Um. This is a non save situation. Giles has proven to be incapable in these situations. He proved it again last night. Not smart.
That was pleasantly uneventful. So we should get another month of solid work from Giles before his next catastrophic meltdown. I really, really hope this Rockets Astros synergy holds out for at least one more day.
It's not like Hinch had a bunch of great options for that 9th. GIles ended up facing 3 lefties. We already used Devenski who is our high leverage guy against lefties. McHugh has been good against lefties but was most likely unavailable. Rondon had pitched 3 of last 4 days. Smith went 2 innings yesterday and doesn't face many lefties. Peacock has given up an OPS over 1.000 against lefties. It was basically Giles or Sipp.
On most nights, Giles is the better bullpen pitcher vs the rest of his peers. Devenski vs lefties is the main challenger... but for some reason or another, they prefer him in the 7th/8th vs just a night-inning-only guy. Hinch still knows Giles and this bullpen better than anybody. He can be stubborn/frustrating sometimes in his assignments/decisions... but he's also helped get guys rehabilitated and useful again, when most fans would have tossed them aside.
David Ross had some really good insight there re: Giles. For a guy that throws as hard as he does, with a wipeout slider, he doesn't miss enough bats (esp with the FB). He needs to pitch up more with the FB for swings and misses, show the FB off the plate down to keep them honest, and bury the slider.
Release point is exactly the same. Great twitter to look at, he does this for lots of pitchers. Ohtani's FB/Splitter is amazing.
Would be nice if the rangers could do us a solid here. Mariners sure have benefited from a soft schedule lately
Do you really want to count on the Rangers to actually not be useless for one time in their franchise's history
He came up during the rebuilding years, and possessed a skill worthy for keeping around. They tried to replace him with Gomez. He was injured for their one WS run. They’ve tried to demote him this year. What will happen next?
He's their only backup CFer right now. Maybe Fisher? Kemp can go get the ball, but he has a Biggio arm. eta: I absolutely love Kemp in LF batting 9th on this team.
