After Indians starter Corey Kluber pitched eight strong innings today in which he allowed only one run on three hits, and 13 strikeouts, Indians manager Terry Francona did what nearly every manager in baseball would have done. With the score Indians 3, White Sox 1, Francona gave the ball to closer John Axford at the top of the ninth inning. And why not? That’s what your closer is for, after all, and Axford entered today’s game with a league-leading nine saves. Cue Rush’s “Working Man” over the PA, hand the ball to your closer, and hope for the best. Usually it works.
It didn’t work today. Axford walked his first batter, Gordon Beckham, on four straight pitches. After two more balls to the next batter, Jose Abreu (whose first-inning homer accounted for the White Sox’ only run up to this point), Axford got Abreu to strike out. With a full count on the next batter, Adam Dunn, Axford’s sixth pitch looked good from the vantage point of my living room couch, but instead of ringing Dunn up, umpire Pat Hoberg called it ball four. The next batter, Dayan Viciedo, belted a 2-2 pitch over the right field fence for a three-run homer, giving the White Sox a 4-3 lead, and erasing the great job Kluber had done.
With two out in the bottom of the ninth, Lonnie Chisenhall singled, then advanced to second base on a passed ball. But there he remained, as Asdrubal Cabrera (and is there anyone on the team who you least wanted to see come to the plate in this situation? I can’t think of anyone) struck out swinging to end the game.
I guess the charitable way of looking at today’s game would be to say oh, well, two out of three ain’t bad. The Indians won the three-game series, and isn’t that what counts? And when your team is doing well, I guess you can look at it that way. But when your team is dead last in the division, and needs every win it can get, it’s not easy to take the charitable point of view. Gosh darn it to heck, the Indians should have won this game. They needed to win this game.
I’m not saying Kluber should have pitched the ninth. He’d already thrown 110 pitches. But as several commenters in today’s open thread post pointed out, the notion that in a save situation, you automatically go to The Guy Who Is Your Closer has increasingly led managers astray by failing to consider alternative ways of dealing with the ninth inning.
What if a manager were to tell his bullpen that yes, in a save situation, the ball would be given to The Guy Who Is Your Closer, but if that closer showed clear signs of not having his best stuff that day—for instance, walking two of the first three batters he faces, including throwing six consecutive balls to start the inning—then he, the manager, would have no qualms about removing the closer from the game before things got out of control? Yeah, the closer wouldn’t like that, because no one wants to be taken out of a close game, but winning the game is more important than the feelings of your players. If he doesn’t want to come out of the game, then maybe he shouldn’t have, I don’t know, walked two of the first three batters he faced.
I realize this is armchair managing at its finest, and that it’s easy for a guy who works at a library, and who hasn’t played organized baseball since he was about ten years old, to think he has all the answers. But isn’t something like this worth trying, if only for a few weeks? It’s just so frustrating to see a winnable game turn into a loss because one player just didn’t have great command of his stuff on a given day.
Kluber set an Indians record today by striking out seven consecutive batters. Catcher George Kottaras, filling in while Yan Gomes is on paternity leave, set an Indians record by becoming the first Indians player to hit home runs in his first two plate appearances as a member of the team. Those are fine achievements. It’s a shame that the team had to take a tough loss today.
I should acknowledge that the title of this post is tongue in cheek. But for purposes of comparison, be it known that Axford now has an ERA of 4.38 and a WHIP of 1.38. Perez, now a member of the Dodgers, has an ERA of 1.88 and a WHIP of 0.84, and has two more innings of work than Axford. I’m just sayin’.
My theory on why Axford blew the save: He comes out to arguably the most overrated rock band in the history of music’s song. Oh, how I loathe Rush. That’s right ladies and gents, LOATHE them. ;o)
Buck Showalter would’ve ripped that ball out of the pitchers hand after the 6th pitch wildly missed the strike zone. Axford has no command – his peripherals are terrible. He’s a AAA closer, that’s it.
1.38 WHIP for a guy who pitches 2 times a week (if they have a lead, which is rare right now). That’s unacceptable. His BABIP is .194 – which means he’s been lucky as sh*t so far – that’s going to come up. Which means – you guessed it, more blown saves. He’s struck out 12 in 12&/1/3 innings…yet has 9 walks. NINE! His OBP for lefties is about .340, for righties – about .300. He has traffic out there all the time.
He’s a bomb just waiting to go off. Indians knew it – yet still signed him.
He’s Chris Perez part II (at best).
In addition to Axford’s self destructions, he has even more working against him: moving from NL to AL. Here he was being average at best in the NL for the past two years, and then we move him to the AL, where the hitters are more fierce, there is the DH, and NL pitchers traditionally struggle. Maybe it would have just been smart to give one of the guys from our own system the chance.. I think Cody Allen would definitely be an upgrade, and *gulps slowly* what about Carrasco?? Just my take on the whole debacle that is The Ax Man
“Come back, Chris Perez—all is forgiven ”
NO, NO NOOOOOOO, not by me! Go wash your typing fingers with soap for writing this.
i would like to add that we are just 3 games back of the 2nd WC spot 😀 go tribe!!!!!!
Hey now, Axford’s command constantly gives me fits, but I draw the line at longing for Chris Perez.
Perez is a ticking time bomb. Below average K%, and despite a crazy high fly ball rate (57%!), but by some stroke of luck he still hasn’t given up a home run yet. The fly balls are gonna start leaving the yard eventually.
Guys. The game lasts 9 innings. Both teams are expected to play 9 innings. I visualize the Joker meme saying “A starter gives up a three runs in the top of the fourth and no one bats an eye, but the closer gives up a 3 run homer and everyone loses their minds!” Seriously. It happens. If you scrutinized every player for each botch this season you’d still be writing. Lets talk 30 errors in 31 games. I want Omar, Robbie and Travis back a heck of a lot more than Perez.
I still agree with the notion that the whole concept of “closer” is basically an invention of statistics (and agents). I’m waiting for the manager with enough guts to abandon the idea of a closer and just go with the guy who’s doing well. In this case, either let Kluber finish up, or go with a guy that has been hot the past couple games.
There are 2 teams doing this today…the Astros and Cubs. The only reason they do it is because they don’t have anyone good enough that they trust to get 3 outs in a row.
As much as I personally think that if the guy is cruising they should finish the game no matter how many pitches they have…let them lose it, I have to say that you asking for Perez back is absurd. The guy definitely wore out his welcome in Cleveland. Now with your point with Axford, I can’t fault Tito’s decision, he gave the ball to his closer, you know the one that is CURRENTLY leading the American League in saves, and the guy had a bad outing. He’s human it happens, remember the days of Bob Wickman? That was usually pretty brutal to watch, but he got the job done. If blowing saves becomes a pattern, then we have something to complain about, it’s only May 5th after all, and he is still 9-11 in save opportunities. I’ll take that!
I think a couple of you overlooked the part where I wrote “I should acknowledge that the title of this post is tongue in cheek.”
Axford’s save percentage is currently 81.8%. According to this article by Anthony Castrovince (http://tinyurl.com/SaveRate), the MLB average for the five-year span from 2009 through 2013 was 68.7%. But bear in mind that some of those blown saves were recorded by pitchers whose grasp on the closer role was tentative at best. Axford is a proven closer, and you’d expect–you’d INSIST–that he have a higher save percentage than the league average.
Eleven chances is a very small sample size, and it’s a good idea for everyone, myself most certainly included, to keep in mind that the season is still young. We’ll have to see what happens over the next few months.
Just to be straight, I have followed these guys since Gary Bell was our closer. Jose Azcue in the early 60’s could out hit this line up! Leon Wagner could drive the ball farther than “Swish”! This is the WORST hitting team in Tribe history! If the keep this up, 110 losses in 2014!!!!