Does Washington have a Saul? E-mail
Written by William Yoder   
Monday, 20 April 2009 11:01

saulLets be honest here, Saul Rivera has been bad in 2009. In 6 games (7 IP) he has allowed 10 ER, and has only had 2 scoreless outings. His ERA is at 12.27, and his WHIP is a whopping 2.58.

Ok he’s been worse than bad.

But that’s not the point. The point is its been seven innings pitched. His performance Sunday afternoon when the team needed him most was disappointing to say the least, and it probably will cause many Nats fans to say that they don’t need a bigger sample size to see that he just plain sucked.

They’re right, he did suck. But over the last three seasons this is how un-sucky Saul Rivera has been for a bad ball club that needed a lot of work in the bullpen.

2005- 54 G, 9 HLD, 60 IP, 3.43 ERA
2006- 85 G, 19HLD, 93 IP, 3.68 ERA
2007- 76 G, 17HLD, 84 IP, 3.96 ERA

I’ll take those 237 IP and judge them over his last 7 IP any day. The truth is Rivera has been the most consistent reliever in Washington Nationals franchise history. His ability to eat up innings successfully for a bad club has a broader impact that can ever be measured with stats as he saved the arms of many who probably would have just made situations worse.

The worst part about the whole situation is that Rivera would have been a Major Leaguer still today had Manny Acta not put Rivera in a situation to fail. Some pitchers just do not have the mentality to be closers, and Rivera is one of them. This can be noted by the fact that he has converted 0/7 saves in the last two years, and only 4/11 in his career.

The real question should be, why didn’t Manny Acta know this?

Comments (2)Add Comment
...
written by KwameBrownRules, April 21, 2009
Why hasn't Acta been fired yet? The situation in Washington is not going to get any better, might as well as put someone else in charge who will run things a little differently. Look at what happened to the Mariners just one year after they fired their manger this early into the season.
...
written by ZimmerManbearpig, April 21, 2009
Really? You can't say a reliever with a 3.96 era is a good asset to the team. Guys who come into those situations have it easy and shouldn't be coddled. If he's good enough another team will pick him up but RP come and go and I see no love loss.

I am with Kwame Brown on this one. Acta has looked clueless from the moment he came aboard. Let's stop making excuses for a bad team. Teams don't rebuild, these are professional players and they need to start acting like winners. Acta hasn't created a winning culture and has allowed their inherent laziness take control of the team. They know they can make excuses for losing because they are a new team, when in reality there is no excuse for losing. Look at the Rays last year. Yes they had talant, but they've always had talant. It wasn't unitl Joe Maddon took over and instilled a winning will into his players that they went from last to first. I like what I'm seeing from Kasten this year, but the entire organization just looks lost. Ship up or ship out guys

Write comment

busy
< Prev   Next >
 

Follow The Nats Blog

fbtwitter_64rss_64snapshot_2009-08-21_14-01-53

If you like this you may like

baseballdebatetag

Great Baseball Reading

Hardball Times
Baseball Prospectus
Baseball Digest Daily
Wezen-Ball
Seam Heads
Sweet Spot (By Rob Neyer)
Fan Graphs
Beyond the Box Score
The Daily Something
Baseball Mustings
Sabernomics

Search The Nats Blog

About Bloguin

Bloguin is the revolutionary blog network specifically focused on helping bloggers get the most out of their websites. We're currently working on building a large network of online communities and hope to expand our blogging coverage to include a wide range of topics.

Advertisers

The Bloguin Network allows advertisers to promote their products and services to our ever-growing number of visitors. We offer both site-specific ad placements as well as the ability to run a network-wide campaign. If you're interested in working with Bloguin to meet your advertising needs, please contact us.

Bloggers Wanted

The Bloguin Network is always looking to expand. We're specifically looking for blogs in the sports, entertainment, and video games field, but are open to adding any type of quality site.. If you're a blogger and interested in joining our network, please fill out our application form.

The Bloguin Login

The Bloguin Login gives you full access to everything our network has to offer. Your name and password will work for each and every one of our sites. Signing up is simple, and will allow you to post in all our forums, create member blogs, and access other cool features! What are you waiting for? Create an Account!