SB Nation • 5 min read

Bullpen Day

We have a bullpen day today, which seems weird because we have like 17 starting pitchers on the roster (well, 6). Louis Varland is the opener. I would think Eric Lauer would be able to throw a couple of

innings

I’m old, so I’m not a fan of bullpen days. I don’t even like when starters go just five innings. I hate when people say throwing six innings is pitching deep in the game.

It seemed weirder because we have Jose Berrios sitting around doing nothing much. But then he pitched yesterday and was hit hard, so perhaps he wouldn’t have been a good choice to start.

I understand that teams do well in bullpen games. Teams have a winning record in bullpen games. We have had a few this year:

April 30th: Yariel Rodriguez starts. He wasn’t good, 1 inning, 2 hits, 2 earned, 1 home run, 2 walks, 1 k. We won 7-6 over the Red Sox.
May 31st: Braydon Fisher starts. He really wasn’t good. 1.1 innings, 4 hits, 5 earned, 1 walk, 1 k, 2 home runs. We won 8-7 over the A’s.
May 28th: Paxton Schultz starts. He was terrific. 2.2 innings, 1 hit, 4 strikeouts, no runs. We won 2-0 over the Rangers.
June 6th: Paxton Schultz starts: He wasn’t good. 2 innings, 4 hits, 3 earned, 1 k, 1 home run. We won 6-4 over the Twins.
May 6th: Jose Urena starts: He was ok. 4.1 innings, 4 innings, 4 hits, 2 earned, 1 walk, 2 strikeouts, 1 home run. We lost 8-3 to the Angels.
May 11th: Jose Urena starts: He was ok. 2 innings, 2 hits, 1 earned, 1 walk, 1 home run. We won 9-1 over the Mariners.
June 20th: Spencer Turnbull starts: He wasn’t good. 2 innings, 5 hits, 4 earned, 2 walks, 2 strikeouts 1 home run. We lost 7-1 to the White Sox.

Jose Urena’s starts might not have really been bullpen starts, depending on how you define the term. Counting those, we had 7 bullpen games and were 5-2. 4-1 if you don’t count Urena’s games.

I guess the real question is, does the team do well in the games following the bullpen days? Since you are using up so many bullpen arms, what happens the next two games?

The two games after: