Let's talk about Michael Pineda
- Thread starter jon abbey
- Start date
JimBoSox9 said:
In general I would agree, but in this specific case/game, after the national media hub-bub after the last incident I could easily see Rothschild saying "hey, dont pull any shit out there today, spotlight will be too hot.". No, Rothschild isnt the Mother Theresa of pitching coaches, but I could see him discouraging it for that game.
Bud Selig weighed in, albeit briefly, at an Associated Press Sports Editors commissioners meeting today:
APSE @APSE_sportmedia 6h
Selig on Pineda/pine tar: "There's a million ways to do it. This one, I can understand why Joe Torre reacted how he did. It was obvious."
Edit: I have no idea how to make Tweets show up properly. If someone wants to PM me instructions, that'd be great.
APSE @APSE_sportmedia 6h
Selig on Pineda/pine tar: "There's a million ways to do it. This one, I can understand why Joe Torre reacted how he did. It was obvious."
Edit: I have no idea how to make Tweets show up properly. If someone wants to PM me instructions, that'd be great.
NEW YORK -- MLB commissioner Bud Selig says the sport will wait until after the season to study whether the rule preventing pitchers from using pine tar should be changed.
http://espn.go.com/mlb/story/_/id/10840255/mlb-look-pine-tar-rule-season
http://espn.go.com/mlb/story/_/id/10840255/mlb-look-pine-tar-rule-season
For fuck's sake, just use the rosin bag. All statements like that do is bail Pineda out. Of course it helps grip, but its main use is to doctor the ball. Will MLB look into rules preventing hitters from taking steroids because it might help them grip the bat more tightly?
If pitchers were just using rosin, you might have a point. But since most are using less obvious stuff than pine tar, and also cheating, I don't see what the problem is in reevaluating substances in general.mt8thsw9th said:
Also, your statement is the first time I've heard anything that suggests pine tar doctors the ball and presumably changes movement. Everything I've seen talks about grip. Do you have anything to back that up?
Unless you slathered it on so heavily that the ball was brown, it doesn't change the aerodynamics of the ballEvilEmpire said:
It is used for grip, period.
Better grip is kind of a big deal. If pine tar provides grip above and beyond that which could be achieved by the rosin (which it does), then the application as a grip aid or in ball doctoring should not matter. The pine tar itself does not doctor the movement, the ability to grip the ball better provides the pitcher with a greater ability to apply more torque on the ball, which equals greater movement.
Both give the pitcher an advantage he would not have otherwise under the current rules.
Both give the pitcher an advantage he would not have otherwise under the current rules.
Yes, but the claim was made that pine tar is used to "doctor the ball". And that is not the case.
I agree with you on the effects of better grip.
I agree with you on the effects of better grip.
Yeah, I agree, I guess what I am saying is that the effect of better grip is potentially equal to doctoring the ball and there's a lot of back and forth about it and there really doesn't need to be. Both give the pitcher an advantage above and beyond the rules.* Basically my retort was more general than to just the current swing of this thread.
Plus, all Pineda had to do was watch Major League for potential hiding spots.
*as currently constituted.
Plus, all Pineda had to do was watch Major League for potential hiding spots.
*as currently constituted.
I think most of us are in agreement as to grip. Grip is important enough that we've been hearing for weeks about how most pitchers feel compelled to cheat in order to improve it. Most if them of course use substances other than pine tar and are much more subtle about it.FarvinMoosey said:
I absolutely hate the idea of a Yankee pitching coach or teammate feeling obligated to school Pineda on how to cheat better. I also don't much care for all the splitting of hairs on how some ways of cheating for better grip are more or less acceptable than others. Cheating is cheating. Thankfully there hasn't been a lot of that in these forums, but listening to talking heads on various broadcasts talk about it that way irritates me.
If the practice of illegally augmenting grip is so widespread, I'd prefer the league evaluate it and either approve it or increase vigilance against it.
Average Reds said:
http://edge.si.com/edge/2014/04/24/pineda-and-pine-tar-scientists-take
Alan Nathan says
Nathan being a bit diplomatic there, but aside from his "belief" on what most pitchers use it for, hardly the stuff of good science, he basically is saying that in the hands of a skilled pitcher, pine tar can be used to do more than provide a better grip.
Frankly, umpires should be able to detect the use of pine tar simply by inspecting the balls which they never seem to do, so not sure why using a big glob of pine tar would be hard to get away with. Pineda certainly looked to have more than enough pine tar in which to do more than just improve grip, and the fact he used it in the climate controlled dome in Toronto suggests he was using it for more than grip.
EvilEmpire said:
Someone once said: If you ain't cheatin', you ain't tryin'. (I think it was Abner Doubleday, shortly after he invented baseball in Cooperstown, NY, but I am having trouble finding a link for it.)
I have heard the YES commentators explain that hitters want the pitchers to have a better grip because, my goodness, they don't want the pitchers to miss their spots. That doesn't make sense to me. If the pitcher is trying to spot a fastball in the Maddux low and away spot on the black, and the ball ends up middle-middle, why is the hitter going to be upset about that?
--
Edit: formatting.
Of course, both grip and location vary along a spectrum. No hitter wants a pitcher to be so wild as to be all over the place, and speaking as a former pitcher who nailed a mascot or two in his day, a bad grip (say, from the cold) can lead to such disasters. So in this sense, hitters are certainly willing to have pitchers have a good enough grip to avoid danger. But no, they wouldn't wish them to have pinpoint control (not that grip alone guarantees any such thing), and neither would they want them to be able to get an extra feel on a good curveball (for instance). I always found that extra grip made it far easier to throw a much sharper curveball.HriniakPosterChild said:
Bingo. You just can't define bright lines between grip, spin, control, movement. You can make a general characterization about scuffing the ball vs loading the ball vs hand stickum, but the edges between them are extremely blurry. The devil's in the details and we'll never know enough about each guy's process to be able to tease out the real impact.
Is this news? New to me.
[tweet]https://twitter.com/Joelsherman1/status/461341948855738368[/tweet]
Ten game suspension turning into a month. Sucks for them.
[tweet]https://twitter.com/Joelsherman1/status/461341948855738368[/tweet]
Ten game suspension turning into a month. Sucks for them.
I had thought a player had to actually be physically able to play in order for a suspension to take place - so that, for instance, a suspension couldn't take place during a time when a player was injured and wouldn't have been playing anyway.
Is that only if they're officially on the DL? Or am I just imagining that was the case entirely?
Is that only if they're officially on the DL? Or am I just imagining that was the case entirely?
terrisus said:
It seemed to me that Sherman was suggesting that the 10 days of downtime is long enough that he can't just jump back, so he has to ease back into it, which could take the 3-4 weeks. I don't think he's saying he's injured.
rembrat said:
Yeah it is weird. I'm guessing you can't practice with the team or whatever, but that means he can't throw? Wonder if it's just a little fib to help limit the innings even more.
Maybe terrisus is right and something happened today, shutting him down for 10 days from now? Who knows.
Whatever Sherman said is wrong. He was pitching in Tampa today and got a grade 1 sprain in his lat muscle. That's why he's out for 3-4 weeks.
mabrowndog is a dingus[/tweet]
Ten game suspension turning into a month. Sucks for them.
https://twitter.com/Joelsherman1/status/461341948855738368JohntheBaptist said:
mabrowndog is a dingus[/tweet]
Ten game suspension turning into a month. Sucks for them.
Then that's my mistake--I conflated the "10 days" with his suspension, my bad. Thanks for the clarification.
That kinda sounds worse now.
That kinda sounds worse now.
Oh well. His innings were going to be limited anyway, and at least now he'll be back when the weather is warmer. Maybe he can use the time to figure out the whole pine tar thing.
This is the same thing that Clayton Kershaw is currently rehabbing.
Can we start calling Pineda "Mr. Glass" after the next setback?
Can we start calling Pineda "Mr. Glass" after the next setback?
He is scheduled to start game 162 in Sunday, but has been dominant in the 12 starts he's managed to make before and after his suspension/injury. He has only given up more than 2 ERs in a game once in those 12 starts, a ridiculous 1.93 ERA and 0.86 WHIP, holding the oppostion to a collective .547 OPS.
If he and Tanaka are healthy next year (admittedly a big if), NY has a very tough 1/2 at the top of the rotation to build around.
If he and Tanaka are healthy next year (admittedly a big if), NY has a very tough 1/2 at the top of the rotation to build around.