Farrell out

[soxeast]

Let me be clear. I'm not defending Farrell. I'm just arguing that DD is skating, and shouldn't be. Farrell had to go, and nobody on Earth railed against the baserunning bullshit more than I did this year. I help coach one of my 9 year old's little league teams, and they wouldn't run into the outs the Sox ran into all season. I simply do not understand how Butterball was still coaching 3rd at the end of the season. I'm ok with statistical arguments, but I simply refuse to believe that the number of outs they ran into was offset by the extra bases they took. I just didn't see it. But I digress...

Farrell went into the playoffs against a 100 win team with Doug freaking Fister as his 3rd starter. He had a lineup with two guys who had an .800+ OPS and one of them was a rookie (Devers, who was the highest at .819). Only Betts (108), Benintendi (103), Pedroia (101) and Devers (112) had an OPS+ higher than 99.

We can say that Farrell grinded his players, and should have given them time off, etc., but they only won the division by one game. If he gives Mookie or Xander or whoever time off, whose to say they even make the playoffs? I think the Sox won the East via smoke and mirrors, and the Yankees going through a couple of prolonged slumps as a team, but when the lights were on, and the Sox had to play a team like Houston, those flaws were clear to anyone watching, and I just have a hard time pinning all of that on Farrell. Like I said, he had to go. I was certainly not a fan, but I'm also not very optimistic about this team's future with DD at the helm. Hopefully, I'm proven wrong, but I don't think his track record is nearly as positive as some others do. The gutting of the farm system, which most of us certainly expected when he came in, is something we haven't felt yet, and I'll just never forgive him for allowing an entire season to play out with a Red Sox team in which not one guy hit 25 homers. It's 2017. Everyone hits 25 homers, and he couldn't find one to pick up the slack when Papi retired?

He's got one more year as far as I'm concerned. And then he can follow Farrell off into the sunset.

I agree with your base running comments. Just curious how many games you think the base running cost The Red Sox?

As far as the playoffs, the point isn’t the winning as the issue, it’s how the sox lost. Farrell imo has a history and criticism of grinding players/keeping pitchers in for too long. Keeping Sale in is an extension of the type of manager he was.

As far as the division, imo last year and this year they faded near the end because he grinded his players. Xander should have rested after this year after the July injury. If for example Farrell would have managed Sale properly, he would have restricted the number of his pitches along with having him skip a start. Once it was known that his slider had flattened consistently, Farrell didn’t show any signs of slowing Sale down. Most importantly, even when he was getting bombed. You are right, I can’t know for certain that we wouldn’t have gone down in 3 or 4 anyways. But the fact remains; he remained oblivious in protecting Sale while doing what he does too frequently; over-extending his players/pitchers.

For example, on 8/20 the Sox had a 5 game lead on the Yanks. Each prior month Sale was fading a bit. Why not give him a rest just for 1 start? You KNOW he is slipping and will slip. The Sox were AHEAD 5 games. One skipped start in August and managing him a bit more cautiously instead of keeping him for that 300th strikeout was really going to cause the Sox to lose the division? You see he was slipping.

While you say “we only won by one game”—I say a rested Sale doesn’t get wiped for example vs Toronto, instead beats them. Then Pomeranz doesn’t have to pitch vs Houston 2nd to last game of the season in which Houston gets a good look at him and while Pomeranz seemed to be fading. Thus it possible the Sox would have gone into Houston in games 1 and 2 with much better prepared and rested starters if Farrell wasn’t such a grinder. The stats tell us Sal fades. Yet did you see at any point other than last game of the season John did anything to account for this? Even in game 1 vs Houston. And even in the last game 4.

As far as Xander—when he got that injury – there is no way I agree with what you’re saying that maybe we would have lost the division. Xander had an injury that caused him to be downright awful.

And as for this year’s Sox. With all the injuries and worn down players, we had a 3-2 lead in the 8th inning, set up by a pen that was solid in which they had roles all year. Instead John decided to run away from 8th inning Addison Reed while what I heard from Lou Merloni (and later the Houston mgr) that Sale was tiring/losing location. IMO that’s not the GM. That’s on the manager. We hit enough home runs to take that 3-2 lead in game 4.

 

[soxeast]

I have come to the conclusion it is impossible to watch any team play 162 plus games a year and not be left with the firm conviction that your manager screws up a lot. I believe we all would feel that way about anyone, and many more significantly. I think this is a relatively new phenomenon -- there has always been second guessing in sports but not to anything close to its present vitriolic degree.

My opinion on John Farrell is that the thing that made him a lightning rod is his face. I'm not kidding. He looks dopey. He gives off the appearance when things are going poorly that things are happening to him, not that he is making them happen. To use football coaches, if Norv Turner is one end of the spectrum and Jack Del Rio the other, John had Norv face. A good MLB team can still lose 70 games and in most of them there will be at least two or three decisions you can question. Baseball is a sport, unlike the others, where fans have a sophisticated understanding that not doing something is actually making a choice.

When you have Farrell face, it catches up to you eventually.

You may very well be right about drawing conclusions that the manager screws up a lot. Each person will define though what is screwed up. For me, I’m bias. My 1st games that I remember were 1970. I was both a Red Sox fan and Cinci fan. Over the years they spoke of Sparky Anderson/ aka Captain Hook. I agree with that philosophy along with bulldog pitchers back then like Luis Tiant (etc). OFC the bulldog pitcher would have to show he isn't fading. In this case he should never have treated Sale like a bulldog. And nowadays because we have more availability of stats, imo stats point to that conclusion.

So recently there was a poster like me who thought Farrell needed to go but he supported keeping Sale in to start the 8th. Our philosophies will never be the same. But I can’t turn off what I believe. And now that I have access to stats that show how Sale fades and how his slider flattened out over the course of the season, I’m supposed to ignore all of that? I can’t. Thus my opinions/preference on how I’d like a game managed is now considered “vitriolic” in some degree?

As far as Farrell looking dumb. I don’t think I ever took that into account. I’d like to think I don’t. I just thought for the most part his answers to questions were dumb. What if I don’t agree with how often they ran into outs? I don’t agree with it, and he says he is going to keep doing it; won’t there be some vitriolic responses from posters and media? In regards to Sale—on a postgame on 9/28 he said “Any time you go through spells or turns like this, it comes down to consistent location and command.” And he said same day “We recognize where guys are in terms of workloads, the way they've thrown of late, early exits. That kind of starts to factor in, . . . “

What does all this talk mean in that we saw Sale struggle much more in September, and it was a progression each month of the season, wasn’t it? How does keeping him in to get the 300th strikeout and keeping him in so long during game 1 show that he “recognized where guys are in terms of workloads?” Further, if John is saying that “it comes down to consistent location and command” with a guy like Sale who had an enormous workload and was a bit worn down, why wouldn’t his quote of it “comes down to consistent location and command” matter to a worn down pitcher who was pushing that 4th inning in game 4 but his location was slipping big time? To make matters worse he's facing a rh batter how just a few days earlier blasted a home run off him. What do John's words mean if he doesn't follow them?

I have easier access as do all fans to stats now. So I wouldn’t call it “vitriolic” if what we feel a manager is doing doesn’t make sense or isn’t how we’d like to see the game managed.

 

[RedOctober3829]

Interviewing process going fast for #RedSox & could have new manager by end of the week. More on #7News @11 #AlexCora

 

[soxhop411]

Farrell...... In?

 

[Bob Montgomerys Helmet Hat]

Farrell...... In?

Interesting. I've been thinking that Philly might be a landing spot for Girardi

 

[shaggydog2000]

Interesting. I've been thinking that Philly might be a landing spot for Girardi

The Phillies want to keep regional fans miserable and violent, like they've always been. Farrell perpetuates that much better than Girardi would. Being besties with Tito is just the icing on the cake for the whole deal.

 

[DisgruntledSoxFan77]

Farrell...... In?

@rembrat Comment?

 

[JimD]

Despite the team's habit of trashing people on the way out the door, it's been nice to see that very little dirt about Farrell has been made public since his dismissal. He wasn't Dombrowski's man, some writers heard loud arguing between them, DD didn't like the way the manager handled the Machado incident, but that's been about it. I hope it stays that way.

 

[GK2186]

Despite the team's habit of trashing people on the way out the door, it's been nice to see that very little dirt about Farrell has been made public since his dismissal. He wasn't Dombrowski's man, some writers heard loud arguing between them, DD didn't like the way the manager handled the Machado incident, but that's been about it. I hope it stays that way.

Seems to be since Lucky left the smear campaigns stopped

 

[TheoShmeo]

Despite the team's habit of trashing people on the way out the door, it's been nice to see that very little dirt about Farrell has been made public since his dismissal. He wasn't Dombrowski's man, some writers heard loud arguing between them, DD didn't like the way the manager handled the Machado incident, but that's been about it. I hope it stays that way.

Yeah, with some of the grumbling coming out of NY about Girardi being wound too tight, I found it to be interesting that we'd heard nothing really at all about Farrell and that no one in NY is doing the hand ringing thing about the dreaded (and I think overstated) smear campaign.

I have a feeling you will get your wish on Farrell. The team seems to have moved on, and his coaches will not be carry overs.

I always thought it was interesting that he did not get more blow back on the Jessica Moran thing and I wondered if there would be some commentary about that in the wake of his firing.

 

[JimD]

Yeah, with some of the grumbling coming out of NY about Girardi being wound too tight, I found it to be interesting that we'd heard nothing really at all about Farrell and that no one in NY is doing the hand ringing thing about the dreaded (and I think overstated) smear campaign.

Yep. Joel Sherman dropped his column within an hour of the Girardi announcement, which pretty clearly indicated that he got his info from Cashman or other well-placed team sources. And no one has batted an eye.

 

[DanoooME]

Interesting. I've been thinking that Philly might be a landing spot for Girardi

The Phillies want to keep regional fans miserable and violent, like they've always been. Farrell perpetuates that much better than Girardi would. Being besties with Tito is just the icing on the cake for the whole deal.

Interesting that the local paper says the top two candidates are Gabe Kapler and their AAA manager Dusty Wathan.

 

[Hawk68]

This is really interesting. Speier becoming mouthpiece for the Red Sox leadership.
He cites change in clubhouse and an eye toward future resulted in decision - Farrell out.

Mr Speier cannot write this on his own, he came up as stat geek blogger, and to this day has few personal observations or game day quotes... and now this management tome.

This is all Corporate COMMS plan roll-out. The firing presser reveals little to nothing and then a logical lay-down pointed toward the future.

Our Red Sox are far left PC, but with this execution, well managed.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/sports/redsox/2017/10/12/changing-clubhouse-changing-game-led-john-farrell-departure/udmlcW3yBhWJK57GJSuk2I/story.html

Bumping the Farrell Out thread.

As we go through the "Valley of Death" in the off season search for a big bat, the Speier article on how DD viewed core underperformance worth reconsideration.

The above article makes clear the Sox replaced Farrell expecting core performance increase. The subsequent resigning of Moreland to a CBT friendly contract reinforces the Speier/Management view on the need for clubhouse presence.

Now the JDM pursuit has evolved into a stare down with Boras over terms - and this article may suggest DD will stick to a hard bottom line with JDM to take our offer (whatever it is).

The fall back plan may be to enter the season planning on core upside and get through the first 1/3 of the 2018 season with payroll flexibility to adjust fire as necessary.

 

[Vermonter At Large]

I thought the Speier article was spot on. The combined underperformance of Bogaerts, JBJ, Benintendi, and Betts pointed directly to the coaching staff. Whatever combination of factors that led to that underperformance - confidence, failure to adjust to pitching adjustments, trying to pull everything, playing with nagging injuries, trying to overcompensate for the power loss of Ortiz, etc, it is up to coaching staffs to help their players through those issues. So a complete re-hash of the coaching approach was necessary and needed. It may turn out that some or all of those players will respond to a coaching approach, or that some or all might turn out to be uncoachable. I think that a patient approach is the best strategy in the short-term.

 

[RustyKuntzwasnotastripper]

Just the more aggresive approch should help. I watched alot of games last year and it seemed that so many hittable 1st pitch strikes just taken. Then with 2 strikes wild swings at pitches out of the zone.

 

[Savin Hillbilly]

Just the more aggresive approch should help. I watched alot of games last year and it seemed that so many hittable 1st pitch strikes just taken. Then with 2 strikes wild swings at pitches out of the zone.

Yes, it's possible that the work-the-count approach has gotten a little too predictable. The Sox were not only last in the league in 1st pitch swing rate, but dramatically so: the gap between them and the #14 team was larger than the gap between the #14 team and league average. According to FG the Sox were middle-of-the-pack in O-Swing% in 2017, but dead last in Z-Swing%. Ideally you want to be the opposite of that.

Another concerning tidbit: The Sox were fourth in the league in number of 2-0 counts seen--and dead last in number of 2-0 pitches swung at. This makes no sense; the whole point of getting into that kind of count is to improve your chances of getting a pitch you can do damage with. So go and do the damage already. The other playoff teams were #1, 2 and 3 in 2-0 counts seen -- and #2, 3, and 4 in 2-0 pitches swung at.

 

[Dewey'sCannon]

Yes, it's possible that the work-the-count approach has gotten a little too predictable. The Sox were not only last in the league in 1st pitch swing rate, but dramatically so: the gap between them and the #14 team was larger than the gap between the #14 team and league average. According to FG the Sox were middle-of-the-pack in O-Swing% in 2017, but dead last in Z-Swing%. Ideally you want to be the opposite of that.

Another concerning tidbit: The Sox were fourth in the league in number of 2-0 counts seen--and dead last in number of 2-0 pitches swung at. This makes no sense; the whole point of getting into that kind of count is to improve your chances of getting a pitch you can do damage with. So go and do the damage already. The other playoff teams were #1, 2 and 3 in 2-0 counts seen -- and #2, 3, and 4 in 2-0 pitches swung at.

That, to me, is especially telling. As you say, those 2-0 pitches are the ones you should be looking to driver somewhere. It's unlikely that the Sox batters saw fewer good pitches to hit at 2-0 than all these other teams. Another aspect of where coaching comes into play is what pitch to look for on 2-0 - it's possible that one reason they took so many 2-0 pitches is that they were looking for one pitch and got another, indicating inadequate scouting/coaching/preparation for the pitcher's tendencies, etc.

 

[charlieoscar]

Another concerning tidbit: The Sox were fourth in the league in number of 2-0 counts seen--and dead last in number of 2-0 pitches swung at.

The blame falls to a few players.

2-0 seen/2-0 swung at:

Brock Holt -- 23/5 -- 21.74%
Chris Young -- 35/9 -- 25.71%
Jackie Bradley -- 80/19 -- 23.75%
Mookie Betts -- 122/32 -- 26.23%
Xander Bogaerts -- 90/23 -- 25.56%, which leaves the rest of the team at 578/246 -- 42.56%.

 

[In my lifetime]

Yes, it's possible that the work-the-count approach has gotten a little too predictable. The Sox were not only last in the league in 1st pitch swing rate, but dramatically so: the gap between them and the #14 team was larger than the gap between the #14 team and league average. According to FG the Sox were middle-of-the-pack in O-Swing% in 2017, but dead last in Z-Swing%. Ideally you want to be the opposite of that.

Another concerning tidbit: The Sox were fourth in the league in number of 2-0 counts seen--and dead last in number of 2-0 pitches swung at. This makes no sense; the whole point of getting into that kind of count is to improve your chances of getting a pitch you can do damage with. So go and do the damage already. The other playoff teams were #1, 2 and 3 in 2-0 counts seen -- and #2, 3, and 4 in 2-0 pitches swung at.

I don't believe the problem is that the work-the-count approach is more predictable, since it was very easy to discern this approach initially. I think the work-the-count approach has been neutralized somewhat by teams putting more emphasis on loading up their bullpen with quality arms. So the advantage to knocking out a starter via pitch count is decreased as team's bullpens get stronger. So one would think the work-the-count approach would be most effective against the better pitchers, since top pitchers>>even best bullpens. However the top pitchers typically throw a much higher % of strikes, thus making it difficult to succeed with that strategy against them. Here are the top 15 strike % leaders:

1 Chris Sale Boston Red Sox SP 68.2%
2 Clayton Kershaw Los Angeles Dodgers SP 68.2%
3 Max Scherzer Washington Nationals SP 67.8%
4 Corey Kluber Cleveland Indians SP 67.7%
5 Stephen Strasburg Washington Nationals SP 67.4%
6 Jacob deGrom New York Mets SP 67.3%
7 Alex Wood Los Angeles Dodgers SP 67.3%
8 Rick Porcello Boston Red Sox SP 67.1%
9 Jeff Samardzija San Francisco Giants SP 67.0%
10 Jimmy Nelson Milwaukee Brewers SP 66.9%
11 Masahiro Tanaka New York Yankees SP 66.7%
12 Ivan Nova Pittsburgh Pirates SP 66.5%
13 Luis Severino New York Yankees SP 66.3%
14 R.A. Dickey Atlanta Braves SP 66.0%
15 Justin Verlander Houston Astros SP 65.9%

To my way of thinking, it doesn't mean that that work-the-count approach should be abandoned, but instead applied selectively to those instances when the starter is significantly stronger than the relief pitchers that are likely to pitch and the starter strike % is not outstanding. It would require that a team and an individual's hitting approach change from game to game, but that should not be too much to ask from a professional MLB player. I am sure this is not a ground-breaking idea even though there is likely to be some player resistance in modifying their approach game to game.

 

[Vermonter At Large]

The 2-0 count thing is interesting, but just one small part of a very complex whole. Were they automatically taking on 2-0, or were they looking for a certain pitch in a certain location on 2-0 and being selective? Was that choice taken away from the young hitters (driven by signs from the dugout) or were the hitters making the decisions? Was there an overall approach that the coaching staff was driving (and forcing the hitters to comply) or did it change according to the current game situation? Were the hitters uncomfortable with whichever approach, or were they adaptable? Was the coaching staff urging players to pull the ball to maximize power or to go the other way if the pitch warranted (to me, this was a huge fault with the young players - not going the other way often enough, allowing opposing pitchers to identify and exploit their tendency to want to pull the ball). Was the coaching staff working with each hitter individually, or trying to fit square pegs into round holes? With so much data available to coaches and hitters, it seems to me that the balance between using the data effectively and tailoring it to individual hitters' traits is pretty delicate and difficult to calibrate. I am both encouraged and frightened by some of the tools (such as launch-angle analysis) available nowadays - they can be wonderful aids to coaching, but the potential for damaging hitters with incorrect application of this type of data could be considerable.

 

[charlieoscar]

The 2-0 count thing is interesting, but just one small part of a very complex whole.

VAL raises some good points but looking 2016 stats may help reduce the options.

2-0 seen/2-0 swung at:

Brock Holt -- 47/8 -- 17.02%
Jackie Bradley -- 95/18 -- 18.95%
Mookie Betts -- 88/31 -- 35.23%
Xander Bogaerts -- 103/25 -- 24.27%

While Betts did quite a bit better on the 2-0 count, Holt, Bradley, and Bogaerts were even poorer in 2016. It would be interesting to see how the latter two did in the minors on the 2-0 count. You probably also need to look at the batting situations...runners on/outs/score combinations.