5/13/21

Ray Savage - Thoughts on Luis Rojas

 


SAVAGE VIEWS – Thoughts on Luis Rojas


May 13, 2021

Let me say at the start that I want to see Rojas succeed as the Mets Manager.  He has some of the attributes I would look for in selecting a manager.  He is a baseball lifer who has a good resume and he has paid his dues.  I like the fact that he is young, has what appears to be an excellent rapport with his players and is respected by the tough New York Media.  I strongly believe a secret to success of any organization is having stability at the top.  Clearly, that has been lacking for some time. 

I take issue with some of the decisions he has made this season.  One thing I continually harp on is the general lack of aggressiveness as a team.  I think they stole 3 bases over the first 25 games.  That is simply unacceptable – especially for a team that has had difficulty lighting up the scoreboard.  And one game last week against the Rockies they stole two runs which proved to be the winning margin.   There is enough speed on this team to make more attempts to steal some bases.

I can count at least a half a dozen games that a runner from second did not attempt to score on a base hit.  The team has a dismal record of getting the man in from third with less than two outs.  Therefore, would it not make sense to force the opposing team to make a perfect play to prevent a run?

I can’t recall any time this season the team has attempted a hit and run.

James McCann is a catcher who has never caught more than 103 games in any season.  It seems logical that he needs to be spelled frequently.  Watching Tuesday night’s game against the Orioles he looks worn out.  He is lost at the plate and his defense is suffering.  I wonder why he is catching 90% of the games when you have a more than adequate backup in Nido.  In 22 Abs this season Nido has struck out only twice.  Putting the ball in play is clearly an attribute this team should value.

Last night Stroman was pitching a marvelous game.  He ran into trouble in the seventh inning when he gave up hits to the first two batters.  Runners were sacrificed when McCann mishandled the bunt and was unable to try to get the runner at third.

Severino was intentionally walked – a decision I disagreed with.   Stroman was at 90 pitches and I think he had enough left in the tank to retire a weak hitter in Severino.  I’m kind of old-school and I think he should have been given the chance to get out of the jam.  The decision to bring in Loop to face a lefty was short sighted since everyone knew the Orioles would counter switch with a right hand hitter.

How come every year we wind up with a player like Almora on the team?  Remember the profound lack of success in past years of Keon Broxton and Aaron Altherr to name a couple.  There have to better choices out there.

It’s nice to see the Mets putting together a winning streak even though the hitting has been lacking.  I’d feel better if I thought we had the right person commanding this ship.

 

Ray

12 comments:

Mack Ade said...

Lots of different opinions on this guy.

Damned if you do or damned if you don't.

I judge his effort on the final product.

So far...

1st place

% wise 6th best W-L IN LEAGUE

Reese Kaplan said...

Back in the USA to find out I only need to flee to Africa for a few weeks to get the Mets to win.

Anonymous said...

This typeface is nearly unreadable.

Anonymous said...

When considering typefaces, keep it simple.

Look at books, magazines, newspapers. Anything that is widely read. Use reader-friendly typefaces that they use.

My two cents.

Jimmy

Tom Brennan said...

Agree, Ray - hard to read this type face. I like Helvetia.

Almora - I would have re-signed Marisnick, who is hititng well.

Naturally, Mallex Smith is rehabbing, so Khalil Lee, who only just started to hit, got the call up instead. Bottom line, though, is when Nimmo returns tomorrow, an OF of Conforto, Smith, Nimmo and Pillar is already crowded.

They do need to run more, and a team struggling with RISP needs to be more aggressive on the basepaths. I love what I have seen of Villar in that regard.

I agree also - stay with Stroman - he is a winner.

Tom Brennan said...

Reese, welcome back to the US, back to the US, back to the USS-A.

Mack Ade said...

There is a place on runway 3 Reese leaving for the Gaza...

:)

RDS900 said...

I did not realize that he typeface was a problem. I have always used Lucinda Calligraphy for all my communications. I'll switch to something else going forward.

RDS900 said...

I know, but considering the opposition...

RDS900 said...

Nice to see them steal a couple bases yesterday. Hope they can find a place for Pillar when Nimmo returns.

Tom Brennan said...

Ray, agree, and Villar, a true hustler on the basepathd

Remember1969 said...

A few thoughts here.

I agree some with Ray and some with Mack in the first comment above.

First, yes, I would like to see more aggressiveness on the basepaths. There are six players in McNeil, Conforto, Smith, Davis, Alonso and McCann who are not speed players and will probably never will be. Lindor has not been on base enough. Nimmo is the guy that could turn into a better baserunner/base stealer if given enough room to grow that part of his game. Pillar and Villar have been very good baserunners and are get thing most of their playing time and times on the bases.

So in the regular line-up 7 of the 9 players are not speedsters - we can hope for the best baserunning they can give us, but don't look for this team to ever look like the '85 Cardinals.

I don't know whether it was a hit and run or a straight steal, but Villar's scoring on Peroza's single to just behind first base in the Phillies game was great baserunning. (One instance of a hit and run this year).

Once Lindor really gets rolling and gets on base more often, I look to see him running more when he can. I think the energy on the basepaths will look better with him on them.

As far as the Severino intentional pass, Rojas would have and should have been crucified if he had not made that call. It was the absolute right baseball move in a 0-0 game with one out and runners on second and third with the pitcher's spot up next. There were at least three good reasons to make that move.

(1) The traditional reason, it sets up for a double play. There is extremely little chance of a double play without somebody on first base. Yes, there is the possibility of a fly-out, runner out at the plate, but that is far less likely than a sac fly, or even a ground ball to second with no chance of a play at the plate. Freddy Galvis, with some speed is the runner on third.
(2) It forces the opposing manager to make the tough decision of whether to lift his ace (who threw a no-hitter the last time out and had a shut-out going for 6 innings in this game). If you can get that guy out of the game, that is a massive advantage. He had only thrown 74 pitches through his six frames.
(3) Using two pinch hitters in the same at-bat is also advantageous. Any way that played out, there would have been a good hitter to pitcher matchup.
(4) For a little lesser, but still good reason to walk Severino, was that he was already 1 for 1 with a walk against Stroman. While I understand that .240 hitters are 'weak', they still hit and he had the advantage of having already seen Stroman twice in the game.
(5) The pinchhitters they brought in were both hitting less than .200 on the year.
(6) To Mack's point, results matter. Limiting the damage to only the one run a that point in the game is about as good a result as they could have hoped for.

As far as the decision to lift Stroman, I cannot fault the manager for that. He had thrown 90 pitches and had just given up 2 hard hit singles without retiring a batter in the inning. That is not a good start - we'll never know what the finish might have been, the the bullpen has been almost lights out of late and this was the right decision at the time. Results matter, Loup got the job done in that inning; Means was out of the game and they won against the O's bullpen.