With Scott Proctor back on the Yankees’ roster, I’ve been looking back at the way the club used relievers at the end of the Joe Torre era. Torre had a reputation for burning through his best arms, leaning on any decent reliever he could find for as long as the player was reasonably effective and then discarding him when the inevitable arm troubles popped up. I went looking through the numbers assuming that the nature of Torre’s bullpen usage had probably become exaggerated with time, but the data shows that Torre was about as abusive as people claim.
I compared Torre’s last 4 seasons to Girardi’s first 4 (the last of which still has 16 games left) to try and see how the usage patterns differed. Here is how it breaks down:
| Pitcher Seasons | Joe Torre (2004-2007) |
Joe Girardi (2008-2011) |
|---|---|---|
| 60+ appearances | 14 | 8 (2 more likely in 2011) |
| 70+ apps. | 9 | 2 |
| 80+ apps. | 3 | 0 |
| 60+ IP | 14 | 7 (1 more likely in 2011) |
| 70+ IP | 11 | 3 |
| 80+ IP | 5 | 1 |
As you can see, Torre had no qualms about using relievers for 70+ innings or 70+ appearances, something that Girardi has simply been unwilling to do. The most egregious examples of Torre’s reliever misuse came in 2004 and 2006. In 2004, Paul Quantrill appeared in 86 games and threw 95.1 innings, while star set-up man Tom Gordon was used 80 times for 89.2 innings. There is no way of knowing whether their overuse caused their struggles in the ALCS against Boston, but it is certainly possible that they were simply exhausted by the time October rolled around. Gordon was worked particularly hard down the stretch, throwing in four straight games in late August and then making 17 appearances in September, including in both halves of a doubleheader in the season’s penultimate series.
This brings us to Scott Proctor’s 2006 season, which was negligently handled by an organization and a manager that wanted to extract every inning from Proctor’s arm that they could in the quest for another division title. His usage in late 2005 should have given everyone a clue as to how he would be used, as he pitched 5 innings in a spot start on August 11th and then was brought back after 2 days rest to pitch in short relief. In 2006, Proctor made 83 appearances and threw 102.1 innings (102.1!) over the course of the season (102.1!), including 42 multi-inning outings. After making just 9 appearances in April, he made 16 in May, 14 in June, 12 in July, 17 in August, and 15 in September. He pitched in both ends of a double header twice in August, with the two occurrences coming within a span of 12 days and sandwiched around 4 other appearances. To be fair, he only threw one pitch in the first game of the double header on August 30th, but he also threw more than one inning in both games on August 18th, which came during a stretch where 9 out of 10 outings were for multiple innings. From 2003-2011, only 3 pitchers have exceeded the 102.1 innings Proctor threw that season in relief, one of whom was a 37 year old starter enjoying his last hurrah (Steve Sparks). The Yankees and Joe Torre showed no regard for Proctor’s arm (although Torre laughably blamed Proctor), and their lack of caution may have resulted in the arm troubles that destroyed his career.
Joe Girardi may have some flaws, but he is worlds better than Joe Torre was at managing his bullpen and spreading work around so as not to exhaust any of his key arms. As the evidence shows, Torre used his key bullpen arms excessively, racking up innings and appearance totals that were absurd and showed little regard for player health. He truly was Torre, Destroyer of Arms.
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I still think maybe the craziest thing of all is that Mo threw 107.2 innings in 1996. 107.2!!! If Mo’s arm was just a little bit different, maybe we’re talking about how sad it was that he was obviously such an incredible pitcher who burned out so early due to overuse, and how most of his promise was just wasted because he never really recovered from that season.
Yankees probably got lucky, look at Mariano’s next 3 years after 96:
1997- 71 ip
1998 -61 ip
1999- 69 ip
As the Yankees bullpen gets worse, Torre starts leaning on him heavily
2000 – 75 ip
2001 -80ip
You can almost see the bullpen around him getting worse.
And then the breakdown (was a forearm strain i think?)
2002- 46ip
But those years immediately after 96 could have saved his career- The Yankees were so good in 1998 they really did not have to use him as much. He did not strike as many people out (5.3/9 in 1998!) so he was more efficient leading to less stress.
We probably have to thank the 98/99 Yankees bludgeoning opponents thereby creating fewer changes for Torre to destroy Rivera than anything else.
I suspect that if it were possible to include times warmed up in the bullpen but not brought in the game, the level of abuse would look even worse. If you want to be charitable, Torre did manage in an era that the Boss was still healthy and treated every game like it was as important as a football game where Girardi doesn’t have that same pressure. Still, they are like night and day in their bullpen management. Spreading the workload is one of Girardi’s greatest strengths and abusing those in the circle of trust was Torre’s biggest weakness.
On Proctor, that does not even count the times he was warmed up and did not come in.
One of the crazier things too has to be Ramiro Mendoza from 1997 to 2002:
-265 games, 46 starts, 645 IP.
If you break it down even further from 1997 to 1999
-133 games, 35 starts, 387 innings.
Mendoza, who was an effective reliever/spot starter was essentially done being an effective pitcher at age 30 and out of baseball at 32 (with 1 inning of relief for the Yankees in 2005).
Another example could be Steve Karsay, who came into NY already known to be a little brittle, and what did Torre do? He pitched him to the tune of 78 games, 88 innings.
Madness.
Madness? What did the Yankees do with Mendoza? Win four World Series. A nine-year career with an inning tacked on is a nice run for most relievers.
Torre got results from overusing some guys 1996-2003 and that’s why he kept overusing guys 2004-2007. Why fix what ain’t broke? How could he do anything different when Gordon, Myers, Proctor, and Bruney were the only consistenty good relievers besides Mo 2004-2007?
Nice work Moshe. I took a similar look when Torre’s comments about Proctor first came out in 2009. A lot Torre’s favorite arms died at his hands.
http://fackyouk.blogspot.com/2009/05/torre-adding-insult-to-injury.html
Matt, breaking out a Fack Youk link is going to make a lot of people very upset. I’m still not over the fact that you guys are gone, and it’s been over a year! Any chance you and Jay will ever get back in the blogging game?
Thanks Larry, though I don’t know about a lot of people being upset about it.
I won’t speak for Jay. As for myself, I’ll never say never, but I don’t see it happening any time soon.
I was also a fan of fackyouk, and very disappointed when it went away.
Add me to the list of people who miss you guys. Great stuff.
Hey Moshe — nice article. I thought it was well reasoned. I also wrote about this way back when and I think one point people forget about is Joe Torrey’s usage of said pitchers compared to their historical workloads. He also had a propensity to use them excessively in the first half of the season rather than spacing out their workload over the course of the season.
http://www.yankeeist.com/2011/01/what-would-joe-torre-do.html
Matt!! I too miss FY. You guys should either restart or jump on another site as part time writers — you both have great points that people are really interested in!
What did Torre do 1996-2003?
He overused relievers towards the end of his tenure as Yankee manager, but I doubt it was any different than what he did 1996-2003.
His problem 2004-2007 was he didn’t have a bridge to Mo as good as Mendoza/Stanton/Nelson and for a time Grimsley thrown in the mix, so he felt he had to go to (who he felt were) his very best guys more than he would’ve liked to. What else? A lacking bullpen or the perception of one always leads to overuse of the best guys.
Who could he have gone to more than Gordon, Quantrill, and Proctor?
Tanyon Sturtze’s ERA was 5.47, Felix Heredia’s 6.28, and they’re in the top five relievers column on the 2004 Yankees Baseball Reference page. Their bullpen after Mo, Gordon, and Quantrill was C-R-A-P and Quantrill wasn’t so hot at a 4.72 ERA clip. Scary is his ERA was LOWER than most relievers’ ERAs. That’s why Gordon and Quantrill were overused in 2004.
Their 2005 bullpen after Mo and Go(rdon) was horrendous, too.
Proctor, Bruney, and (Mike Myers) were the only good relievers after Mo in 2006-2007 with Joba in the mix late ’07.
The 2004-2007 Yankees were all hitting and starting pitching with very little bullpen after Mo.
2004 Yankees didn’t’ even really have starting pitching, smike and mirrors
They had enough starting pitching and hitting to make up for their crappy bullpen after Mo and Gordon.
2004 was more hitting than starting pitching. Basically the Yanks just outhit the opposition, mostly.
This certainly makes sense and reaffirms that Torre did overuse the bullpen. But I am a bit confused. How did Torre need THAT many reliever innings. Clearly, one of two things is happening here that your stats aren’t really accounting for. Either Girardi’s pitchers are going deeper into games and accounting for more of the overall pitching or Girardi has more available relievers over the course of the season. If it is the former, there could be a number of things here that no one comments on: (a) Torre was good at keeping starters fresh and so taxed his bullpen instead of his starters or (b) Girardi has a better starting rotation option than Torre. If it is the latter, we could be talking about (a) more minor league depth, (b) more injuries causing more relievers to be brought up and down, or (c) Girardi just being more effective at getting Cashman to change the roster repeatedly (or Cashman finally realizing this).
Anyways, I’m not stat guy but a quick look at the 2005 Yankees versus the 2009 Yankees seems to show that Girardi just pitched his starters more. Good be that he is to blame for Chamberlain or even AJ overpitching (I’d prefer wearing out relievers to starters). Granted that is a leap but I just think that the numbers above may be a bit biased and don’t think about all of the possible variables. Or, to be more objective, Torre may have abused his relievers but there may be a very good reason to have done so.
The Torre usage patterns are outside the norm. The Girardi usage patterns are within the norm. There’s a reason you rarely see relievers pitch as much as Torre used his, no matter the quality of the starting staff. This year’s Yankees team is a nice example of a team with an uninspiring starting staff that the manager handled with aplomb, using his starters as much as he could and not leaning too hard on his top 2 relievers.
The Torre defenders will go to any lengths to excuse the way he abused the pen. He’s pitch Gordon in games that were clear blowouts. He did so throughout the 04 season and then did so in the 19-8 game three of the alcs. No wonder Gordon was cooked and unreliable that series. He refused to attempt to develop other relievers.
Compare that to the way Girardi brought along Robertson in 09. He was awful early in the year, but Girardi kept pitching him. By the end of the year, he was a reliable option who got key outs in the postseason. That would have never happened with Torre.
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Moshe, a lot of people have made good points about Torre’s later teams having terrible starters and few real good bullpen options. A manager, especially a Yankee manager has one mandate, win every game. I think that the media has soaked everyone into believing that one size fits all, regarding pitcher workloads. This in turn may lead to confirmation bias from fans, bloggers, and other writers. Consider the following and remember that these guys pitched without the benefit of today’s medical technology:
Freaks of nature? Or where these guys merely playing against hitters that couldn’t crack today’s star-studded line-ups? Or could this idea of over-working relievers be part true and part hype? Whatever the answer is, it isn’t quite so cut and dried as many believe….
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