Gonzalez's Bullpen Effectively Confusing

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Gonzalez’s Bullpen Management Effectively Confusing


The Marlins’ bullpen has been a lifesaver. Yes, the lineup has been mashing, and yes Scott Olsen and Mark Hendrickson have been as good as could have been asked for, but were it not for the bullpen’s consistency in closing out games, and bailing out the starters, the Marlins would be in awful shape.

At 9-6, the Marlins have yet to record a loss from a bullpen pitcher. Kevin Gregg has been wild but effective as the closer; Renyel Pinto may be the team’s MVP through the first 15 games as Fredi Gonzalez has used Pinto for more innings (10.0) than any other reliever all while posting a sub 1.00 ERA.

That’s where the bullpen stops making sense. Gonzalez insists on using an ineffective Lee Gardner for full innings of work. Logan Kensing has been arguably the team’s second best reliever (behind Justin Miller) yet he seems to be neglected on the bullpen hierarchy and Taylor Tankersley, in my mind the most talented arm in the bullpen, is being used strictly as a lefty specialist. Holding Kensing back can be somewhat justified because he leads all Marlins relievers in walks, giving Justin Miller and Renyel Pinto multiple inning appearances makes sense because whatever rhythm they have seems to equate well to more than one inning.

Gonzalez’s use of Tankersley, however, makes little sense. He has yielded the fewest walks in the bullpen (1) and he’s struck out 4 in the 5 innings he’s been allowed to pitch. Were it not for one bad game against the Pirates, he would have allowed 1 earned run all season. And while some may say that were it not for a bad outing against the Mets, Gardner would also have allowed only one earned run, the use of the two pitchers (and their subsequent success) is drastically different. Since Tankersley’s bad outing he has been used in 4 games, logging a total of 2 innings not allowing a single run, or walk, while striking out 2. Gardner, conversely, has logged 3 2/3 innings, walking 3 and striking out 1. Yes it’s a very small sample size, but Tankersley’s performance indicates he deserves more than just the 1 or 2 batters he’s allowed to face every third night.

It would be wonderful if Lee Gardner could recapture the success of a year ago, but in 6 innings this year, he’s already allowed as many homeruns (2) as he did in 74 2/3 innings last year, and he’s already halfway to his earned run total (16) of a year ago.

Gonzalez needs to start using Tankersley as more than just a one-batter pitcher, and he needs to take a step back and remember that Gardner is not the pitcher he was a season ago.