Category Archives: Don Mattingly

There Is Just Nothing Juan Uribe Can’t Do Poorly

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Over at FanGraphs, Matt Klaassen has been going through the best and worst plays of 2012 based on WPA. (For those not familiar, that’s “Win Probability Added”, and is a context-based stat which shows how each play in a game added or subtracted from a team’s chance to win. It’s based on situation, so a two-run homer, for example, is far more valuable when you’re down one in the ninth than when you’re up six in the fourth. You can read a full definition here.)

A few days ago, Klaassen looked at the worst bunts of 2012 by WPA; that is, the bunts which did the most damage to a team’s chance of winning. (The correct answer here is probably “all bunts”, but still.) Who’s the very first name on the list? Oh, this is just wonderful:

Worst Bunt into a Double Play

One would think that a bunt into a double play would be the worst overall bunt of the season, but that is not true this year, at least. On May 8, Brett Pill homered off of Clayton Kershaw in the top of the second inning to put the Giants on top of the Dodgers 2-0. By the bottom of the seventh, the Dodgers were still down 2-1, but Ryan Vogelsong, who had been dealing all game, was on the hill. The Dodgers started a nice rally with singles from Juan Rivera and James Loney. It was a nice situation to have — two runners on with no outs. Juan Uribe came to the plate and bunted. It made sense — Uribe’s hitting has totally gone into the tank since making the move from San Francisco to Los Angeles. Maybe he’s a double agent. Buster Posey fielded the bunt and the Giants managed to get both Uribe and the lead runner, costing the Dodgers -.228 WPA. It wasn’t the Dodgers last shot — Andre Ethier‘s double play ball with the bases loaded in the eighth was even more devastating — but Uribe’s bunt was very bad.

I didn’t have a recap of that game, but the disastrous call was not lost on others at the time…

Eric Stephen, “Dodgers Sacrifice Chance To Win In Loss To Giants“:

The Dodgers offense could only manage one run in their 2-1 loss to the Giants Tuesday night, as the Dodgers’ demise was hastened by a pair of ill-fated bunts.

Down one run, the Dodgers threatened in the bottom of the seventh inning off Ryan Vogelsong when Juan Rivera and James Loney opened the frame with singles, but a Juan Uribe sacrifice bunt attempt turned into a 2-5-3 double play that effectively neutered the rally. Uribe has one successful sacrifice bunt attempt in the last three seasons.

Chad Moriyama, “Don Mattingly Regrets Nothing About His Bunting, I Regret Watching The Game“:

In the bottom of the seventh inning, with the Dodgers down one run, the team basically hit the lottery by somehow managing to get Juan Rivera and James Loney to not make outs.

That brought up Juan Uribe in what was clearly a traditional sacrifice situation, especially considering that Uribe sucks. However, while he does have 60 sacrifice bunts in his career over 5121 plate appearances, he’s had only one sacrifice bunt in the last three seasons over the course of 941 plate appearances. As such, it’s safe to say that he’s not exactly accustomed to bunting.

Uribe executing a successful sacrifice is anything but a foregone conclusion, then you add that you’re actually lessening your chances of scoring runs by bunting, and it’s just an overall terrible decision.

Mattingly though, of course, called for the bunt anyway, and it worked out SPLENDIDLY

The next inning, Mattingly called for another bunt with men on, and while this one worked, it merely opened up first base ahead of Matt Kemp. Kemp was of course walked intentionally, and San Francisco lefty Javier Lopez retired lefties Andre Ethier, Loney, & Tony Gwynn to end the threat. Mattingly later said he wouldn’t have changed his decision in either case, even after the fact… and all of a sudden I’m wondering if this post should have been more about Don Mattingly than Juan Uribe.

Either way, bunting is the worst. The. Worst.

Dodgers Call it Quits With Excruciating Loss

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Choose the more appropriate caption for Shane Victorino being shocked:

1) “What do you mean none of us could hit Barry F’ing Zito?
2) “Chris Capuano really made it only three lousy innings in his biggest game of the year because he hurt himself with a donut??”
3) “Matt Kemp had two on and two outs in the fifth and couldn’t get runs home?”
4) “Matt Kemp had two on and two outs in the seventh and still couldn’t get runs home?!”
5) “Don Mattingly really intentionally walked Angel Pagan to get to Marco Scutaro with men on, even though Scutaro has been blazingly hot and the exact same maneuver didn’t work a few weeks ago?”
6) “Mark Ellis did WHAT?!?! Get the hell out.”
7) “Please tell me that Don Mattingly didn’t force A.J. Ellis to bunt in the bottom of the ninth in a misguided attempt to have Elian Herrera or Bobby Abreu swinging away instead of one of your better hitters, right? Right?! AND that Dee Gordon wasn’t brought in to run for Andre Ethier yet? RIGHT?!”

Frankly, I’m exhausted from watching that game. Just drained. It was alternately thrilling and excruciating, and I’m not sure if I actually even enjoyed the experience or not. The Reds did their job, including a good inning from old friend Jonathan Broxton, to put the Dodgers in a position to head into the final day of the season still alive. And for a minute there in the seventh, you couldn’t help but believe.

After Zito hit Andre Ethier with a pitch to lead off the frame and was relieved by Guillermo Mota, A.J. Ellis followed with one of the most impressive at-bats of the season, a nine-pitch affair that ended with a blast over the wall that fell just out of the reach of center fielder Pagan to bring the Dodgers within one. Dodger Stadium wasn’t full, but it sure sounded like it at that point. Just when you think the legend of A.J. Ellis can’t get any larger… well, there you go.

They weren’t done. Mark Ellis doubled to deep right and… we won’t talk about that. It was a hard-hit ball for extra bases. Victorino followed with a similar hit, this time making it to third, and with three extra-base hits in the inning and Kemp coming up down one, everything was in place for magic. But it wasn’t to be. Kemp went fishing for a low-and-away slider, the kind that we saw him go after constantly back in the 2006-08 era, and the threat was over.

After a quiet eighth, there was hope in the ninth… briefly. Ethier, somewhat miraculously, singled up the middle against lefty Jeremy Affeldt. A runner! The move seemed clear: bring Gordon off the bench, let A.J. Ellis try to repeat his magic or possibly hit one into the gap that Gordon might be able to score on. If Ellis failed, then let Gordon try to steal ahead of Herrera (or his pinch-hitter, Abreu.)

No. Of course not. Mattingly sent in the bunt signal without sending in Gordon, and while it’d have been nice if Ellis could have made it work, it almost didn’t matter. What was the end game there? Twice-DFA’d Bobby Abreu with your season on the line? Elian Herrera? You’re taking the bat out of the hands of one of your best hitters for… what, exactly? Moving Ethier up 90 feet that Gordon probably could have (and eventually did) steal anyway? It’s stunning. Ellis struck out after failing to bunt twice, Abreu flew out, and Mark Ellis failed to redeem himself.

And with that… it’s over. The Reds did their part. We could have had an absolutely rocking Dodger Stadium for a late afternoon game tomorrow with Clayton Kershaw on the hill, especially since the game is to start earlier than the Cardinals game.

But it wasn’t to be, and there’s no shortage of reasons why.

And I’m spent.

Dodgers Squander Opportunities to Fall 5.5 Out

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I know everyone’s going to want to blame tonight’s loss on Don Mattingly. It’s the way baseball works, is it not? Managers get way too much credit for wins and far too much blame for losses, and Mattingly didn’t do himself any favors in tonight’s crucial seventh inning.

So let’s get right to it: Josh Beckett was more than effective through six two-run innings, but ran into some trouble in the seventh. After a single, a walk, and a sacrifice bunt, Beckett was faced with men on second and third with one out. Mattingly ordered the intentional walk to red-hot Angel Pagan to load the bases, and with Brandon League ready to go, the manager walked out to remove Beckett.

Except, no. He didn’t. Or as I recapped it in real time:

Remember, this is September, the time of expanded rosters. You have something like 39 pitchers down in the bullpen, so you never have to worry about pulling a pitcher too early because it might exhaust your bullpen. You especially never need to worry about pushing your luck with a veteran pitcher who had given you more than you probably had a right to expect.

Beckett stayed in, of course, and in what may have been the most predictable outcome ever, Marco Scutaro popped a single to right field, scoring two and basically putting the game away. It’d be sad if it weren’t so clearly apparent that this was going to happen. Scratch that: it was still sad.

The most depressing thing of all? Mattingly was right on the precipice of a brilliant move that would have earned him endless praise. League is ostensibly this team’s closer right now, and he’s been excellent lately.  For years, we’ve all railed against the usage of the traditional “closer”, nailed to often low-leverage ninth-inning duties, and if Mattingly had put his closer into the game when things were really on the line, we’d have all loved him for it. He did, eventually, bring in League, but only after it was too late.

So close, yet so far.

*******

Got that out of our systems? Good. Now let’s get to the real reason that the Dodgers lost this game, and stop me if you’ve heard this before: the 2-6 “heart of the order” of Shane Victorino, Adrian Gonzalez, Matt Kemp, Hanley Ramirez, & Andre Ethier combined to go 0-20 with three walks. That is, safe to say, atrocious. You can blame “jelling“. You can blame Mattingly for refusing to move A.J. Ellis up from the eight spot. (And on Ellis, even if he was hitting higher right now, he’d just be getting stranded by these guys.) You can blame it on whatever you like. But it’s a simple equation: these guys don’t hit, the team doesn’t score.

The even more infuriating part about this was that Tim Lincecum wasn’t that good. This wasn’t vintage Timmy mowing guys down left and right; despite occasional flashes of a wicked split-fingered fastball, this was the 2012 “I’m going to walk seven dudes!” version. Until the ninth inning, there wasn’t a single frame where they didn’t get at least one runner on, but they just could not either get the big hit or string enough smaller ones together to make it matter.

Where’s your loss? There’s your loss.

*******
All that being said, I can’t let Adam Kennedy‘s night go by. Here’s the thing about Kennedy: even when you happen to stumble upon the rare positive contribution from him, like the 6th inning home run that barely cleared the right field wall and put the Dodgers up 2-1, he’s still Adam Kennedy. It just usually takes a little longer for that innate Kennedy-ness to come out than it did tonight, when he allowed a two-out Hunter Pence single to bounce under his barehanded attempt in the bottom of the inning. (Though it was charitably labeled an infield hit, most good third basemen would have had a play on it.) Not only that, he ended up getting pulled the very next inning after injuring his groin on that bad play. So in the span of less than two full innings, he went from “potential hero” to “likely goat” to “oh right, he’s old & busted.”

So if we had to sum up Kennedy’s night from start to end in less than five seconds, well, this is the only way you can:

Tough Night for Don Mattingly As Dodgers Lose to Braves in 11

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A few weeks ago, Russell Carleton wrote about the real-world challenges of being a big-league manager over at Baseball Prospectus. Amongst other interesting points, he presented this bullpen scenario:

It’s the ninth inning, and you’re up by one. Your top two relievers are Smith and Jones, and both are fresh and available, which is great, because you’re in the thick of a tight pennant race and need this game. Smith is generally better than Jones and usually gets the call here. But there’s a complication today. Smith has a daughter who has a chronic medical issue. He’s a private man and doesn’t discuss this with the press, because he wants to keep his family out of the limelight. (Can you blame him?) He got some bad news about his daughter earlier and has been walking around with his head down all day. You’ve seen him like this before. He’ll say he’s okay, but he can’t concentrate, and his performance suffers to the point where Jones would actually be the better pitcher tonight to nail down that lead.

It’s easy to say that you’d go with Jones in this situation. But if you do, there will be 12 reporters in your office after the game. All of them will ask why it is that you didn’t go with Smith. Is there a closer controversy? Is Smith injured? When you mumble some made-up BS about “better matchups,” they’ll go to Smith to ask him how he feels about losing his job as closer to Jones. And Smith definitely does not want to answer those questions tonight. If you tell the truth, but kindly ask the reporters to leave that out of the game story, some idiot will put it on Twitter anyway, because he… gets… to… break… a story! Because America has a right to know!

This is what I was thinking about in the eighth inning, when Ronald Belisario was allowed to face Jason Heyward with the tying run on third and two out. I’m sure there must have been a good reason why the struggling Belisario remained in the game rather than allow the deadly-on-lefties Randy Choate (who had thrown just four pitches in six days) to face Heyward, who has a massive platoon split (.973 vs .651) this season.

There must have been a reason Choate didn’t enter there, some unexplained situation that we’d never know about, some personal issue or hidden injury that was preventing his usage, because that’s the only way it’d make sense – or at least this is what I was trying to talk myself into believing when Belisario allowed Heyward to shoot a laser up the middle to tie the game. But then Choate later came on to start the tenth inning, so it seemed he’d been available all along… and so I have no idea what exactly Don Mattingly’s thought process was there. (Choate, of course, struck out a righty and allowed a hit to a lefty when he finally did get in. I hate baseball sometimes.)

Honestly, I defend Mattingly a lot, and generally I like his work, but tonight was a series of bizarre decisions by the Dodger manager. Once the game made it into extras, the Dodgers threatened in the tenth when Elian Herrera reached on an error by first baseman Freddie Freeman, but the opportunity was quickly lost when Shane Victorino gave up an out to bunt Herrera to second. Mark Ellis was unable to move Herrera over, and when the Braves predictably walked Matt Kemp – love it when your best hitter doesn’t get a chance to swing – Andre Ethier grounded out against lefty Eric O’Flaherty.

After Choate retired one of two Braves in the tenth, it wasn’t Kenley Jansen, who hadn’t pitched since Monday, who entered to extinguish the threat, but Brandon League, who’s been an absolute disaster as a Dodger. Michael Bourn, who had singled against Choate, stole second and advanced to third on a poor throw from Matt Treanor, followed by League striking out Martin Prado (thanks in large part to Prado, who swung at ball four and possibly ball five). Chipper Jones drove the ball solidly to center, but fortunately right at Kemp; a few feet in any direction, and the Dodgers would have lost with their worst reliever as their best one sat unused in the bullpen. And don’t we all love when that happens?

In the eleventh, League allowed runners on the corners with two outs thanks to hits from David Ross & Paul Janish. Mattingly strode to the mound to make a double-switch, bringing in A.J. Ellis for Treanor (just the second time all year both catchers have played in the same game) and his ace reliever to put out the fire with the winning run 90 feet away… Jamey Wright. Wright immediately allowed Juan Francisco to knock a single into left field for an Atlanta win; meanwhile, Jansen – who’s thrown six pitches in a week (!) as the Dodgers have generally been winning by large margins – never got a chance. Because CLOSERS GONNA CLOSE, don’t you know. And Jansen will stay up waiting all night for that save opportunity which will never come.

All of this overshadowed the positives of the game for the Dodgers, and there were several. Chris Capuano was excellent once again, striking out eight while pitching into the eighth inning, and even then the two hits he allowed in that frame were hardly well-struck. Ethier, for the first time since July 17 and only the second time in more than two months, went deep – and it was absolutely crushed. Hanley Ramirez had two more hits, continuing his productivity since joining the Dodgers. And Luis Cruz, that inexplicable, wonderful, fantastic Luis Cruz, reached base in each of the five times he was up on three hits and two walks.

Still, this was a game the Dodgers could have and perhaps should have won; with San Francisco crushing the Padres 9-0 after just three innings, it’s probably going to cost them first place, at least for a night.

Don Mattingly Channels His Inner Allen Iverson

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Don Mattingly, on whether Matt Kemp‘s injury might keep him out of the All-Star Game:

“We’re talking about him playing for us before the break. We’re talking about guessing when he’ll be ready. It seems silly to me. He’s not ready to play yet and we’re talking about the All-Star Game. We’re talking about practice.”

Practice. We talkin’ bout practice, man.