Well, I think it’s at least partially because most of our young “hitters” actually do suck quite a bit. Not all of them, mind you, but enough to poison the well from the Bochy/Sabean perspective.

As for why they’re so willing to play young pitchers, it’s because they’re basically forced to. Unlike young position players, who can be unceremoniously dumped on the bench to be “tutored” by veterans, the “baseball man” groupthink on pitching prospects seems to be that 1) starting prospects shouldn’t be sent to the major league bullpen, and 2) reliever need regular work. So as long as a young pitching prospect is on the roster, they’re going to get innings. Also, it helps that pitchers tend to get hurt so often, opening up opportunities, and that the modern usage pattern of relievers really forces teams to use everyone in the bullpen.

I think it’s got a lot to do with how long you get to look at them for. Hitters get one at-bat every few innings, while pitchers typically throw to at least three batters in a row, usually more. So you get to see a variety of pitches, to a variety of hitters, in a variety of situations, but consecutively. That makes pitchers easier to evaluate: you can see how they’d throw to a left-handed contact hitter in a 1-2 count with runners on first and third and one out, then you can see what they’d throw to a right-handed power hitter in a 2-0 count with runners on first and third and two outs. But with hitters, you only get one look every few innings, and in too wide a variety of situations. Coming up in the first with a runner on second and two outs is a hell of a lot different than coming up in the third with no one on and one out.

Plus, with starters, you get to see them face a variety of batters a bunch of times. If your starter goes 8, they may see eight different hitters three times each, so you get a good idea of how they do against switch-hitters, against power hitters, and in a variety of counts and situations. But hitters may face the same power-throwing lefty four times in a game, and while the adaptations should be looked for, they’re basically going to approach that AB the same way each time. And the fact that our hitters aren’t getting consistent playing time to try and nail down an impression isn’t helping.

I think they were playing that way because they knew they had a consistent bullpen and an inconsistent offense, and instead of letting hitters develop a rhythm they were looking for someone to get hot and knock the crap out of the ball, instead of just being good. That makes some sense; it’s better to trust your offense in one guy who’s doing it all when your lineup is full of terrible hitters. But it didn’t work, obviously because you can’t force or predict hot streaks. As for the pitchers, they knew they had a solid pen and could let Runzler or Joaquin or Martinez get into trouble because they had someone else (Wilson, Affeldt, Romo, Medders) who could get them out of trouble. Not so much in the lineup.

So those are some sort of incoherent thoughts but whatever.

What I mean is, it’s pretty easy to see Runzler come up to the big leagues and throw fire from the left side with a nice slider (going off my memory here, which is sketchy in regards to Runzler). Obviously with control issues. We all could see that, no doubt Bochy/Sabean could see that.

I disagree about control. I don’t think we can see if a pitcher has good control or not based on 8 innings. Even seeing “stuff” is hard, since things like velocity change from game to game. And it’s not just us – here’s what Jim Rice said about Greinke after watching him:

Zack Greinke didn’t really impress me last night. He pitched well and maybe I caught him on a bad night, but to me he didn’t seem dominant. Greinke has may have the lowest ERA in the AL since Pedro Martinez in 2000, but he doesn’t strike me as the dominant force that Pedro was during his statistical peak. Don’t get me wrong, Greinke pitched very effectively but he was not the unhittable beast on the mound that Pedro or Clemens (or even Johan Santana) were during their reign of dominance.

He only gave up two hits in 6 innings but struggled with his command and, with 5 strikeouts, it’s not like he was punching tickets up and down the Red Sox lineup.

He reminds me of a right-handed Roger Moret. He has that long and lean frame but good speed on his fastball and sporadic command.

Emphasis mine.

The first reaction would that Rice is an idiot. But that’s not fair. And even if he is – he was still one hell of a baseball player. He certainly knows more about playing baseball and probably scouting than any of us does. And he watched Greinke for 6 innings, and concluded that he has sporadic command (here are Roger Morat’s numbers, by the way).

He’s wrong. I know that it’s just his opinion, and he admits that Greinke might have had a bad night, but he’s still wrong. There is no reasonable defenition of "sporadic " that would include Greinke’s command. And maybe it’s not his fault. There is something fundamental about baseball that makes it practically impossible to judge a player based on a game or two.

Beats me….