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January 13, 2025 at 1:03 pm #274767
MLB published an article that is interesting to read about the 5 man versus 6 man rotations. What are everyone’s thoughts on this? I recommend reading the article before jumping to an opinion. It was interesting for me to read and get some data on the 6 man as I have grown accustomed to a 5 man and wrote off 6 man basically.
Do you think the 25 Cards could benefit from a 6 man rotation? I think it would be interesting to think through and see if it helps us put more rookie SPs to the fire to see what each one has.
https://www.mlb.com/news/why-more-mlb-teams-are-using-6-man-rotations
January 13, 2025 at 2:41 pm #274768I’m not really a fan. I don’t think it solves anything. It just shifts the balance a bit out of whack the other way.
Now I am a fan of completely getting rid of “starters” altogether and having a bunch of 3-5 inning guys – maybe as many as 10 of them and a few 1 inning guys. This model feels like it fits both today’s pitchers better and the Cardinals current situation better.
January 13, 2025 at 3:42 pm #274770I still haven’t gotten over the idea that if a pitcher throws 5 innings, he feel like he did his job, and if he throws 6 innings, he thinks he’s thrown a complete game, and if he has to throw seven or more innings, he worries that he might get injured and might not be able to get all the money he is entitled to.
IMO, if a pitcher only pitches every 6 days, he’s not really a starter, rather he’s the kind of pitcher that Jnevel describes above.
January 13, 2025 at 4:30 pm #274771There’s quite a few so-called members of a rotation that work a turn about every 6 weeks.
January 13, 2025 at 5:36 pm #274772I don’t think it’s a durability issue. In pro sports, all athletes are bigger, stronger and faster than they ever have been. Olympians continue to set new records, 300 pound lineman now run 4.4 40’s, and your average middle schooler can dribble and pass like Cousy (ok, maybe not pass). The issue IMO has to be the mechanics that come with how guys have to pitch now to get those elite athletes out. I’d bet every hitter today is twice as good as DiMaggio or Gehrig. The level and focus of the game is just so much more intense due to all the money flowing into it to make it that way. Either that or baseball pitchers are all just a bunch of wimps for no particular reason. Believe whichever you prefer. But my money is on the game has changed and the stress of throwing a perfect slider with X amount of inches of break on it 30 times a game plus every other unique pitch in an arsenal is just a lot more taxing than Nolan Ryan just rearing back and throwing it hard without regard for spin rate every time. The game has changed. The strategy around how to use pitchers needs to change too.
January 13, 2025 at 6:56 pm #274774Well, the Cardinals won’t have to worry about that for awhile, because they aren’t going to go deep into the playoffs for awhile…
And you have the question of whether it is going to help the bullpen by pitchers going deeper into games or hurt it by taxing it more.
When the Cardinals traded for a bunch of pitchers at the 2023 trade deadline, I was hoping they would “send waves” of pitchers to MLB and develop them by piggy-backing starters on top of each other. Say every 5th day, you are going to have Matz pitch 4 innings and Graceffo pitch 4 innings, leaving one inning for the rest of the bullpen to cover…and keeping everyone stretched out in event of injury…
I think until there is data regarding how it impacts bullpen usage and sp health, I’d rather see more multi-inning relievers.
January 13, 2025 at 7:06 pm #274777I guess hitters have evolved and pitchers haven’t?
January 13, 2025 at 7:19 pm #274778I agree Jnevel. When you look at pitchers, they may be throwing less innings per year, but they are throwing each pitch with such effort to do whatever they can to get out each hitter.
I thought the point about the season length was also interesting. MLB keeps expanding the playoffs and more teams are playing in them for more games with less recovery time between the season. It probably doesn’t help that most player now a days are doing much more intensive off-season throwing programs to train and improve. In the old times, many pitchers would go work a normal job in the of season.
January 13, 2025 at 7:25 pm #274781If they aren’t going to unload Matz and Mikolas, they might as well give it a try. Maybe pitching on extra rest will help them turn things around.
However, to make it work you are going to need a couple guys who can pitch two innings of middle relief, every 10 days or so. Chris Stratton was in this role for a few months, a couple of years ago, but they reverted to using him one inning at a time.January 13, 2025 at 7:45 pm #274784I would also be on board with piggy backing with 4 innings stints from guys like Hence in the future, with some guys like Mathews in the future still going 6 or 7 innings regularly. Every pitcher is different and there isn’t a point in trying to mold everyone into either a 1 inning RP or a 6+ inning SP. There are guys that will be in the middle, and I think a smart team could try to take advantage of that. Maybe they have 1 or 2 guys that pitch every 5 days deeper, and then another couple that pitch 3 innings every 3 or 4 days, and someone that pitches every 6 days. It makes predicting a rotation difficult, but try to tail your rotation to your pitchers optimal workflow.
For the Cards, I could see a modified 6 man type rotation working out. Gray is good to go to provide 5-6 quality innings every 5 days. Mikolas is only good for a single time through the order, but the team wants to use him as a bulk guy. Maybe throw him every 3 games for 2-3 innings. Matz can’t be trusted to throw much deeper than a few innings even if he isn’t hurt. McGreevy and Pallante could go every 6 days and try to pitch deeper into games and build up their innings. For McGreevy he is used to 6 days from the minors and let him adjust to the bigs pitching the same frequency he did in the minors.
There definitely are drawbacks like less RP available and potentially needing to make more roster up down moves for fresh arms. It also is much harder to plan out 2 weeks of consecutive games, but that is something I’m sure some whiz could work out.
Long term hopefully Matz, Mikolas, and Fedde aren’t taking those rotation spots throughout 25. I hope all 3 are gone by July or a pure piggyback scenario / long RP
January 13, 2025 at 8:02 pm #274786I’d like to see someone try a 7-man rotation of 4 starters with a pitch count of about 75 on 3 games rest followed by 3 “piggy back long men” with a pitch count of 50 on 2 games rest, and then a 6-man bullpen.
Gray 75, Matz 50
Mikolas 75, Liberatore 50
McGreevy 75, Thompson 50
Pallante 75, Matz 50
Gray 75, Liberatore 50
Mikolas 75, Thompson 50
McGreevy 75, Matz 50
Pallante 75, Liberatore 50
Gray 75, Thompson 50
Mikolas 75, Matz 50
McGreevy 75, Liberatore 50
Pallante 75, Thompson 50The starting pitchers go through the batting order twice (4.5 IP).
The long relievers go through another 13 hitters (3 IP). Ideally, this is a LHP but the other team cannot stack RH batters against them… which makes them better than they would have been as starters.
Then the bullpen takes over for the final 25 pitches per game (1.5+ IP).January 13, 2025 at 8:46 pm #274793I’m not a fan of the 6 man rotation. It would deplete your bullpen in a hurry unless you have several quality relievers with options that you can shuttle back and forth to AAA.
Good grief I can still remember when some teams would use a 4 man rotation and starters were ridiculed if they didn’t toss at least 200 innings a year. I recall some starters going over 300 innings a year.
Players have gotten so soft.
January 13, 2025 at 9:40 pm #274796Soft ‘n Gentle…
January 14, 2025 at 10:00 am #274803Well, without reading the article, I’d say the 6 man rotation is coming and will be the standard within 5-10 seasons.
Baseball has evolved since the days when Gibby would pitch 3 complete games in the WS in about 10 days!
January 14, 2025 at 10:36 am #274804Another option would be to go with a five slot rotation, but the bottom two positions might not be the same guys every five days. Say, for example, guys like like Matz, Milolas, Pallante, etc. could be used as either starters or long middle relief.
Let’s say on day 5 of the rotation, one of those guys pitches four effective innings, but their pitch count is getting kind of high, go ahead and yank them while you are leading the game, or tied. Why wait for them to melt down?
Then, as the rotation goes through another cycle, the guy you pulled after four inings and 70-75 pitches can probably start or pitch middle relief somewhat effectively toward the back end of that new rotation cycle.January 14, 2025 at 12:26 pm #274808The six-man rotation seems like a natural evolution in line with the wat the game has transgressed. I think we will eventually see 27 man rosters and the six-man rotation as normal, with the expanded schedule (March to November in some years) and emphasis on maximum effort every pitch.
My preference lies more in bullpen usage than starters. I would like to see managers get away from the idea that relievers can only go one inning. The classic old “long relief” guy has gone extinct.
Similar to our esteemed poster Rats, I have played a lot of sim baseball. I was in a league one time where I had the 1962 Dodgers, and they had Stan Williams on their pitching staff. I loved having a guy like Williams as I could start him once in awhile, and use him 3-4 innings now and then, or bring him in for one innings. Using him 3 or 4 innings would require a 2 to 3 day rest, but he was available most of the time. In real life Williams pitched in 40 games with 28 starts and only 5 complete games; 184 innings.
I think that sort of pitcher can still be available today. Once a guy has come in and is warmed up and in a groove, he should be able to keep going another inning or two and not tax the rest of the bullpen so much.
January 14, 2025 at 10:35 pm #274830A 5-man rotation means most starts are made by a starter on 5 (not 4) days rest due to off days.
A 6-man rotation will mean most starts will be made by a starter on 6 (not 5) days rest due to off days.
Starters will basically pitch one day per week.2024
ERA Starts Days of rest
3.87 42 3
4.08 1528 4
4.13 2053 5
4.33 1125 6+Admittedly, those 6+ days of rest starts probably don’t happen as often to #1 or #2 starters.
However, with a 6-man rotation your #1 or #2 starter would get only 27 starts per season.
With 27 starts, they would need to average 6 innings per start just to make it to 162 innings and qualify for the ERA title. Also, winning 20+ games would become nearly impossible.January 23, 2025 at 11:07 am #275274I read some of this thread over the last 10 days and for the last few years have wondered if having a “Japanese style” rotation would work. In Japan they have SP set to a day of the week start. The Dodgers with their SP depth (and Japanese SP) I could see do this easily. Teams are going to play basically every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. If they set Snell as Friday SP, Yamamoto as Saturday SP, and Ohtani as Sunday SP, then worked the M-Th with Sazaki, Glasnow, and Gonslin they could make it work almost all the way through May before they’d need a “bullpen day” or something. So if the Cardinals wanted to try something, could they make it work? Obviously this would require a 7 man bullpen, but teams often had 7 man bullpen before the roster size was expanded to 26 a few years back. So if they said Fiday- Gray, Saturday- Fedde, Sunday- Pallante, and worked the M-Th with Matz, McGreevy, and Mikolas with each SP making 1 start a week. Does this limit innings? Limit injuries? Allow SP to go deeper into games? Sunday is most likely a day game, is there a SP who pitches better in day games? Pitcher bad in day games, have them as the Friday SP which is going to almost always be a night game?
Th 3/27- Gray
Fr 3/28- OFF
Sa 3/29- Fedde
Su 3/30- Pallante
Mo 3/31- Matz
Tu 4/01- McGreevy
We 4/02- Mikolas
Th 4/03- OFF
Fi 4/04- Gray
Sa 4/05- Fedde
Su 4/06- Pallante
Mo 4/07- Matz
Tu 4/08- McGreevy
We 4/09- Mikolas
Th 4/10- OFF
Fr 4/11- Gray
Sa 4/12- Fedde
Su 4/13- Pallante
Mo 4/14- Matz
Tu 4/15- McGreevy
We 4/16- Mikolas
Th 4/17- ????
Fr 4/18- Gray
Sa 4/19- Fedde
Su 4/20- Pallante
Mo 4/21- Matz
Tu 4/22- McGreevy
We 4/23- Mikolas
Th 4/24- OFF
Fr 4/25- Gray
Sa 4/26- Fedde
Su 4/27- Pallante
Mo 4/28- Matz
Tu 4/29- McGreevy
We 4/30- Mikolas
Th 5/01- ????
Fr 5/02- Gray
Sa 5/03- Fedde
Su 5/04- Pallante
Mo 5/05- Matz
Tu 5/06- McGreevy
We 5/07- Mikolas
Th 5/08- OFF
Fr 5/09- Gray
Sa 5/10- Fedde
Su 5/11- Pallante
Mo 5/12- Matz
Tu 5/13- McGreevy
We 5/14- Mikolas
Th 5/15- OFF
Fr 5/16- Gray
Sa 5/17- Fedde
Su 5/18- Pallante
Mo 5/19- Matz
Tu 5/20- McGreevy
We 5/21- Mikolas
Th 5/22- OFF
Fr 5/23- Gray
Sa 5/24- Fedde
Su 5/25- Pallante
Mo 5/26- Matz
Tu 5/27- McGreevy
We 5/28- Mikolas
Th 5/29- OFF
Fr 5/30- Gray
Sa 5/31- Fedde
Su 6/01- Pallante
Mo 6/02- OFF
Tu 6/03- Matz
We 6/04- McGreevy
Th 6/05- Mikolas
Fr 6/06- Gray
Sa 6/07- Fedde
Su 6/08- Pallante
Mo 6/09- Matz
Tu 6/10- McGreevy
We 6/11- Mikolas
Th 6/12- ????
Fr 6/13- Gray
Sa 6/14- Fedde
Su 6/15- Pallante
Mo 6/16- OFF
Tu 6/17- Matz
We 6/18- McGreevy
Th 6/19- Mikolas
Fr 6/20- Gray
Sa 6/21- Fedde
Su 6/22- Pallante
Mo 6/23- Matz
Tu 6/24- McGreevy
We 6/25- Mikolas
Th 6/26- ????
Fr 6/27- Gray
Sa 6/28- Fedde
Su 6/29- Pallante
Mo 6/30- Matz
Tu 7/01- McGreevy
We 7/02- Mikolas
Th 7/03- OFF
Fr 7/04- Gray
Sa 7/05- Fedde
Su 7/06- Pallante
Mo 7/07- OFF
Tu 7/08- Matz
We 7/09- McGreevy
Th 7/10- Mikolas
Fr 7/11- Gray
Sa 7/12- Fedde
Su 7/13- PallanteI know that’s a lot, but it’s to the All-Star break and if they tried it (and everyone was healthy) they would only need 4 starts made outside of those 6. They could go with a pen game or demote a guy to bring up a SP for the day and then demote him to bring up a different RP. It would be unorthodox for sure, but could it work?
January 23, 2025 at 12:50 pm #275279Obviously this would require a 7 man bullpen, but teams often had 7 man bullpen before the roster size was expanded to 26 a few years back.
Yes but that was back in the day when a starting pitcher didn’t receive a ticker tape parade for going 5 innings.
January 23, 2025 at 1:06 pm #275280Yes but that was back in the day when a starting pitcher didn’t receive a ticker tape parade for going 5 innings.
That’s kinda my point with this. If Gray, Fedde, Pallante start every weekend series. They know they are starting every Friday, Saturday, Sunday and making 28 starts each, 1 day a week. Get back to extending the SP because they are only starting their 1 day a week and making 28 starts. Plus on the marketing side of selling tickets they can say you are guaranteed to get a Gray start on Friday night. Which more is why I was thinking about the Dodgers doing this. If they were to guarantee a Snell start Friday, Yamamoto on Saturday, and Ohtani on Sunday every week how they could market that and ticket sales.
January 23, 2025 at 1:47 pm #275281What about the size of needless job titles? I was just now made aware that the Cardinals employ three assistant general managers…Haha! Does it really take three guys to comb and style Girsch’s pretty head of hair? Or a better question may be, what purpose if any, does Girsch serve on this collection of gifted whiz-kids? What a waste…
January 23, 2025 at 5:03 pm #275282The Cardinals have had three AGMs for many years. Girsch was moved into a projects position and the GM job is open.
January 23, 2025 at 6:31 pm #275284Haha…”Projects Position” Sounds like he’s on the management team at Pruitt-Igoe.
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