A fellow blogger, over at ArmChairGM, posted a story about how middle relievers kind of get the shaft in fame, power, adulation, and big contracts. But see Scott Linebrink. Kind of sounds like the thing that The Loogy Lounge would be all about right? Well, John Stevens is probably still breathing hard somewhere in the 50’s on the West Side of Manhattan because the fellow blogger ponders:
“Why is the closer’s role more important in baseball than then the middle reliever/set-up man? Why is the save a more prominent statistical category than a Hold?”
And the truth of the matter is, John Stevens has already answered this. It’s not. They’re equally asinine. You should be as unimpressed with a guy who enters with a three run lead and gives up two runs whether it’s the seventh inning or the ninth. They’re both terrible outings.
As I end this article, I wonder why Holds is even counted as a category? Is this just another Bill James way of tracking player information?
We don’t know either, guy. But it’s kind of a fun to make up new shit. And no, Bill James had nothing to do with it. John Dewan and Mike O’Donnell got plastered one night at Sully’s and decided that Calvin Schiraldi was getting NO respekts….and they did something about it.
Is Holds going to someday be as important as Saves?
Yes. The hold became as important as the save on the day it was invented in 1986.
I question all of these things because I feel every ballplayer on the teams 40 man roster deserves respect. Therefore I salute all of the George Sherrill’s of the world. It doesn’t matter what inning they pitch in, just as long as they do their job.
And, guy, we salute you. May the middle reliever get the same massive overpriced contracts as each of his fellow overhyped teammates.
