Looks like Mujica is helping to stabilize the bullpen, rotation still pitching great, now just need the offense to pick up; perfect time to go to Milwaukee, their pitching is pretty awful.

I don't understand how Mujica can keep this up. All he has is a splitter that drops out of the strike zone. Why won't the hitters just learn to lay off the pitch? I know Sutter made a career off the pitch but aren't hitters smarter today?

If they don't recognize the pitch he can. You could say the same thing about Mo Rivera. Besides, he doesn't just have the split, he also utilizes a circle change, which, IMO, is the most effective off-speed pitch in baseball.

Do you ever watch him pitch?

Mujica is absolutely hammering the black. He throws the splitter for strikes often enough to keep guys honest and then puts them away with it in the dirt. Hitters always have to respect the fastball, especially with 2 strikes, and the split/change dives so late that it looks like fastball until they start their trigger. By the time it dives out of the zone, they've already committed and they miss.

He throws his fastball about 40% of the time. He throws almost exactly 1/2 his pitches in the zone and draws swinging strikes on better than 1/3 of the pitches he throws outside of the zone. He is in the zone often enough and throws his fastball often enough that hitters can't simply spit on anything.

And Trevor Rosenthal? Threw only 45% of his pitches in the zone last year and is only at 49% this year.

Mujica throws more pitches in the strike zone than Rosenthal. Oh, and Rosenthal throws his fastball 84% of the time. So if all Mujica does is throw one type of pitch out of the strike zone...but actually throws it less frequently than your hero throws his primary pitch and does so more accurately, I guess the question becomes how Rosenthal could possibly keep it up?

Keep on trying...

I think BRC's line of critique was more appropriate for Brad Lidge, who could never throw his slider at the bottom of the zone for a legitimate strike and couldn't locate his fastball for shit. I always thought the approach of any team facing him the first time should just have been to keep the bat on your shoulders, because he could not locate his pitches in the zone.

Lidge was the same guy I was thinking.

Lidge couldn't duplicate his arm angle either. If he wanted to get the slider down, he'd have to alter his release and the spin on a slider can be recognized much sooner than the drop on a split/change. He telegraphed the slider almost his entire career, everything just came so fast and turned so hard that, when he had his fastball command, there just wasn't enough time to gear up for it and recognize/adjust slider.

When that fastball command abandoned him, guys just stopped gearing up for the heat, spit on it if he threw it and waited for him to telegraph a slider.

There's much more deception to Mujica's arsenal, though his raw stuff is nowhere near Lidge's at his peak.

I'm okay with Mujica getting the 9th. If he falters, its Rosenthal's job. Rosenthal has a much higher upside than anyone else left.

I really wasn't criticizing. Sutter made a career of the same pitch. Same thing with Riveria as you mentioned. My question is why can't hitters lay off? They don't always go for the high heat. Why do they seem to go for Riveras slider and Sutters split?

Rivera often only threw his cutter, yet hitters couldn't square it up. His location was nearly spotless in his most dominating years. You couldn't not swing yet, you couldn't make great contact because of location.

We were spoiled watching Rosenthal at the end of the year. He was pumping serious gas and pounding the zone that weren't centered, either corners, low, or high in the zone late. He has great upside, but he has work to do now in those set up innings that will either project him to top of the rotation type starter (most preferred) or eventually a Motte type closer. If it is the latter it is because he has improved location, but secondary pitches did not evolve consistently.

Here's a link to a good story on Seigrist (except according to the MLB Cards site he has 21 K's in 11 innings not 20). I think we could see this kid up in September. Very intriguing prospect. Especially as a lefty. One of those diamonds in the rough possibilities.

http://www.news-leader.com/article/2...ield-Cardinals

The young pitching pipeline adds another MLB prospect.:thumb:

Why. In the ****!!!!!! is Boggs in this game.

The thing that amazes me is that they sent Scrabble down and kept Boggs and Salas. :spock:

So they just ran to Exxon and grabbed the gas can..............

Jesus Christ