Houck up
- Thread starter bosockboy
- Start date
Oh that's right, I forgot about the rule changes. I haven't watched baseball since 2018. I was just being "funny" again.
Hopefully it's as a replacement for Garrett Richards.
I mean it sucks to have a rule change screw up your season but the major league level in the midst of a pennant chase is not the place to relearn a new approach and figure out how to pitch again.
I mean it sucks to have a rule change screw up your season but the major league level in the midst of a pennant chase is not the place to relearn a new approach and figure out how to pitch again.
Not sure he's stretched out enough to do this. 4 and then 3 1/3 innings in last 2 outings for the Woosox. And 5 Runs given up in that last outing. Richards' last two outings weren't so bad. And unless he's hurt, the Sox aren't kicking him to the curb quite yet
Most likely it's to replace Brice who replaced Andriese. Won't take much for this to be an improvement. Houck can be used as a 6th starter when Cora feels like the others need an extra day and also in long relief (which was supposed to be Andriese's role but he sucked and became unusable).
I think this is right. You don't throw him, for instance, into a two-inning relief role every third day if he hasn't been doing that.
There was an article in The Athletic before the break that suggested that the Sox were going to go to a 6 man rotation. Part of it being the schedule right out of the gate for the second half, and also to protect the arms. With last year's abbreviated season, no starter got a ton of innings, so Cora wants to load manage as much as he can. I'll post the link shortly.
Here it is:
Here it is:
Yeah I'm guessing this is right. Houck will basically be slotted into the long-relief/6th starter/mop-up/last guy in the bullpen in extra innings role. Which makes sense because it's a low-leverage way for Houck to get re-acclimated to major-league hitters and still (presumably/hopefully) provide way more quality in that role than Andriese. And then if Richards (or Perez, or whoever) really sucks Houck is well-positioned to take that 5th spot in the rotation.
Or maybe we do get a 6-man rotation for a few weeks, but that strikes me as a bit odd because our rotation is fairly top heavy (Eovaldi is good and EdRo's FIP and xFIP suggest his top-line numbers should improve as the season goes on), so why would you want to reduce the frequency that Eovaldi and Rodriguez are pitching? If Chaim thinks Houck is clearly ready to take a starting spot now he should just demote/IL/etc. Richards, and if he doesn't think Houck is clearly ready to take a starting spot now, there is no reason not to start him in the bullpen as a long-relief type and assess as the season goes on.
Six man rotation makes sense to me. It let's Houck get a couple turns through the rotation to continue to build up his pitch count without bouncing anyone out. And in three weeks or so, you re-evaluate in anticipation of Sale's return. I think that's where we see who the odd man out is in the rotation. As frustrating as Richards has been with how he starts games, I don't think now is the time to push him out, at least not in favor of Houck when he's still building back from his IL stint. But when Sale's ready, all bets are off and the weak link goes to the bullpen.
In the short-term, a RHH-specialist ready to bury this Yankee lineup.
Long-term, I’m curious how the FO sees Houck. His April outings showed a major leap in his stuff over last year, but that was before the spin rate crackdown. I think the six-man rotation is most likely, but I wonder if we could be showcasing him for some kind of trade. A package of Dalbec/Arroyo/Houck/bubble prospect arm (and maybe Jimenez) could get a pretty solid return. We need space on the 40-man, and next year’s rotation already looks decent (Sale, Eovaldi, Pivetta, Whitlock, Pérez, Seabold, Bello, Winckowski, Crawford) with a fair chance of re-signing E-Rod (or someone else in this winter’s flush free agent starting pitching market).
All the publicity points to a 6-man rotation with Sale (3-4?) weeks away.
Someone needs to get bumped when Sale is activated. Houk's performance will be key to that choice.
In the meantime, assuming neither Houk nor Sale are throwing 100 pitches anytime soon...who (at least in the short term) provides the filler role that used to be Andriese (if behind) and Whitlock (if ahead)? Whitlock obviously can't pitch every day which means there will be scenarios (as soon as this week) where the Red Sox are close or ahead in the 5th inning but the starter is gassed. So, absent Whitlock it becomes Sawamura/Hernandez -> Taylor -> Otovino -> Barnes. My concern is that starters get relief but relievers get burned out. Are we now looking at Workman as the long reliever alternating with Whitlock?
I know game situations will dictate, but it seems to me we're going to get a whole lot of Brandon until Sale joins the rotation and one of the starters gets reassigned to long relief.
Someone needs to get bumped when Sale is activated. Houk's performance will be key to that choice.
In the meantime, assuming neither Houk nor Sale are throwing 100 pitches anytime soon...who (at least in the short term) provides the filler role that used to be Andriese (if behind) and Whitlock (if ahead)? Whitlock obviously can't pitch every day which means there will be scenarios (as soon as this week) where the Red Sox are close or ahead in the 5th inning but the starter is gassed. So, absent Whitlock it becomes Sawamura/Hernandez -> Taylor -> Otovino -> Barnes. My concern is that starters get relief but relievers get burned out. Are we now looking at Workman as the long reliever alternating with Whitlock?
I know game situations will dictate, but it seems to me we're going to get a whole lot of Brandon until Sale joins the rotation and one of the starters gets reassigned to long relief.
Isn't the notion of "showcasing" a player for a trade kinda antiquated? It's not like 20-30+ years ago where no one saw minor leaguers unless they were at the ballpark. Every minor league game is on video in one way or another. And I can't imagine any team that might be interested in Houck wouldn't be looking at his outings in Worcester as well as his outings for the big club last year and earlier this season to learn everything they could possibly learn about him. One or two appearances in the next couple weeks isn't going to dramatically affect a team's opinion of him. At best, a couple outings might show that he's fully recovered from his injury, but not any more so than his three starts in Worcester would have.
He's up because they think he is what they need to win games now.
You’re right, it is antiquated. Showing he’s healthy is partly the deal in that case, but I agree he’s here to get guys out. Mostly speculating what Bloom thinks our trade assets are and how we’re going to address the upcoming 40-man crunch.
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I know I'm in the minority and have expressed this view before, but I'd love it if Houck were used like Whitlock. In a world where you are getting starts of four innings or less pretty routinely, having two guys like Whitlock and Houck two out of every three or four games for multiple innings is incredibly valuable.
With that said, it's been the company line that Houck is going to be a starter, so going to a six man rotation makes a ton of sense here as well. See what he has, and even if he's just mediocre, that should be enough to push Richards into mop up duty when Sale eventually returns.
With that said, it's been the company line that Houck is going to be a starter, so going to a six man rotation makes a ton of sense here as well. See what he has, and even if he's just mediocre, that should be enough to push Richards into mop up duty when Sale eventually returns.
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I think he is coming up to be a Whitlock-type reliever. As the next 18 games are against RHH heavy lineups in NYY and TOR, his slider should really be a weapon in 2-3 inning stints a couple days a week.
It's weird. He was moved to the pen after struggling as a starter. He had great success and then in the AFL, he was converted back to a starter. The results carried over, though. I wonder if that's his ultimate role. With 14 pitchers, I wonder if piggyback starting is viable in the majors.
This (and the post by greek_gawd) makes most sense to me, too. Houck is not stretched out for more than 4-5 innings as noted above, so if he does get added as a 6th starter, you have just increased the number of bullpen innings needed every week. Bullpen usage has already been about as high as it can be, esp. for the finite quality arms Whitlock/Ottavino/Barnes/Taylor/Darwinzon. Pray that Richards continues to improve, or at least not get worse, and wait for Sale in 3-4 weeks.
[edit] And next year Houck gets another shot to compete for a starter's role.
Given how inconsistent Perez and Richards are, and the fact that the best you can hope for from either of them is 5 solid innings, having both Whitlock and Houck available to throw 2-3 innings when necessary would be great. I could also see them having Houck shadow Sale's initial starts once Sale's back so they don't overextend Sale and have someone available to pitch a few innings following Sale.
View: https://twitter.com/PeteAbe/status/1415767423601553413
"Houck in the bullpen for this series. Scheduled to start against Toronto on Wednesday. " - Pete Abe
"Houck in the bullpen for this series. Scheduled to start against Toronto on Wednesday. " - Pete Abe
I'm not sure if anything has changed, but during the spring Cora was pretty emphatic about Houck being in the rotation and not in the pen when he's called up. I've mentioned in the other thread that the Sox play 18 games in 18 days against three tough division rivals. Cora knows better than us, but this looks like a great time to go six deep with the rotation and allow starters a fifth day off in between starts as they might have if there was a scheduled off day. Let's remember, these guys have already played 90 games vs the 60 all of last year.
The SoxProspects guys were pointing out on their podcast (recommended if you haven't listened) that Houck makes sense for the next stretch because of how many games they have against NYY and TOR.
The Yankees routinely start seven or eight RHH, but Toronto, too: their biggest bats — Vladito, Semien, Springer, Teo Hernandez, Bichette — are also all RHH. So Houck, either as a starter/opener (depending how stretched out he is) or in a multi-inning relief role, could potentially have real impact.
So yeah..., it makes a lot more sense to me now.
The Yankees routinely start seven or eight RHH, but Toronto, too: their biggest bats — Vladito, Semien, Springer, Teo Hernandez, Bichette — are also all RHH. So Houck, either as a starter/opener (depending how stretched out he is) or in a multi-inning relief role, could potentially have real impact.
So yeah..., it makes a lot more sense to me now.
If you saw the timestamp, you'd know that the post you snarked at was written before the game was ppd
Sorry, I'm on the other side of the planet and coffee was still brewing. No offence but this isn't my first read of the day.
I think it was also SP I was listening to recently that was talking about his ongoing lack of an effective third pitch making it difficult to project him as a starter. That especially after one time through the order minor league teams were learning to just sit on his fastball and ignore the slider and having more effective at-bats against him.
No. Seems like they were waiting until closer to game time to make those announcements, and the Yankees beat them to the punch by postponing the game. Either that or they were trying to work out a trade or something. Trade is unlikely since you'd think it would have happened anyway by now.
Brice is the obvious DFA to make room for Duran on the 40-man roster. Chavis is the most likely option to get Houck back up and leave them with 14 pitchers and 12 position players as usual.
He is basically a two pitch pitcher.
A question - have any of those (apart from knuckleballers) been successful as starters?
Randy Johnson. It helps when your have two 80 pitches... Why bother throwing anything else when nobody can hit either of your top offerings?
He's been working on his third pitch which is probably why he was getting whacked around more than usual in AAA.
Maybe his ceiling is a twice around the order guy, which, with big pitching staffs is still worth trotting out for bulk innings.
Maybe his ceiling is a twice around the order guy, which, with big pitching staffs is still worth trotting out for bulk innings.
Seems like a great Jeff Nelson comp. Ceiling of a powerful 6 out middle reliever.
I recall reading that he was almost exclusively working on a change up and curve but I can't find that anywhere now. Would explain not dominating but if he has two plus pitches and at least an average occasional curve and change-up... he'd be very good mid rotation guy. Shit.... I always go back to Maddux who really only had two pitches. I'm not sure how to classify them as "plus" or anything like that. He had just immaculate control
I remember that too. It was after he was optioned but before he got hurt.
How many three inning saves have you seen lately?
One hit, one walk, three Ks, no runs against the Yankees in New York. Not too shabby. Welcome back Tanner!
One hit, one walk, three Ks, no runs against the Yankees in New York. Not too shabby. Welcome back Tanner!
He was filthy tonight. Consider the source, but Eck and Remy were losing their minds over how great he looked in his third inning of work. His fastball had a ton of movement. It wasn't exactly the 27 Yankees out there tonight, but his stuff looked great.
Pitching Ninja was impressed:
View: https://twitter.com/PitchingNinja/status/1416220986274373632?s=19
Pitching Ninja was impressed:
View: https://twitter.com/PitchingNinja/status/1416220986274373632?s=19
didn’t get to watch the game but man, that 3 innings in the box score super stands out!
no idea how the season unfolds for tanner, but needless to say it’d be pretty great to get this kinda production for 5 or so innings every 5 days.
the rotation performed admirably the 1st half and is a big reason we are 1 in the standings, but they looked gassed before the AS break. houck and sale is not only needed but could really make the difference between ending strong or flaming out.
no idea how the season unfolds for tanner, but needless to say it’d be pretty great to get this kinda production for 5 or so innings every 5 days.
the rotation performed admirably the 1st half and is a big reason we are 1 in the standings, but they looked gassed before the AS break. houck and sale is not only needed but could really make the difference between ending strong or flaming out.
Maddux had 2 pitches…however I remember an interview that he did after he retired in which he explained that he could manipulate those pitches by applying pressure to a different finger when he threw them. Dude was brilliant.