Blake Snell looked unbeatable, Cash and analytics said otherwise
Blake Snell of the Tampa Bay Rays was pitching the game of his life, leading the Los Angeles Dodgers 1-0, limiting them to two hits over 5 1/3 innings, when his manager, Kevin Cash, decided he’d seen enough.
Cash, who I’ve long considered the smartest manager in baseball, made one of the dumbest moves I’ve ever seen. And it caused the Rays on Tuesday night to lose the decisive Game 6 of the World Series. After Snell yielded a one-out routine single to center field, Cash tapped his right arm to summon Nick Anderson from the bullpen.
As Cash approached him, the 6-foot-4, 27-year-old Snell looked apoplectic, as if he were being arrested for a crime he did not commit.
“I was definitely disappointed, upset,” Snell said after the Dodgers rallied for a 3-1 victory and their first world championship since 1988. “I felt good. I did everything I could to make my case to stay out there. It was one of the better games I’ve pitched in a long time.”
Cash made his fateful decision based not on how Snell was pitching at the time, but on analytics: His ERA tends to soar after the second trip through the batting order. But that doesn’t always happen.
“I felt Blake had done his job and then some,” Cash said. “He was outstanding. But I didn’t want Mookie Betts or Corey Seager seeing Blake a third time.”
Hall of Fame player-turned analyst Chipper Jones tweeted: “Dude has a 9K, 2-hit shutout, with 73 pitches, and you yank him? I’m riding my horse.”
A baseball manager must discern how the pitcher is doing in that moment, just as a good horse trainer can tell the condition of his horse. It’s not just about past performances.
MLB Network’s Al Leiter, who once threw 140 pitches in a World Series game, said, “This isn’t a No. 4 starter who just happened to have a good game. This is a winner of the (2018) American League Cy Young. You go with your eyeballs. He had electric stuff, a four-pitch mix, and he got strikeouts on all four of them. He was overpowering. He was cruising.”
Indeed, Snell had extra pop on his fastball. He usually maxes out at 96 mph but on this chilly night in Arlington, Texas, he was consistently clocking 97.
The Dodgers were all but flinging their caps into the air when they saw Cash advancing to the mound. Betts and some of his teammates said afterward they were ecstatic about Snell coming out.
It reminded me of last October when Zack Greinke was mowing down the Washington Nationals and A.J. Hinch, much to the delight of the Nationals, pulled him from Game 7 and blew that World Series.
Did Kevin Cash give any thought to how Snell’s successor might do?
Al Leiter: “And then here comes Nick Anderson. He’s had a fine season, but this postseason he did not. This was his seventh game in a row that he gave up a run. You take out your ace who’s dominating, and you bring in another guy.”
Indeed, just about everyone but Kevin Cash could tell that Nick Anderson was worn down, thanks to overuse by Kevin Cash.
Anderson pitched seven games in 19 days, and in 10 innings he allowed 14 hits, 4 walks, 8 runs, all earned, while striking out only 5. This was his third appearance in this World Series.
Harold Reynolds on MLB Network cited these analytics: “Over the last two postseasons, when a team sees the same reliever three times in a series, the batting average shoots up to .340, with 11 home runs.”
I agree with Leiter that “analytics are a great tool, but they shouldn’t write the script.”
Baseball is the sport I love the most, but I don’t like the path it’s on. Soon we will have robots for umpires, and we might as well have robots for managers.
