Re: Giles, I'd be interested to see the stats for "closers" brought in to start an inning in tied games. It *seems* to me that they almost invariable suck massive donkey balls, such that I'm bewildered whenever a manager does it. But, that's just how it *seems*. The Astros are like mega-stats-gurus, slide rules being standard issue and all, so I imagine they've looked into it and there's no such thing. But I'm curious anyway.
The spike in his K-rate is hard to ignore. His velocity is up 2 MPH, his LD% is down, and his GB rate is the highest it's ever been. All of the numbers say his results are legit. But unfortunately you never know how people respond to different situations. How they deal with pressure, how they deal with frequent usage etc. I'm of the opinion that McHugh should be one of our top relief arms right now. I think you can always send him back to his old role if it doesn't work, but he seems to have more potential value in this role than as basically a break glass in case of emergency starter that won't even make the playoff roster. For that matter him and Peacock have both been great in the pen.
Nope. That said, he's still in the top 10 in sweeping action on his slider, but still seems to be the bottom man on the relief totem poll.
His usage has been a little odd this season. He’s been extremely effective, but has been deployed mostly in single inning low leverage situations. I suspect that’s a product of outside circumstances (other relievers in established roles, need to keep him available in case of an injury in the rotation) rather than a lack of confidence in his abilities. He’s not going to be an all-star, but he’s certainly a valuable player.
Yeah, I don't understand why he has no trade value to speak of, when you consider the fact that he was easily a top 60 or so SP for 2 or 3 years, and was healthy after coming back last year, but I imagine if the Astros could have gotten a return for him this winter they would have. Now, with DK moving on Morton possible to join him it makes more sense to just kind of keep him on the shelf there waiting for an in case of emergency situation this year- or more likely as the swing guy or 5th starter next year- depending upon if Morton comes back or not. I thought he was going to be used as a more traditional long man that pitches 4 or 5 innings when a starter gets got or a guy that starts the 10th inning and the team says- get to it- you are it, but by and large that's not what he's done and he hasn't been a leverage guy at all, but does seem to be sneaking into some situations lately.
You could make a good case for McHugh, Rondon and Devo being All-Stars right now. They typically only take closers and set up men though, so McHugh won't get picked despite his raw numbers saying he would be deserving at the moment.
This is not exactly what you want, but, regardless here's the career stats for some closers pitching in tie games vs their career OPS allowed: Jansen: .485 / .506 T. Hoffman: .656 / .609 Wagner: .540 / .558 Kimbrell: .554 / .482 K. Herrera: .674 / .635 M. Rivera: .655 / .555 A. Chapman: .457 / .497 J. Soria: .656 / .618 Of course not all these guys were closers their entire career and about 58 other caveats, but I saw your post and though I'd spend 5 minutes looking up something. Basically I don't know any more than I did 5 minutes ago.
This is awesome! Thanks. It does seemingly lean towards my impressions being not grounded in statistical reality.
Devenski more likely as an All Star. I don't understand the lack of Correa Votes, he has impressive numbers
Probably the lack of Correa votes has something to do with the fact that there is no way in hell that he's had the best first half of the season amongst AL shortstops. I mean, if I was betting on a reason, that'd be it. Long term I love Correa. I love Correa's talent. Lindor has been better than him so far. So has the Angels guy factoring in defense (but he's been hurt so I'd probably ding him) and about 4 or 5 other guys are putting up similar type season to him at AL SS. And, isn't he in 2nd? Which is just about the highest you could possibly argue him to be with a straight face?
