The Future of Starters

Jayson Stark speaks with a number of general managers about the game moving toward the Rays version of a rotation, using good starters and some openers. Stark’s big worry is that one will lose the marquee match-ups:

Let’s say this again. For 100 years, the first question everyone asked on the way to a ballpark was always: “Who’s pitching tonight?”

But suppose the answer in 2038 is: “Everybody,” or “Who the heck knows?” Would some of those people then just change their minds and stay home and binge a little Netflix?

I like the Rays answer to this question:

Heck, they don’t even accept our master premise, that a team without true “starters” is less interesting or entertaining.

“You have fans coming to the game saying, ‘Really? Sergio Romo is starting a game? What is this?’” Silverman says. “I think it’s kind of interesting. I think it actually adds some intrigue. And every opponent that we’re playing – their TV and radio guys are spending [a lot of time] talking about it. It’s something new that’s part of the conversation of baseball.”

Rotations have come and gone and come again. Look at the 1956 Yankees, for example. This was a World Series Championship team, and they only used two pitchers nearly exclusively as starters, Whitey Ford and Johnny Kucks. All the other starters listed as the top five made a significant number of relief appearances, and a number of listed relievers made a significant number of starts. The difference then was that when a reliever started, he was expected to be in the game as long as possible. If we saw that many relievers making a significant number of starts today, it would probably be due to injuries.

The reason that kind of rotation management stopped was that pitchers didn’t like it. They want to know when they are pitching, and what part of the game they are pitching. That’s why closers don’t want to enter in the middle of the eighth inning, it throws off their preparation.

The Rays don’t appear to be doing this randomly, they got their pitchers to get on board, and I suspect everyone knows exactly how to prepare. If Casey Stengel had this idea, those Yankees teams might have even been better.

from baseballmusings.com https://ift.tt/2Mt3Nmc