Game Forty One Recap
Dave · May 20, 2010 at 4:00 pm · Filed Under Mariners
Yay, 15-26.
Don’t have much time, will add more later, but congratulations to Junior (and Sweeney) for a big hit and a big win that the team desperately needed. Here’s to hoping the Mariners run off about 15 more of those in a row.
It’s really limited observations at this point, but my anecdotal impression of Bard so far is that he can catch pitches in the dirt but can’t catch them when they’re thrown from the outfield with a runner approaching. The latter is annoying, though not fatal (so far); but the former happens far more frequently, and is something neither of the other catchers seems adept at, so if I had to pick one….
(I’d be a lot more comfortable about seeing League come in to a high-leverage situation if Bard was catching, for example, and I suspect League would feel more comfortable about throwing his “best in baseball” splitter in that situation also, which should lead to better outcomes.)
Bard should be pretty good at catching balls in the dirt. If I recall correctly, he was the personal catcher a few years ago for Wakefield.
Lenny – He was Wakefield’s personal catcher – for about 3 starts, then the Red Sox dumped him and went and retrieved Doug Mirabelli from the Padres, I believe, simply because Bard could not handle Wakefield’s knuckler. Sadly – I’d still rather have Bard playing than either of the other choices.
Interesting stat:
Jack Z’s old team the Brewers are currently 16-25.
Jack Z’s new team the Mariners are currently 15-26.
Not saying there’s a connection, just interesting that both teams have equally bad records this year.