June 25, 2013

Anatomy Of a Blown Save

Jonathan Papelbon recently hasn't helped his trade stock for himself or the Phillies. Papelbon has blown four out of his last five save opportunities including a frustrating blown save last night that would have given Cliff Lee the victory. And this is how Papelbon blew the save

First Cliff Lee gave up two base runners to start the ninth. Charlie Manuel and Bruce Bochy last night were competing to see who could leave their starting pitcher in longer and then blow the victory before pulling the pitcher. Manuel won by one inning. 

Papelbon came in and immediately gave up a hit to Kyle Blanks to make the score 3-2. He then hit Jesus with a pitch and got Yasmani Grandal to ground into a double play with Blanks moving over to third. Then just Papelbon's luck he allowed Blanks to score the tying run on a passed ball. A blown save. Take a look at his chart via Brooks Baseball

#3 is the passed ball. Mark Kotsay swung at the pitch but because he plays for the Padres of course that got by Carlos Ruiz. You see that's how the Padres beat teams. They single and bloop you to death and then finally kill you with a passed ball on the one swinging strike induced by Papelbon. 

Someone named Justin De Fratus eventually gave the Padres the victory when he allowed Kyle Blanks to single in the game winning run. De Fratus is from Oxnard, California so my guess is that he's actually a spy for the Padres because I've never heard of him before. 

And that is the anatomy of a blown save. 

1 comment:

  1. Papelbon is like every other reliever not named Rivera. When they're bad they're really bad and bad for a streak of games.

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