Klaassen: Should Arizona Have Pitched Around Fielder?

Let’s let Kapitan Kirk Gibson answer that…”“I left him in; it was a bad decision on my part, obviously,”

This is not to say that these are the only considerations to take into account. Perhaps Arizona manager Kirk Gibson or his coaches could have seen something in Kennedy at that point that would have indicated he should be pulled (I don’t know). Maybe Gibson would have been better served to bring in an appropriate lefty-killing reliever to get Fielder out.

It is easy to speak with the benefit of hindsight — after all, Fielder did hit a home run, a play that was the third-greatest contribution to the Brewers’ victory. But it simply is not the case that Fielder was likely to hit a home run off of Kennedy, or even get on-base. Even the best hitters make outs in 60 percent of their plate appearances, and Kennedy is a better-than-average pitcher. I seriously doubt people would have even mentioned Kennedy pitching to Fielder if the plate appearance had ended in a lazy fly to left field, or even a walk followed by a Weeks ground out to end the innings. The ratio of Fielder’s versus Weeks’ projected wOBAs versus right-handed pitchers is close enough that having Kennedy intentionally walk or pitch around Fielder would have been understandable. However, on the basis of the numbers, there was nothing wrong with letting Kennedy pitch to Fielder in that situation.