for Brad Lidge. Despite the "fans" turning on him, blaming him for all the Astros problems and treating him like the scum of the earth the last few years, he always handled himself with class.
Who ever said this? Everyone said if you can get a Tejada or Hanley Ramirez or Jose Reyes (even with bad defense) or whatever, that you do that without question. People were b****ing about benching Everett for *Eric Bruntlett* or *Chris Burke*, which were the options that we had at the time. It would have been stupid to bench him for those types of players.
