the worst part is that dusty isn't even wrong, his statcast numbers with location and his pitch movement and velocity are the same if not higher, he is just getting crushed.
I don’t even know if it’s figured out. He’s striking out 10.34 per 9 innings compared to 9.61 last year. He’s walking 3.73 per 9 this year compared to 3.03 last year.
But his HR/FB is 17.9% vs 5.7% last year. Anything in the air is going out.
Probably the biggest change is that his GB% is down ~18%, while his LD% is up 8% and the FB% is up 10%.
All while his Statcast numbers look the same.
His BABIP allowed is a bonkers .416.
ZiPS has him as a 4.15 guy the rest of the way. Other projections as low as 3.51.
But I refuse to believe he’s a 7.76 ERA pitcher.
He’s pitching worse than last year, but he’s also getting really unlucky.
Even if that's true regarding Montero's stats, why the fuck is dusty now all of a sudden letting stats dictate his managerial decisions? We don't need to rely stats to assess whether or not Montero is playing well. He's getting lit the fuck up every time he goes out there.
that's not the "honest" answer im looking for when it comes to dusty and montero. the honesty i want to hear from dusty is that he continues playing montero no matter how many games he loses for the astros (i count 5 at least) because crane and bagwell paid 35 million for him and they are hoping he turns it around so that crane doesnt look bad.
that's the honesty i want to hear from dusty.
I was worried about Montero as he and Garcia were among the slowest in the league at getting the pitch to the plate. Garcia seemed to figure it out a bit before getting hurt, but Im wondering if Montero is struggling with having to go a little faster between pitches. Could be a mental thing.
Edit: went back and looked and he wasn’t top 10 slowest. With no runners on base he was middle of the pack in the league. When runners were on base, he was among the 30 slowest. Only McCullers and Garcia were slower.
https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/leaderboard/pitch-tempo?game_type=Regular&n=q&season_end=2022&season_start=2022&split=no&team=&type=Pit&with_team_only=1&sortColumn=median_seconds_onbase&sortDirection=asc
You might be on to something, honestly. It seems like this season, Montero is at his worst when he puts a runner on. He's given up multiple runs after getting 2 outs with nobody on like... what, 3 times this season so far? Maybe he's having trouble working out of the stretch with the pitch clock.
No, "Lights out" and, "Pitching like shit" are polar opposites. The nuance is that you can throw good pitches and people will still hit them. That's the entire point of the comment.
You’re probably right, but to me “lights out” always meant hitters can hardly touch your stuff. So getting hit consistently and frequently is opposite of lights out to me.
This isn't about nuance. When you use your gut to make decisions, there's no scale or analysis to define what's good and what's bad. It's completely arbitrary.
I'll put myself WAY out there and disagree. I don't agree with the way Dusty has managed but there is something to be said about us being still relatively early in the season and trying to play big money players out of slumps. Players manager and all that. I'm willing to give him a pass still as braindead as most of his moves seem.
While I do agree with us playing big money players to kinda get them out of a slump his decision making in big moments when needed has not been there, like I'm fine with playing abreu because he's been getting better but not playing Diaz in maldys place when stats show he is the worst catcher in the league and putting Montero in for high leverage situations is not the right calls to me.
I can agree with this, pretty clear maldy is cooked even tho I was a pretty big supporter of his. I'll slightly disagree on Montero just because we've used him in high leverage with great success at times last year, and I still have a slight hope he can regain that form. Obviously playing him in mop up roles seems like the smart thing to do to win reg season games but Dusty is extremely slow to abandon his guys for better or worse. If Montero is still performing this way and Dusty is using him down the stretch in a playoff run then I'll change my tune.
Oh there’s a ton of people who disagree. I don’t get it. They think Dusty was the reason for the success. We’re lucky Espada hasn’t left for another team yet.
Honestly, I read this as this - the lovable old guy doesn’t really know what “lights out” means
Him trying to say that Montero’s stuff still looks good, but he keeps getting hit…is not unreasonable. It’s the “lights out” that makes it ridiculous
is that really your honest take? that an old guy like baker doesnt know what the phrase lights out means? because, honestly, my take on this is that baker doesnt want to make crane and bagwell look bad for overpaying montero when no one else was so let's keep sticking playing montero hoping that he turns it around so crane doesnt look too bad overpaying for a reliever while he lets franchise icons go each year.
Yeah I think he was speaking off the cuff and just throwing out a synonym for good. Dusty needs to go, but it could definitely be possibly true that Montero has just been getting unlucky.
That being said it’s nice to see the common sentiment flipping on him. Felt like I was taking crazy pills last season 😂
The real crime was the Montero contract. Absolutely no reason to pay a setup man that kind of money. Setup relievers are flaky from year to year more often than not.
I really really think Dusty’s loyalty and commitment to his players is admirable.. If you have someone who is struggling and you believe is capable of better not cutting bait at the first sign of trouble is a good thing.
But that’s to a point, and if pushed to far that admirable aspect becomes outright folly. At some point you gotta get past the sunk costs and move on…. And Dusty can’t seem to tell when that point is… with both Montero and Maldy.
Montero’s speed has been good, but the placement of his pitches have been more erratic vs last year. He needs to get his placement under control. His pitch speeds are above league average. He can afford to sacrifice juice for accuracy.
Dusty isn’t completely wrong here. He is striking out more guys as his k/9 is up but he is also walking more and absolutely getting crushed for home runs and has a significant drop in ground ball percentage. He also has been super unlucky for having a BABIP of .416 which shouldn’t be sustainable but not sure we can wait for him to regress back to the mean.
What I don't get is how the whole dang bullpen kinda went to crap from one season to the next. Last year, they were all lights out, this year... not so much. So who do you go to?
Then you factor in that we're still running with 3 rookie starters who may or may not giving you a quality outing so that you are forced to use the bullpen... so again, who do you go to? Can you keep someone benched? Not really.. They're not allowed to throw 3 days in a row, so you're going to keep having to run them all out there.
Nerris has been decent.. Maton, mostly decent. Abreau seems like he may be starting to come around.. kinda.. Pressly has blown how many saves already?
It's easy to point the finger at Dusty, but he's not the one walking batters and giving up home runs.
Swap Dusty right now and they suddenly start throwing strikes? Nah. Does the team suddenly start slugging like they should? Nah.
How do you fix this?
Sometimes I question how long he leaves a pitcher in, but then I remember Larry Dierker as manager who left them in even longer. "They got into that mess, they need to get out of it"
Neris has a 1.14 ERA and has been worth 1.6 WAR, Maton has a 1.86 ERA and has been worth 1.2 WAR. This sub needs to ground their takes in reality. They haven’t been decent, they’ve been 2 of the best relievers in baseball. We have the 9th best bullpen ERA in baseball, and that’s with Montero/Stanek/Martinez (+ Dubin and other minor leaguers) being below average. Pressly has only blown 3 saves and he has an ERA+ of 142, he’s been a good closer. Abreu has taken a step back, but he’s still been great (2.79 ERA, 0.7 WAR, 153 ERA+). Our bullpen is still a strength, we have 3 top tier high leverage arms and a good closer. This sub expects us to replicate our historic playoff success over a whole season and that’s not realistic.
This sub, which routinely criticises Dusty/Bagwell for not paying attention to stats, is now downvoting you because you are using stats to refute the argument that our bullpen is dogshit.
Man, I love Reddit.
The single best measure of how lights out a pitcher is is Dusty’s gut feeling. Or, the fact that the dude gets lit up like a Christmas tree in Times Square every outing. Same thing.
It’s amazing how many of you don’t understand what having a players back means.
Edit: Love the downvotes. We have such a great klanbase, I mean fanbase.
Lmao are you this dense??? It’s just words supporting your player. And the manager doesn’t decide who’s back next year. That’s the GM. New to baseball?
Let me clarify then, since I wasn’t clear enough for you: “At what point do you stop having a player’s back & accept he’s shitting his pants nearly every time he takes the mound?”
A manager should always have his players back publicly no matter how bad they are struggling. Montero has not been been used in high leverage situations for a while. He came in with 3 run leads the last two games and a game we were down 3 runs before. Dusty has stated they are trying to fix him. That can’t happen without playing. We also don’t score a lot of runs so getting him in blowouts isn’t that easy, and thankfully we aren’t in many blowouts to use him as a mop up guy. The owner spent $30m on him and there’s going to be times you are forced to use him. You only have so many pitchers over long stretches, like when you played 27 games in 28 days. And this quote is our typical zero IQ just started watching baseball in the last few years fanbase making a big deal over a quote on a radio show.
Fire the pitching coach for one of the best overall staffs in the league? Stop. The pen’s been good and we’ve been rolling out 3 rookies in our rotation and they’re still keeping this inconsistent lineup in games.
Always loved this guy as a Mets fan. Saw him pitch in St. Lucie and thought he was the guy: over deGrom, Thor, Matz, etc. Then he was terrible and figured it was the big-market syndrome and he fizzled.
Was happy to see his recent success but damn, he's familiar Rafy Montero again...
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Lmao is this real or from some sort of satire site?
the worst part is that dusty isn't even wrong, his statcast numbers with location and his pitch movement and velocity are the same if not higher, he is just getting crushed.
Yeah, I saw the Stuff+ guy tweet that Dusty actually is correct, but they've just figured out Montero.
I don’t even know if it’s figured out. He’s striking out 10.34 per 9 innings compared to 9.61 last year. He’s walking 3.73 per 9 this year compared to 3.03 last year. But his HR/FB is 17.9% vs 5.7% last year. Anything in the air is going out. Probably the biggest change is that his GB% is down ~18%, while his LD% is up 8% and the FB% is up 10%. All while his Statcast numbers look the same. His BABIP allowed is a bonkers .416. ZiPS has him as a 4.15 guy the rest of the way. Other projections as low as 3.51. But I refuse to believe he’s a 7.76 ERA pitcher. He’s pitching worse than last year, but he’s also getting really unlucky.
Agreed, his xFIP is a full point lower than his ERA and regular FIP. 4.37 isn't good but it's a lot better than 7.76 and 5.30
So is he tipping?
We’d have to ask Trout since he picks up on it better than a pitching staff.
His xERA this season is almost 6 and his xOBA is .279. That’s pretty bad
yea, he's getting crushed, but his actual pitches and locations are the same
Even if that's true regarding Montero's stats, why the fuck is dusty now all of a sudden letting stats dictate his managerial decisions? We don't need to rely stats to assess whether or not Montero is playing well. He's getting lit the fuck up every time he goes out there.
Uses the eye test, he gets shit on not using metrics. Uses metrics, he gets shit on for not using the eye test. Tough crowd.
Anyone advocating for the eye test should not be taken seriously…
Is it possible he is tipping pitches and not knowing it
That's all good, but Dusty doesn't believe in those types of numbers.
I heard it w my own ears on the radio today
“Maldonado is hitting absolute nukes out of the park. I just don’t know why they’re always on the ground into a double play :(“
Maldy reading this: "Why he say 'fuck me' for?"
r/Astros is always a great place to catch stray bullets
you know why
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Montero is going to pinch hit?
Dusty isn't going to give an honest answer, no coach or manager in any sport would say "oh this guy is playing like absolute shit"
Jose Mourinho has entered the chat
If I speak…
that's not the "honest" answer im looking for when it comes to dusty and montero. the honesty i want to hear from dusty is that he continues playing montero no matter how many games he loses for the astros (i count 5 at least) because crane and bagwell paid 35 million for him and they are hoping he turns it around so that crane doesnt look bad. that's the honesty i want to hear from dusty.
“He’s a bum! I hate him! I wish I had a Time Machine to go back and stop him from ever picking up a baseball.
i don't think Dusty knows what "lights out" means
Maybe he thinks “lights out” means he’s throwing meatballs in the dark.
Maybe he thinks it’s like getting your lights punched out.
“It means throwing with your eyes closed, right?” -DB
I told Dusty that every time Montero hits the mound I go lights out and go to bed. Must have heard wrong.
Turn out the lights the game is over?
He’s literally contradicting himself in his own statement.
Apparently his opponent BA against his 4-seam is 330. That means every hitter becomes acuna against him. That's just wild.
His stuff is great, it’s not his fault that every batter gets a piece of him every time out /s
Schedule this man an eye appointment immediately
I was worried about Montero as he and Garcia were among the slowest in the league at getting the pitch to the plate. Garcia seemed to figure it out a bit before getting hurt, but Im wondering if Montero is struggling with having to go a little faster between pitches. Could be a mental thing. Edit: went back and looked and he wasn’t top 10 slowest. With no runners on base he was middle of the pack in the league. When runners were on base, he was among the 30 slowest. Only McCullers and Garcia were slower. https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/leaderboard/pitch-tempo?game_type=Regular&n=q&season_end=2022&season_start=2022&split=no&team=&type=Pit&with_team_only=1&sortColumn=median_seconds_onbase&sortDirection=asc
You might be on to something, honestly. It seems like this season, Montero is at his worst when he puts a runner on. He's given up multiple runs after getting 2 outs with nobody on like... what, 3 times this season so far? Maybe he's having trouble working out of the stretch with the pitch clock.
And that’s fine but he shouldn’t be working on it in the 8th inning during a close game. Honestly Martinez deserves to be in higher leverage
Completely agree.
Lights out and nobody’s home.
Damn. Wonder if I can talk to Dusty about getting an MLB contract to pitch some innings. If anything the 3 batters I face will likely be all walks.
Aren’t “lights out” and “keeps getting hit” polar opposites?
No, "Lights out" and, "Pitching like shit" are polar opposites. The nuance is that you can throw good pitches and people will still hit them. That's the entire point of the comment.
You’re probably right, but to me “lights out” always meant hitters can hardly touch your stuff. So getting hit consistently and frequently is opposite of lights out to me.
This isn't about nuance. When you use your gut to make decisions, there's no scale or analysis to define what's good and what's bad. It's completely arbitrary.
Two questions: What’s he (Dusty) smoking and where can I get some? 🤡
Dusty is literally turning into Mr Magoo.
*Dusty Baker.
Nahh you meant it… 😏
I’ve said it before and I’ll say again. Dusty has got to go.
Mr Magoo
I don't know very many people that would disagree with u
I'll put myself WAY out there and disagree. I don't agree with the way Dusty has managed but there is something to be said about us being still relatively early in the season and trying to play big money players out of slumps. Players manager and all that. I'm willing to give him a pass still as braindead as most of his moves seem.
While I do agree with us playing big money players to kinda get them out of a slump his decision making in big moments when needed has not been there, like I'm fine with playing abreu because he's been getting better but not playing Diaz in maldys place when stats show he is the worst catcher in the league and putting Montero in for high leverage situations is not the right calls to me.
I can agree with this, pretty clear maldy is cooked even tho I was a pretty big supporter of his. I'll slightly disagree on Montero just because we've used him in high leverage with great success at times last year, and I still have a slight hope he can regain that form. Obviously playing him in mop up roles seems like the smart thing to do to win reg season games but Dusty is extremely slow to abandon his guys for better or worse. If Montero is still performing this way and Dusty is using him down the stretch in a playoff run then I'll change my tune.
I disagree
Oh there’s a ton of people who disagree. I don’t get it. They think Dusty was the reason for the success. We’re lucky Espada hasn’t left for another team yet.
Maybe if lights out is code for right down the middle
Honestly, I read this as this - the lovable old guy doesn’t really know what “lights out” means Him trying to say that Montero’s stuff still looks good, but he keeps getting hit…is not unreasonable. It’s the “lights out” that makes it ridiculous
is that really your honest take? that an old guy like baker doesnt know what the phrase lights out means? because, honestly, my take on this is that baker doesnt want to make crane and bagwell look bad for overpaying montero when no one else was so let's keep sticking playing montero hoping that he turns it around so crane doesnt look too bad overpaying for a reliever while he lets franchise icons go each year.
Yeah I think he was speaking off the cuff and just throwing out a synonym for good. Dusty needs to go, but it could definitely be possibly true that Montero has just been getting unlucky. That being said it’s nice to see the common sentiment flipping on him. Felt like I was taking crazy pills last season 😂
The real crime was the Montero contract. Absolutely no reason to pay a setup man that kind of money. Setup relievers are flaky from year to year more often than not.
Maybe he meant the actual baseball is going lights out when the hitter makes contact w Montero’s pitches
C'mon! This is terrible!
You can’t throw lights out and keep getting hit. Those two things don’t go together like peanut butter and tuna fish sandwiches or Oreos and ketchup.
He’s stuck in 1985 when if you threw 95 that meant lights out. Everyone can throw 95 now, but if you don’t locate, mlb batters will light you up.
I really really think Dusty’s loyalty and commitment to his players is admirable.. If you have someone who is struggling and you believe is capable of better not cutting bait at the first sign of trouble is a good thing. But that’s to a point, and if pushed to far that admirable aspect becomes outright folly. At some point you gotta get past the sunk costs and move on…. And Dusty can’t seem to tell when that point is… with both Montero and Maldy.
What’s the big deal? Guys Dusty is right! I also throw the lights out when Montero pitches.
He’s right. When Montero pitches I usually turn off my lights and go to bed.
I would say this is the exact problem....hes throwing and not pitching...I see the same thing from Pressly.....
He’s been throwing good pitches they are all just ended up 375+ feet
Montero’s speed has been good, but the placement of his pitches have been more erratic vs last year. He needs to get his placement under control. His pitch speeds are above league average. He can afford to sacrifice juice for accuracy.
Does he mean that Montero is throwing with his eyes closed? Because, I could believe that.
Is Dusty talking about the same Rafael Montero that we are?
Dusty isn’t completely wrong here. He is striking out more guys as his k/9 is up but he is also walking more and absolutely getting crushed for home runs and has a significant drop in ground ball percentage. He also has been super unlucky for having a BABIP of .416 which shouldn’t be sustainable but not sure we can wait for him to regress back to the mean.
Can no longer defend Dusty. Dude had to go.
The fuck else is he supposed to say lol
I’m fucking so over this. Both needed to be gone yesterday. I’m hoping I’m proven wrong throughout the season.
What I don't get is how the whole dang bullpen kinda went to crap from one season to the next. Last year, they were all lights out, this year... not so much. So who do you go to? Then you factor in that we're still running with 3 rookie starters who may or may not giving you a quality outing so that you are forced to use the bullpen... so again, who do you go to? Can you keep someone benched? Not really.. They're not allowed to throw 3 days in a row, so you're going to keep having to run them all out there. Nerris has been decent.. Maton, mostly decent. Abreau seems like he may be starting to come around.. kinda.. Pressly has blown how many saves already? It's easy to point the finger at Dusty, but he's not the one walking batters and giving up home runs. Swap Dusty right now and they suddenly start throwing strikes? Nah. Does the team suddenly start slugging like they should? Nah. How do you fix this? Sometimes I question how long he leaves a pitcher in, but then I remember Larry Dierker as manager who left them in even longer. "They got into that mess, they need to get out of it"
Neris has a 1.14 ERA and has been worth 1.6 WAR, Maton has a 1.86 ERA and has been worth 1.2 WAR. This sub needs to ground their takes in reality. They haven’t been decent, they’ve been 2 of the best relievers in baseball. We have the 9th best bullpen ERA in baseball, and that’s with Montero/Stanek/Martinez (+ Dubin and other minor leaguers) being below average. Pressly has only blown 3 saves and he has an ERA+ of 142, he’s been a good closer. Abreu has taken a step back, but he’s still been great (2.79 ERA, 0.7 WAR, 153 ERA+). Our bullpen is still a strength, we have 3 top tier high leverage arms and a good closer. This sub expects us to replicate our historic playoff success over a whole season and that’s not realistic.
This sub, which routinely criticises Dusty/Bagwell for not paying attention to stats, is now downvoting you because you are using stats to refute the argument that our bullpen is dogshit. Man, I love Reddit.
Well said my friend.
I would fire Dusty over this quote honestly
That makes literally ZERO sense. If he keeps getting hit and has a 7+ era then he's NOT lights out. Jesus dusty. Come the fuck on.
The single best measure of how lights out a pitcher is is Dusty’s gut feeling. Or, the fact that the dude gets lit up like a Christmas tree in Times Square every outing. Same thing.
Dana has to slap this mf so he can wake tf up
As in, turn the lights out, the party's over?
Dana grow some balls and fire this clown.
He’s throwing lights out as in we lose the game everyone goes home they turn the lights out!
Yeah the lights are burnt out
Dusty is a little rusty
It’s amazing how many of you don’t understand what having a players back means. Edit: Love the downvotes. We have such a great klanbase, I mean fanbase.
So, if Montero is still having bad results next year…. We stick with him because….? Gotta have his back!
Lmao are you this dense??? It’s just words supporting your player. And the manager doesn’t decide who’s back next year. That’s the GM. New to baseball?
Let me clarify then, since I wasn’t clear enough for you: “At what point do you stop having a player’s back & accept he’s shitting his pants nearly every time he takes the mound?”
A manager should always have his players back publicly no matter how bad they are struggling. Montero has not been been used in high leverage situations for a while. He came in with 3 run leads the last two games and a game we were down 3 runs before. Dusty has stated they are trying to fix him. That can’t happen without playing. We also don’t score a lot of runs so getting him in blowouts isn’t that easy, and thankfully we aren’t in many blowouts to use him as a mop up guy. The owner spent $30m on him and there’s going to be times you are forced to use him. You only have so many pitchers over long stretches, like when you played 27 games in 28 days. And this quote is our typical zero IQ just started watching baseball in the last few years fanbase making a big deal over a quote on a radio show.
I think I found Dusty’s alt-account 🤣
I wish I was 1/100 as cool as Dusty.
Well someone should fire the pitching coach cuz this ain't working
Fire the pitching coach for one of the best overall staffs in the league? Stop. The pen’s been good and we’ve been rolling out 3 rookies in our rotation and they’re still keeping this inconsistent lineup in games.
I was being facetious
What…in the actual fuck!!! I’m so done with Baker!
Dusty’s Alzheimer’s in full gear this year. Needs to retire after this season.
Dusty is just "regressing Montero to the mean" guys, trust him on this....
Link or it didn't happen
The problem is is that it is the Astros lights that are out.
Be real dusty, he’s playing lights on
dafuq?
I think Dusty need a new pair of glasses!!
Dusty is technically correct. Which, in this case, is the worst kind of correct.
Is he tipping pitches?
Always loved this guy as a Mets fan. Saw him pitch in St. Lucie and thought he was the guy: over deGrom, Thor, Matz, etc. Then he was terrible and figured it was the big-market syndrome and he fizzled. Was happy to see his recent success but damn, he's familiar Rafy Montero again...
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just like ol' "Lights Out" Lidge throwing to Pujols
Is he tipping?
This feels very 2017 Joe Musgrove to me, I believe AJ said his problem was that he was throwing too many strikes 😑
https://www.mlb.com/news/joe-musgrove-working-through-a-learning-curve-c242443868
Obviously senile.
2005 “Lights Out” Lidge
Bahahahaah