Cooper Criswell optioned to AAA
- Thread starter soxhop411
- Start date
Must be one of the best 6th starter option runs I’ve seen recently. Smoke and mirrors, unsustainable whatever…. He’s given way more than could have been expected
Stinks for Criswell but it's hard to imagine he has another gear beyond this or that he can keep outperforming his peripherals for much longer. He did a fantastic job cementing himself as a sixth starter and potential bulk guy if needed, though — a savvy depth addition from Breslow and one that's already paid off immensely. I imagine the next time they need a fifth starter, it'll be to see what Winckowski can do.
I don't know, the K/BB ratio looks good to me, the underlying peripherals aren't bad at all.
There's plenty to be improved on here, but the BB% and the GB% are very good, the chase % is good. He doesn't get many whiffs but there's a good pitcher in there. His ERA is actually almost a full run worse than his xERA. If anything, his ERA has underperformed his peripherals. The thing he struggles with most is getting into deep counts because his stuff is pretty easy to foul off.
I'd be shocked if he didn't come back up at some point.
Sort of reminds me of 2018 when Hector Velazquez went 7-2, 3.18 in 85 IP, Brian Johnson had a 106 ERA+ in 99 IP, and Steven Wright had a 165 ERA+ in 53 IP.
Or what the Yankees seemed to always get from nobodies every season like 20 years ago.
I was pretty sure Felix Dubront was going to be Jon Lester’s replacement without missing a beat for the following 6 seasons
I remember talking to a Yankee friend of mine around that time and bemoaning how lucky they were to get these types of random performances from journeymen and he was like oh no I think they figured something out with Small and they think he can sustain this success going forward. That... didn't work out for them
Keep in mind that with offense down; pitching is theoretically easier to find. As useful as Criswell was, he had a 102 era+ and 0.1 bWAR. Aaron Small was 133 era+ and 2.7 bWAR in 2005.
Granted, sometimes a replacement level performance is more than adequate when you are used to getting much worse!
Granted, sometimes a replacement level performance is more than adequate when you are used to getting much worse!
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