One more thing. I'm not "blaming" a starting pitcher for a bullpen blowing his game. But when you only go six innings, that's going to happen sometimes. The fact is, when a starter is only expected to give his team six or seven innings at the most, it should be much easier for a starter to post a high winning percentage. If a guy is really so good, we would expect him to leave the game with the lead most of the time. Sure, his bullpen may blow his game resulting in a no decision, but he isn't getting a loss late.

_________________
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1. One of Kluber's two wins he went 9IP 0ER. I'd wager maybe only 1 or 2 other pitchers have done that this year.
2. 20th overall in MLB in runs/game and 2nd to last in the AL. JUGGERNAUT!
3. They only have 5 regulars in the lineup with an OBP over .300. Two of them are Cabrera with .306 (.218 BA) and Santana with .310 (.152 BA).
4. I've listened or watched 75% of Indians games. Their line up is atrocious. They have Santana and Swisher batting 3/4 as they have no other choice. A COMBINED batting average of .352, 6HR, 23RBI

I'm not sure what your point is with Paragraph 1. He got the win he earned.

Cleveland was certainly expected to have a more high powered offense than they have shown in the first 30 or so games, and I wouldn't count on them finishing 20th in runs scored.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

Just pointing out Kluber is doing his best to meet your absurd expectations of spinning a complete game every start.

I don't expect him to pitch a complete game every time. Or even at all. But if you're going to tell me how good he is, I do expect him to pitch better than the supposedly lesser guys he faces most of the time.

Let me ask you this: Did Kluber really pitch well yesterday or did poor Rienzo just fail to get any run support?

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

The Sox line up failed to get run support. Kluber is an solid 4th/5th pitcher. But he set an Indians record of 7 straight SO (Should've been 9). That's better than Colon, Perry, Hershiser, Lee, Sabathia, Feller. A White Sox line-up 4th in MLB in runs/game. They must've been up late drinking too much on W. 6th or Ohio City.

A lineup doesn't get "run support". It scores runs. And it scores them off pitchers. The concept of "run support" relates directly to an expectation that a pitcher's offense should score more runs than the one he is facing and completely ignores the fact that there are opposing pitcher(s) in a game.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
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I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

When all else fails, go after Kirkwood's accidental use of the word 'get' instead of 'give'.

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Rick Hahn is the best GM in baseball.

Are you Kirkwood's lawyer or spokesman? I think the man can type for himself. The way he put it suggests a belief that the game is played in component parts with no relation to other events that have occurred or will occur in the game (something I know you believe).

If you believe in the concept of "run support", then don't tell me how good a pitcher is. Just tell me the pitcher(s) he opposed didn't receive run support.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

A pitcher needs to only focus on getting the batter in front of him out. That's it. He shouldn't be concerned what his offense or what the other pitcher is doing. If he receives a win on his record for his efforts that's a bonus.

You don't know what I believe. You don't know what anyone here believes. Or these discussions would be a lot more productive.

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Rick Hahn is the best GM in baseball.

If a person's statements in this forum aren't evidence of what he believes, any further "communication" with such a person is pointless. I suspect many believe that about you already.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

"Should" is a powerful word. How easy do you think it is to ignore what's occuring in the game apart from what you're specifically doing? I'm sure there are some guys capable of doing it. They're probably winning pitchers.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

This is the worst thread of the year.

Not even close.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

If it's not now, it will be in 3 more pages.

The horse is dead.

Still more interesting than any NBA thread.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

They way he looks this year so far 5/90 seems fair given the crazy money quality SP are getting...

You have severe trouble understanding statements. This is made evident by you incorrectly describing other people's viewpoints, repeatedly.

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Rick Hahn is the best GM in baseball.

Not quite. I understand the English language at least as well as anyone here. If you- or anyone else- can't properly articulate a viewpoint, that's certainly not any failing of mine.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

Crazy then how everyone else seems to understand everyone else's view point.

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Rick Hahn is the best GM in baseball.

Funnier how you speak for everyone here. Fuckin' clown.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

And it didn't take you long to display your lack of understanding of the English language.

I used the phrase 'seems to.' As in...the way I view the conversation within the thread.

If anyone disagrees with that assessment ...they know how to reply.

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Rick Hahn is the best GM in baseball.

I'm often the only one foolish enough to reply to your idiocy. That's a failing of mine.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

I'm not going back to read huge blocks of pages in this thread. The horse is well dead at this point.

The problem with this line of thinking is that we shouldn't be focusing on Wins, we should be looking at runs.
Because a run is a run, and the name of the game.
to measure value in baseball, we’re measuring runs. being a superior hitter or better baserunner offensively adds additional runs that your team would not have scored otherwise. A superior defensive player subtracts runs that the opposing team otherwise would have scored.

Pythagorean theory (that Bernstein loves) basically tells us that the only meaningful inputs to predict the number of wins a team is going to have are the number of runs scored and number of runs allowed. There is a very small bullpen quality effect, and use of PH and substitution patterns; but in a broad theoretical discussion here, let's ignore that.

Ergo, there are two ways you can win more games. you can increase the number of runs you score, or decrease the number of runs you allow. Neither of these are better than the other.

The WINS argument kills me, especially in light of the idea that comparing pitchers value is more important, as nobody has more influence on the prevention of runs than the starting pitcher.. it's weighting defensive runs saved [the concept, not DRS] as equal to offensive runs gained-- and those don't happen in a vacuum as many posters have pointed out. You don't have to embrace statistics, advanced metrics, or really any metrics at all. But you are going to be living in the Dark Ages here very shortly.

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1926-1931-1934-1942-1944-1946-1964-1967-1982-2006-2011

How can you compare runs scored tonight in Wrigley, when it's nearly impossible to score, with what it will likely be like on Wednesday at U.S. Cellular when it's 75 degrees?

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
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With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

Somebody tell adam dunn its not impossible to score when you're standing on 3rd and a pitch goes rattling arounf the backstop…

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And shouldn't McEwing be screaming "GO!!!!!!"? Why even pay a fucking third base coach?

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

Runs aren't scored in a vacuum. Anyone that would look at numbers produced in tonight's conditions at Wrigley with a more "normal" condition at the Cell, and say that they were the same is an absurdist, that likes to use the numbers simply to argue or validate certain talking points.

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1926-1931-1934-1942-1944-1946-1964-1967-1982-2006-2011

Right, but Samardzija has pitched the majority of his games in very favorable conditions for pitchers and that has resulted in his low ERA and WHIP. People are insisting he's having a great season so far. Isn't that really the same thing?

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don