Murphy War Crimes

You have said you were finished with this argument every day for the past four days… yet here we are…
 
It's possible to both acknowledge that batting order doesn't matter in any meaningful sense (assuming you're not doing something galactically stupid like hitting your pitcher leadoff in a league where pitchers hit) and say that specific lineup decisions are both sub-optimal (costing your team fractions of a run is not what you want to do as a manager) and reflect a poor thought process. Whether Murphy hits fifth or seventh is basically irrelevant, but it is marginally worse for the team that Murphy is hitting seventh, and it provides some insight into how Snitker (or Snitker + the front office) approaches these issues.

This only makes sense ceteris paribus. We have no idea what actually goes into these things. If batting order doesn’t matter in a meaningful sense, then literally any basic “personnel management” reason is a good enough reason. “Get ‘em in the right head space” or whatever is something that maybe matters, so who cares if you change something that really doesn’t. Marcus Giles rather famously whined about how uncomfortable he was at leadoff and his numbers reflect that. Now maybe those splits more reflect that he was basically the concussed shell of a man when we moved him to leadoff, but maybe there is something to “comfort” and “fit” and “pressing” or whatever.

Ultimately batting order falls into “clubhouse management” for me. Absent some evidence the batting order is disruptive to team chemistry, let Snit have at it. Maybe he thinks Ozuna needs the confidence boost. What do I know?
 
This only makes sense ceteris paribus. We have no idea what actually goes into these things. If batting order doesn’t matter in a meaningful sense, then literally any basic “personnel management” reason is a good enough reason. “Get ‘em in the right head space” or whatever is something that maybe matters, so who cares if you change something that really doesn’t. Marcus Giles rather famously whined about how uncomfortable he was at leadoff and his numbers reflect that. Now maybe those splits more reflect that he was basically the concussed shell of a man when we moved him to leadoff, but maybe there is something to “comfort” and “fit” and “pressing” or whatever.

Ultimately batting order falls into “clubhouse management” for me. Absent some evidence the batting order is disruptive to team chemistry, let Snit have at it. Maybe he thinks Ozuna needs the confidence boost. What do I know?

I think it could also be argued that it is also sub optimal to be optimal all the time. As far as we are ahead perhaps the team feels like taking away an opportunity here or there for Murphy to hurt himself on the bases or get hit by a pitch.

This is also a time to experiment.
 
Bump. This is not going away and its only getting worse. People can't possibly believe this is a strategy at this point to rest Murphy. Its a full-on platoon.

Very, very concerning given a hot murphy is a game changer, and frankly he's been rusty. To me, its actually critical to get him the reps needed to get him going.
 
I'm on your side of this argument now. The 50/50 split has turned annoying. It is obvious that Murphy is so much better when he plays regularly.
 
I’m with y’all. Murphy is the better player and it’s not close. I could see a 70/30 split but that’s it.
 
twit going to twit. Right now it isn't hurting us outside of not letting Murphy get his bat going like he should be. But there is time for that... hopefully.
 
If you want Murphy to play a ton in the playoffs you should support getting him plenty of rest right now. I’m not sure why that’s lost on people
 
He’s played like 90 games this year. What you are saying makes no sense. By that logic we should call up the minor league squad and rest Acuna Olson and Riley rest of year.

Murphy has just been benched not rested. He’s gone from a starter to a platoon player. TD about to play third game in four days today

It’s just unprecedented to have an all star catcher that has been benched into a platoon player for over a third of the season

The more time that goes in, it actually only gets worse. TD now getting the “two games in a row” treatment so he can stay fresh, whereas Murphy basically reduced to not being able to play more than alternating. It’s ****ing nuts and it’s getting infuriating
 
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yep.. anyone who is looking at this as Twit just 'resting' Murphy for the playoffs is blinded by their own narrative. What we don't know is how the front office will handle his playing time in the post season.. And will all this "rest" help him or hurt his timing. I just don't get why the FO would allow a guy they just commited 6 years 77 million to, to be a part time player. idiotic. TDA is a good ball player, there has to be a way to get guys more playing time without making Murphy have to sit 50% of the time..
 
Time will tell in the playoffs if the two guys are going 50/50 or if Murphy and/or TDA are getting 2 out of 3 or 3 out of every 4 games played. That'll show us how Snit really feels about their platoon.

Travis actually throwing a runner out the other night doesn't help.
 
Time will tell in the playoffs if the two guys are going 50/50 or if Murphy and/or TDA are getting 2 out of 3 or 3 out of every 4 games played. That'll show us how Snit really feels about their platoon.

Travis actually throwing a runner out the other night doesn't help.

Just make TDA Fried's personal catcher... plus that will make Fried want to stay in ATL since TDA is a lifer now. Murphy gets everyone else.
 
He’s played like 90 games this year. What you are saying makes no sense. By that logic we should call up the minor league squad and rest Acuna Olson and Riley rest of year.

Murphy has just been benched not rested. He’s gone from a starter to a platoon player. TD about to play third game in four days today

It’s just unprecedented to have an all star catcher that has been benched into a platoon player for over a third of the season

The more time that goes in, it actually only gets worse. TD now getting the “two games in a row” treatment so he can stay fresh, whereas Murphy basically reduced to not being able to play more than alternating. It’s ****ing nuts and it’s getting infuriating

…except catching is by far the most taxing on the body. 1B is not.

I’m sure you understand that but are just insistent on raging
 
yep.. anyone who is looking at this as Twit just 'resting' Murphy for the playoffs is blinded by their own narrative. What we don't know is how the front office will handle his playing time in the post season.. And will all this "rest" help him or hurt his timing. I just don't get why the FO would allow a guy they just commited 6 years 77 million to, to be a part time player. idiotic. TDA is a good ball player, there has to be a way to get guys more playing time without making Murphy have to sit 50% of the time..

Lol uh no, it’s pretty obvious Murphy is just getting a lot of rest because it’s likely going to be a long season. Anyone who disagrees is just blinded by their own narrative
 
He is on pace for 387 ABS this season. Do you realize how low that is, even for a catcher? Let alone, someone that has statistically been the best offensive and defensive catcher in baseball this year? he's getting rest because Snit has an irrational bias to TD because at some point Snit got it in his head that TD is better than Murphy. Even at the start of the season, I always remember that Murphy randomly had a couple 0-4 games, and immediately went into platoon mode. The only time he ever got "starting" ABs was when he went bonkers with like a 1200 ops and TD was out with a concussion.

The other concern to me, is I just fundamentally struggle to see how this doesn't impact you as an athlete. Maybe Murphy is truly the ultimate team player and is unbothered. But I'd venture most competitive athletes are going to be impacted by being benched despite being 28, having a career year, starting the all star game and being the clear-cut best at what you do in a season, after working your entire career to get to this level - and then you look to your right and see the manager increasingly defaulting to a 35 year old back-stop with an ops 150 points worse than you?

Athlete, desk-job, any job - you just can't tell me that if you know you are doing something better than anyone else and being relegated beyond someone that is worse at it, that it's not going to culminate in frustrations and / or impacting your preparation and leading to pressing. We can't objectively say murphy is pressing because of pressure to stay in the line-up, but its absolutely a realistic outcome. We can't absolutely say Murphy playing worse of late compared to earlier in the season is due to becoming a platoon player, but you also can't rule-out that its more than a coincidence that he has performed significantly worse since not being allowed to play more than two games in a row
 
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Lol uh no, it’s pretty obvious Murphy is just getting a lot of rest because it’s likely going to be a long season. Anyone who disagrees is just blinded by their own narrative

Is any other playoff catcher getting this much ‘rest’ or is twitner a savant for catchers.
 
He’s played like 90 games this year. What you are saying makes no sense. By that logic we should call up the minor league squad and rest Acuna Olson and Riley rest of year.

Murphy has just been benched not rested. He’s gone from a starter to a platoon player. TD about to play third game in four days today

It’s just unprecedented to have an all star catcher that has been benched into a platoon player for over a third of the season

The more time that goes in, it actually only gets worse. TD now getting the “two games in a row” treatment so he can stay fresh, whereas Murphy basically reduced to not being able to play more than alternating. It’s ****ing nuts and it’s getting infuriating

Travis is an excellent backup catcher; backup being the key word there.

Just in looking at Baseball Savant, Sean dwarfs Travis in almost every category. Even in the categories in which they are close, Sean leads or Travis has a slight advantage but it's not enough to take the load 50% of the time.

Sean's defense alone should make him the starter 4 out of every 5 games. With the off days in the playoffs, Sean should be starting each and every game.
 
If you look at other starting catchers for the big guys..

Smith for LA (who platoon everyone) has 417 AB
JT for phil has 432
Rtschman (who ever gets a day off because he is one of their best) 519
Raleigh for Seattle has 435
Murphy for the Braves has 337 No injuries, no illness.. just 337 so that he can be super "rested" in the playoffs. Twit is a genius amoung idiots in the battle of best teams in how he 'rests' his catcher for the playoffs but not a single other starter...


Now, has TDA playing more cost us games.. probably minimal because TDA is a pretty good player.. but will it cost us in the playoffs... no one knows.
 
This all goes back to a simple point. If we were assured Murphy will start every playoff game it’s a non issue

The fundamental concern is Snit has gone from playing them at a level that one could reasonably believe is to “keep Murphy fresh” to playing them at a level that one can only reasonably conclude implies he views them as equals, if not even thinking TD is the guy he wants in there.

Therefore by logic, it’s become a very reasonable and real concern that snit will bench the superior player in the playoffs. We can’t mind read what moves the front office will over rule - that is purely speculation. But we can make inferences based off objective evidence of playing time over a >90 day period that would imply we should all be extremely concerned that Snit will do… what he’s done for basically most of the season
 
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