May 21, 2012
“Gleeman and The Geek” #42: Marquis de Buzzkill
Topics for this week's episode of Gleeman and The Geek included Jason Marquis' implosion and the state of an increasingly ugly rotation, Drew Butera and Ben Revere turning into Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron, how the Twins handled Chris Parmelee, David Lee Roth and the Van Halen concert-going experience, Nick Blackburn's return to the disabled list, our PickPointz MVP picks, early impressions of Brian Dozier, Twitter questions from listeners, and Lewwww!
Gleeman and The Geek: Episode 42
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Saturday night I went to Frontier Field on a sudden impulse, and it was the best decision I’ve made all year. Between Nishioka’s astounding home run (not to mention several fine plays at second base), and an outstanding start by Cole DeVries, it was a game not to be missed. (Also, phenomenal weather.)
If you look at the boxscore from Saturday’s Gwinnett-Rochester game, it’s worth noting that after eight innings, DeVries’s pitching line read 8 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 6 K. It got uglied up a bit when he went out for the ninth and gave up two singles and a triple; I imagine Gene Glynn might have pulled him sooner if it weren’t for the fact that the Wings had a 5-run lead and there’s that guy in the bullpen who can come in and A-Slama the door.
Sunday, as the Brewers were piling on runs like sauerkraut on an overburdened bratwurst, I started thinking about the fact that DeVries and Marquis are currently pitching on almost the same schedule.
So when GatG talked about DeVries, and John’s remark about his 1-4 record went almost unchallenged, I figured I should kill some time during the podcast looking at the numbers for each of his starts and cherry-picking when I felt like it.
The story for DeVries this year has been an atrocious lack of run support. In eight games and 46.2 IP, the Red Wings have scored a total of 16 runs while he was in the game. And six of those were in Saturday’s game. Two of his losses were 2-0 and 2-1; in his three no-decisions he left trailing 3-1, leading 3-1, and trailing 2-1. With reasonable offense by the Wings, he could easily be 5-2. Just for fun I separated his eight starts into five “good” starts and three “bad” starts. In the “good” starts he’s 1-2 with a 2.78 ERA. In the “bad” starts he’s 0-2, 7.53 (still better than Marquis, some might say).
[By the way, it’s pronounced “DeVries”, not “DeVreis”. It’s a Dutch name, but you can pretend it’s German if that helps. And I don’t really want to be the guy-who-does-nothing-but-correct-pronunciations, so I’ll stop before anyone tries to say Towles or Sano.]
Meanwhile, as a part-time Ducks fan, I’ll be missing Lew. But hey, at least he got to Norfolk in time to help beat the PawSox, and that’s a good thing. For the briefest of moments I started to wonder why the Twins hadn’t given ol’ Lew a call, but then of course I immediately remembered that they’re carrying six outfielders and Ford’s pitching numbers aren’t quite as good as Butera’s.
Okay, I’ll shut up now. The salsa ad is making me hungry, so I’m gonna go do something about that.
Comment by Crazy Tom in Rochester — May 20, 2012 @ 11:56 pm
Do you think it’s time to try and sign Buterar to a long-term contract? Now that he’s leading the team in batting and E.R.A. and Mauer being unreliable, maybe we should try and sign him now while he’s cheap.
Comment by Todd L — May 21, 2012 @ 10:18 am
No, his value has never been higher. They should trade him now while the irons are hot.
Comment by ML — May 21, 2012 @ 10:48 am