James Henderson said:
wilmwolf said:
Dudan came in up 5 with a guy on base. If you bring in a different guy there, maybe they go yard, and now you're in a three run game. Looking at the scores from yesterday, a LOT of higher seeds lost or played in very close games. We could've won a closer game having lesser guys pitch, but why mess around and find out? We still have 6 of our top 7 pitchers available today, if you can't win two games with 6 of your best pitchers left, then none of it matters.
You can always go to Dudan later if those things happen. Let Bryant cut it to 2 and then go to Dudan if you need to and it's not like we were done scoring.
From that point on we scored two more runs as well so it ended up being a 7-run win vs. the doomsday scenario of Bryant scoring 5 to tie it.
I'd agree with that last line if we definitively only had to play 2 more games. You may have to play 4.
It's like we want to get be in a game Monday saying, "Well, we have no pitching left."
I don't think any staff manages their pitching thinking about what to they'll do if they have to play Monday. Time and time again, it has been shown that in the regional, you have to win the game you're playing and figure out the next one when it gets here. At this point, if we have to play more than two more games, you might even be able to bring Highfill back for an inning, it's all hands on deck at that point, and if you get to that point, the other team is probably in the same boat anyway.
Also, when you say it's not like we were done scoring, you say that with the benefit of knowing we did score more runs. During the game, you don't get the benefit of knowing what you're going to do. There was zero guarantee we would continue to score. It's very easy to criticize decisions when you have the benefit of hindsight.
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