Bullpen usage correlating with standings

[FT35]

This has been the year of the bullpen.  Everyone seems to be trying different things...starting closers, mix and matching back end arms in earlier innings, teaching the mindset of "preparing for a lineup--not an inning."  Lots of "experimenting" going on.  Has anyone noticed a playoff-caliber team doing these kinds of things on a regular basis?  It seems to me like all of these experiments are coming from teams who are desperate for bullpen outs.  The liberal use of bullpens seems to strongly correlate to the bad teams!  Personally, I think the mindset is just another illustration of why a team is bad in the first place--bad decision making bleeds over into all areas of the game.  If bad decision making happens with the bullpen usage, it's probably happening in several other areas of team management and costing the team wins. 

But look at the playoff-caliber teams this year and you will see nearly all traditionally opperate their bullpen and have a dedicated lights-out closer.  LA, Boston, NYY, Seattle, Oakland, Cubs (although injuries), Washington, Arizona, Atlanta, Cleveland.  The exceptions are the Phillies (who have had a revolving door for closers) but it's been more performance-based and due to the lack of consistency with any one player over time...and Houston--who went through a time of uncertainty because Ken Giles decided this was the year he would lose his mind.  Both those teams are reported to be in talks on all the trade tumors concerning closers.  

Just think the correlation is too strong to not pair some logic with.  

[LittleHurt05]

Cleveland has absolutely moved Cody Allen around depending on the matchup, the Braves do the same with their relievers.

I dont think it's a bad decision making thing, its simply more about talent. Most of those playoff teams have absolute stud relievers available at closer. The Mets and Ray's aren't losing because of their bullpen experimenting, it's simply because of talent. If they had Kimbrel or Chapman, they wouldn't need to screw around with the bullpen, I think that's the correlation to be found.

[Richie]

On 7/27/2018 at 10:36 AM, FT35 said:

This has been the year of the bullpen.  Everyone seems to be trying different things...starting closers, mix and matching back end arms in earlier innings, teaching the mindset of "preparing for a lineup--not an inning."  Lots of "experimenting" going on.  Has anyone noticed a playoff-caliber team doing these kinds of things on a regular basis?  It seems to me like all of these experiments are coming from teams who are desperate for bullpen outs.  The liberal use of bullpens seems to strongly correlate to the bad teams!  Personally, I think the mindset is just another illustration of why a team is bad in the first place--bad decision making bleeds over into all areas of the game.  If bad decision making happens with the bullpen usage, it's probably happening in several other areas of team management and costing the team wins. 

But look at the playoff-caliber teams this year and you will see nearly all traditionally opperate their bullpen and have a dedicated lights-out closer.  LA, Boston, NYY, Seattle, Oakland, Cubs (although injuries), Washington, Arizona, Atlanta, Cleveland.  The exceptions are the Phillies (who have had a revolving door for closers) but it's been more performance-based and due to the lack of consistency with any one player over time...and Houston--who went through a time of uncertainty because Ken Giles decided this was the year he would lose his mind.  Both those teams are reported to be in talks on all the trade tumors concerning closers.  

Just think the correlation is too strong to not pair some logic with.  

I think you're onto something. However, let us not forget -- correlation does not prove causation. That's an easy logical fallacy to fall into. 

I think you demonstrated that a bit here: It seems to me like all of these experiments are coming from teams who are desperate for bullpen outs.  The liberal use of bullpens seems to strongly correlate to the bad teams! 

This is rather contradictory. Yes, the liberal use of bullpens seems to strongly correlate to bad/losing teams. However, just prior to this assertion -- you pointed out that these experiments are all coming from teams with poor bullpens in desperate situations. So... what do we really have here? Sub-standard bullpen talent = sub-standard bullpen production. Which makes your team less likely to succeed. I don't think that anyone would disagree with that. The final conclusion to draw here is merely "better bullpen = better team". That seems pretty obvious. 

Teams worse off in the bullpen are experimenting more, because they don't have the talent. However, I don't think it can be proven that the reason they're failing is due to how they're experimenting. The more obvious conclusion is simply that those teams just have shitty relievers.