22
2012
Did Terry Collins Say What I Think He Said?
An article by 
In Saturday’s 5-4 victory over the San Francisco Giants, the Mets blew a three-run lead in the ninth inning, costing Mike Pelfrey a chance to get his first win of the season. Pelfrey pitched eight strong innings, allowing one run on six hits while throwing 102 pitches. Despite stifling the Giants’ bats all day, manager Terry Collins decided to pull Pelfrey from the game and go with Frank Francisco in the ninth inning, less than 24 hours after the Mets’ closer was defeated by the Giants in the team’s 4-3, 10-inning loss.
Maybe Mike Pelfrey couldn’t go much more than 100 pitches so early in the season. Maybe Frank Francisco was brought into the game to get on the right track after his poor performance the previous night. Maybe Fred Wilpon needed to sell more hot dogs so he called the dugout to get Collins to slow the game down as much as possible.
But no. Those weren’t the reasons why Pelfrey was removed from the game. According to Zach Berman in the New York Times, Collins would have sent Pelfrey to the mound in the ninth inning had there not been a save situation intact for Francisco. But with a three-run lead, Collins made up his mind to send his starter to the showers and his closer to get rained upon.
Francisco faced four batters, retiring one of them. He allowed a walk and two hits, with the second hit driving in a run. That was all for Francisco, who wasn’t in the dugout to watch the misplayed fly ball by Kirk Nieuwenhuis, which caused his ERA to balloon to 8.53. Although the Mets did rally to win the game in the bottom of the ninth, Terry Collins’ words still resonated many hours later. Let me repeat them.
He didn’t allow Pelfrey, a pitcher who had dominated the Giants all day, to pitch a complete game because the rulebook said it was a save situation. Therefore, he chose to send in his erratic closer, who was great in the season-opening sweep of Atlanta, but has since been quite hittable.
Over his last three appearances, Francisco has faced 16 batters, allowing nine of them to reach base. He also has an astronomical 23.14 ERA over those three appearances, earning a loss and a near-loss in the process.
In 2011, Terry Collins said that he didn’t care about Francisco Rodriguez’s 55-games-finished clause in his contract; he was going to use him every time a save could be had. Apparently, the same goes for Frank Francisco, even if his starter would be a much more viable option. Can you imagine what he’d do if a starting pitcher was one inning away from throwing the team’s first no-hitter, but had already surpassed 100 pitches and was in a one-run game? Wait, you don’t have to imagine that, as Collins was already quoted as saying he would have pulled Jonathon Niese from a game earlier this season in which Niese took a no-hitter into the seventh inning.
There is such a thing as “going by the book”. But there is also such a thing as “going with your gut”. Terry Collins should have gone with his gut on Saturday. Instead, his decision-making almost cost the team a victory that seemed inevitable after Pelfrey came back to the dugout in the eighth inning. It looks like Terry Collins is going to have to return that book that he keeps going by before it becomes overdue, because once it does, both he and the team might be suffering the consequences of a long, lost season.
About the Author: Ed Leyro
Ed Leyro was hatched in the Bronx, but spent most of his youth in Queens at Shea Stadium. Apparently, all that time spent at Mets games paid off as Ed met his wife (The Coop) for the first time at Citi Field during its inaugural season. Guess the 2009 season was good for something after all. In addition to his work at Mets Merized Online, Ed also owns, operates and is head janitor at Studious Metsimus, where he shares blogging duties with Joey Beartran. For those not in the know, Joey is a teddy bear dressed in a Mets hoodie. Clearly, Studious Metsimus is not your typical Mets blog.
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|---|---|---|---|---|
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| Mets | 16 | 23 | .410 | 6.0 |
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It’s amazing that he would go on the record with comments like that. Even if that’s what your thinking, why blab it? It’s unfortunate that he’s going to be one of those 100 and out managers, but to even go as far as saying the rules apply even in cases of a no-hitter, it tells me Collins has a huge disconnect with Mets history and this fan base. Great post Ed.
So to ensure the chance at a no hitter with 3 innings left he should leave in his young starter in his first outing who had already tossed 102 pitches? Like I care if they go to the bullpen and finish off the no hitter? What good is that no hitter going to do if Niese has to have shoulder surgery because of it? He would have needed around 153 pitches at that rate to get a no hitter.
“Can you imagine what he’d do if a starting pitcher was one inning away from throwing the team’s first no-hitter, but had already surpassed 100 pitches and was in a one-run game? Wait, you don’t have to imagine that, as Collins was already quoted as saying he would have pulled Jonathon Niese from a game earlier this season in which Niese took a no-hitter into the seventh inning.”
Niese would have been pulled because it was his first start and he had thrown 102 pitches through 6 IP. Not 8 IP, Dr. Baseball, 6 IP. He got no one out in the 7th, and had pitched 6 IP.
Where do you read 8 IP? It said going into the 7th AKA after 6 IP.
But your missing the point.
The point is that Collins was asked a hypothetical question about if the no-hitter was intact would he have pulled Niese after seven and the answer was yes.
As it turned out it was a mute point, but his philosophy is not mute, it’s relevant and valid and worthy of debate which is what we do here on MMO.
Hmmm, well, when he said “Can you imagine what he’d do if a starting pitcher was one inning away from throwing the team’s first no-hitter”—see to me, one inning away would mean 8 IP.
Maybe not to you and the author though.
It’s whining for the same of whining.
6 IP and 102 pitches, first start of the season, has absolutely zero relevance to a situation where a guy has a no-hitter after EIGHT IP.
Come on chief.
Agreed, not only was it the 6th inning of the first start but one he had already thrown 102 pitches.
I have a question about that Niese game. Lets say he had the no-hitter and Collins pulled him out of the game after the 7th and brought in I don’t know Rauch lets say and then Francisco for the ninth. Is it still a no-hitter for the Mets and are we off the scnhied?
Technically, yes, it would count as our first no-hitter. But it wouldn’t be celebrated on the same way. I can’t see players running out of the dugout, jumping all over Frank Francisco for pitching one hitless inning, the way the White Sox players mobbed Philip Humber.
It’s something special for one pitcher to throw nine hitless innings. Although it’s still a no-hitter and would count as the Mets’ first, a combined no-hitter wouldn’t have the same feeling or reaction by those who would witness it.
Great article Ed. You, We, are all seeing why this guy has had 2 teams revolt on him. He’s very good at getting his young guys to believe in themselves and getting them to play hard all the time but as far as managing a baseball game, he’s an absolute schmuck. Everything to him goes by the book. That answer yesterday made me want to put my fist through the TV screen and grab him by the neck. If we scored one more run and took away the save opportunity then Pelfrey would’ve come out for the 9th. That tells me he’s more concerned about his players individual accomplishments than he is about the teams accomplishments. Maybe it’s because he’s had 2 different teams revolt on him and he wants to get the players on his side, like letting Reyes take himself out of the game for a pinch runner and letting K-Rod get credit for games finished by letting him finish games in non save situations and bringing him in when the team was trailing big on the road in the 8th to get the final out . Had he handled K-Rod with a little bit of intelligence last year, that 55 games finished clause doesn’t even come into play. As far as I’m concerned the Mets will never get to the next level with him at the wheel. He was perfect in his role as minor league field coordinator. As a manager he’s out of touch.
Oh I get it, the Met fans missed Benitez so much that we just to go out and get a double in Francisco. Yeah, that’s what that 23,14 era is all about. Now I get it.
If Francisco could put up a season close to what benetiz did for the Mets, it would put the team in great shape.
The story of my life. I always miss the good parts.
Stick -
During a three year period, Benitez had the most saves in the Majors (yes more than Rivera), the highest successful save opportunities and an incredible BAA.
Yes, most fans disliked him after walking O’Neil in the world series but that game was lost innings later by Turk Wendell.
In 2002, Benitez saved 33 out of 37 games with a 1 – 0 record and 2.27 ERA for a crappy team – and on opening day for the 2003 season he was the only player BOOED on opening day.
The fans ran him out of town on a rail – he couldn’t compete as a Met anymore (imagine tens of thousands of people booing you while you were trying to do your job).
Of course, He went to the Marlins the very next year and saved a career high 47 games with a 1.29 ERA. If memory serves me 11 of those saves came against the Mets where he had a perfect record.
So the disparaging of Benitez continues to this day. Very interesting.
yup. It all comes down to perception. The closer version of the “clutch batter”. doesn’t matter how much he does along the way, if there are a couple of very visible failures, that is all people count.
Collins is on a 2 year deal..Let’s hope he’s not extended.I’ve seen enough of him on the bench and still rememeber him crying after the last game of the year at the press conference because his team played so hard for him and managed to win a grand total of 77 wins.Another loser in a long line of loser managers for this franchise.In his defense, bringing in Francisco for 2 years at 6 mill a year was the work of the genius Alderson.Toatal waste of money for a team with no depth..We could have bullpenned by committee and gotten the same results and used the 6 mill for some decent back up players
are you really saying all this 14 games in, with 148 to play?
Yes ii am.Not a fan of Collins or Alderson since day one..Nothing that happened this year has changed my mind
“We could have bullpenned by committee and gotten the same results and used the 6 mill for some decent back up players”
so, the same 14-game results?
unless you can tell the future. then forgive me.
“Another loser in a long line of loser managers for this franchise”
It’s incredible what some folks here write.
I will simply sit here and wait for tagee’s Apology for getting on me about getting on our Bullpen!
So getting off to a hot streak you are quick to remind everyone it’s clearly too early, and against bad teams, but yet the third week of the season its not too early to get on a bullpen.
Love the consistency!
Hope you’re holding your breath while waiting, save on the hot air that’s constantly coming out.
I’m not judging Francisco just on this year….You do know he had a career before he got here right?
Did you see what he did then?
My guess would be NO!
Otherwise you would know what you saw in spring, what you saw this week is typical for Francisco!
I heard Terry’s post game interview after that Pelfrey start. According to what I heard, it was more about getting Pelfrey out of there after 8 solid innings then it was about getting the closer in there.
He said something to the effect of he didn’t want him to start the 9th, put a couple of guys on then have to pull him for the closer. That bothers me more than the fact that he didn’t actually let him start the 9th, which I would have preferred.
Pelfrey is a big league pitcher now. Take off the white gloves. He should have started the 9th.
You all are blasting the manager for not trusting Pelfrey? How fast you all forget that Pelfrey is one of most unreliable pitchers in the game. No manager in the game would have brought him out for the 9th. The criticism is unfounded and shows a total lack of knowledge of the players and the game. I guess based on 8 innings you all are declaring Mike Pelfrey to be an ace.
While Pelfrey certainly isn’t the most reliable starter he has completed games before in his career so that’s not true that no manager would’ve let him come out for the 9th. He was on his game Saturday as rare as that may be and could’ve easily pitched the 9th. Even on rare occasions a mediocre starter is on his game. Even Dave Mlicki, John Pacella, Charlie Puleo had their moments. You do not need to go to your pen for 162 games, it’s overmanaging. He even said it after the game if we scored one more run he would’ve let Pelf go back out. He was more concerned about getting Francisco a save than he was about stopping a 3 game slide.
hey guys…let’s not forget that we are talking about Mike Pelfrey!
In most cases I believe that your starter should get that opportunity to start he 9th inning but Mike has always been somewhat of a head case. Terry Collins needed to get his closer back on track and wanted Pelfrey to get a win. If it had been a lights out relief appearance, we wouldn’t be discussing this…
Too much fodder and let’s not make this website like a reality show designed to stir up CRAP
Alan there were some of us that did not like pulling Pelfrey in the shoutbox when it was going on. The end result had nothing to do with not liking the move.
Hey Cortez, I have been a met fan for 45 years and I have watched this franchise win 2 World Series.That would make most of the managers losers.What team have you been watching?