Starters become bit players with emphasis on bullpens
The World Series was just more than an hour old when the first starting pitcher was removed.
The reasons for Framber Valdez’s slow walk would have been the same in 1921 as they were in 2021: The Houston Astros left-hander got shellacked, allowing nine base runners and recording only six outs. His shower came with his team already down by five runs.
“We had to go get him at that point,” Houston Manager Dusty Baker said.
Just 20 minutes later Tuesday night, Atlanta Braves right-hander Charlie Morton hurled a curveball that froze Houston second baseman José Altuve, a strikeout. And here was Morton, unstable on his right leg, limping off the mound, not a single thought that he could remain in the game. The reason: broken fibula.
“He wants to be on this stage,” Atlanta Manager Brian Snitker said. “God bless him. I really hate it for him.”
That was it: two starting pitchers, 4⅓ innings completed, 96 pitches thrown.
Swing open that bullpen gate, boys. And keep ’em coming.
That baseball is unrecognizable to the Steve Carltons, Nolan Ryans and Jim Palmers of the world is not breaking news, but it is a defining characteristic. The starters who exited early from the Braves’ series-opening 6-2 victory did so for traditional reasons: poor performance by Valdez, injury to Morton. But the trend, by now, is both well-established and far from a small sample: Starters do less. Relievers do more. The game is tilted off its axis. And who knows when – or if – it will tilt back?
Consider that the last two teams standing arrived at this World Series not because their starters routinely pitched effectively deep into games but because the expectations are so low from the first pitch that a five-inning effort can seem solid, a seven-inning stint monstrous, an eight-inning outing superhuman. That’s what Valdez delivered in his most recent start, a series-changing victory over Boston in Game 5 of the American League Championship Series.
That’s an absolute outlier. Only one other pitcher this entire postseason –
San Francisco’s Logan Webb – so much as saw the eighth inning. Of the eight teams that reached the division series, only two – Milwaukee and San Francisco – got more outs from their starters than their relievers.
The prevailing notion in baseball – backed up by the numbers – is that pitchers are at a distinct disadvantage when they go through a lineup for the third time.
Game 2 on Wednesday night matched José Urquidy for Houston against Max Fried for Atlanta. Nobody expected either to be around at the finish.
HOMERS LIFT BRAVES
The Braves overcame the loss of Morton to win Game 1 due to the early run production and solid work by the bullpen. Jorge Soler became the first player to begin a World Series and Adam Duvall added a two-run homer.
Every Braves starter wound up getting a hit and more than four hours later, this was the scene in their dugout: outlandish outfielder Joc Pederson sipping a glass of red wine and smoking cigars with closer Will Smith.