Thoughts before an early game…
April 21, 2003 in Uncategorized
In today’s Globe notebook, Lowe shows why he and others just don’t get the idea of the poorly nicknamed bullpen by committee.
“From the beginning I felt if you designated guys’ roles, then I think they’d be fine. I agree with you guys that guys go out there trying to prove that they should be the closer. It doesn’t work. They need to designate roles, `You’re this role, you’re that role.’ Some guys might not necessarily like it, but it would ease their minds so they could just go out there and pitch.
”[ Brandon] Lyon’s mind-set is that he’s the closer. No contending team is going to win without a good bullpen. You cannot have an audition every night, `[Go with] this guy, no, this guy.’ It’s too much pressure. A bullpen works when guys know when they pitch.”
See, Derek, the auditions have been because…well…it needs to be determined who the go-to guy in the pen is. The way I see it; this whole ‘committee’ thing means you go with your best guy when he’s needed. Not restrict your ‘closer’ to the 9th inning.
Todd Walker and Kevin Millar have both reached base in all 17 games they have been in..that’s pretty good, no?
11:00 AM game today for those not in New England and always forget when Patriot Day is…
