The Lindstrom Experiment

by boteman on Apr 25, 2009 8:48 AM EDT

Fredi Gonzalez left Matt Lindstrom in the game to sink or swim on his own last night, as a test. Clearly, he failed. Now what?

As I sat in my new favorite local sports bar, I watched Lindstrom self-destruct in 5 batters. As I watched the Marlins' lead fizzle before my eyes, it became clear to me that Fredi was watching Lindstrom intently to see how he would react under this pressure.

Walking in a run in the 9th inning with a lead is bad enough. Giving up the lead and a grand salami to a guy whom you know is quite capable of it was the real test. Could Lindstrom put behind him the "harmless" walk while the Marlins still held the lead? Could his pitches actually fool this key hitter?

Mitch Williams on MLBN stated flat out last night: "Lindstrom has no movement on his pitches. It's one thing to throw a fastball in the high 90s, but if it's flat, its hittable."

How true. Oh how painfully true.

I must, therefore, conclude that Fredi saw this and decided to give Lindstrom enough rope to hang himself, which he did brilliantly.

Now the question is what to do with the hanging corpse.

Discuss.

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For as hard as Lindstrom throws,

he doesn’t miss as many bats as you’d think, which is troubling. Last year, he was successful when he had a good slider working. He cannot rely solely on his fastball to blow away hitters. As you said, it’s a fastball that is as straight as uncooked spaghetti and if big league hitters are sitting on it, they are able to make contact at a good rate. He did not throw a single off-speed pitch until after the Rollins GS. And what made things even worse, is that he didn’t even have good command of his FB.

Yes, I have a prospect fetish. That's why I'm a Marlins fan.

by Sashimi on Apr 25, 2009 11:58 AM EDT reply actions

I guess when they told him to “pitch to contact” he took them quite literally. :-(

by boteman on Apr 25, 2009 2:56 PM EDT up reply actions

Not that we didn't all see it anyway, but...

Just how much movement was there on those fastballs that got cranked out?

These are just the end-play pitches of each AB, but if you look at the all-pitch chart , you’ll note he only threw two pitches with less horizontal movement than the ones that were sent flying. You can also note from that all-pitch chart that he only threw 6 pitches that weren’t fastball/changeup (not that those 2 changeups really made a difference anyway).

38 pitches, 30 fastballs, roughly 6 of those (20%) with next-to-no movement. Combine that with throwing less than half of his pitches for strikes and it’s a wonder he got out of there with only 7 runs given up.

Marlins Stadium: When It's Raining, The Roof Will Happen!

by dan 2.0 on Apr 25, 2009 3:58 PM EDT reply actions

Another telling graph

It took him 17 pitches to finally mix in an off-speed pitch.

Yes, I have a prospect fetish. That's why I'm a Marlins fan.

by Sashimi on Apr 25, 2009 4:35 PM EDT reply actions

we should send this guy down to the minors

teach him to throw something other than a fastball, and to get some freaking movement on all his fastballs, this is ridiculous

-"I'll weather whatever storm, Make it out without a bruise"
-"Even when winning illogical, losing is still far from optional"
-"Even the greatest gotta suffer sometime"
-"No excuses, No explanations"

by MiamihastheDolphins.... on Apr 28, 2009 4:59 PM EDT reply actions