Entering the season, the concern among Athletics\u2019 fans and baseball experts was that the team had not done enough to improve their bullpen sans closer Mason Miller. Through ten games, that concern is fully warranted. It is likely that good players with a history of success did not want to sign with the A\u2019s to play at a minor league home field, or the team was unwilling to offer these players the contracts they wanted. As a result, middle relievers Scott Barlow and Leiter Jr. were the best the A\u2019s could do in this past offseason\u2019s free agency relief market.<\/p>\n
The A\u2019s have a bunch of iffy relievers, none of whom have extensive closing experience at the MLB level. So then it falls to the team\u2019s manager Mark Kotsay to best position his players for success. Yet, right now it is hard for Kotsay and A\u2019s fans to trust any reliever that enters the game in the seventh inning or later. In Sunday\u2019s series finale against the Astros, Barlow entered with a four-run lead and did not record an out, combining with Leiter to blow that advantage.<\/p>\n
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Last night, Kotsay thought Leiter\u2019s experience at Yankee Stadium could lead to him getting through the eighth inning, a decision that massively backfired. If Kotsay had switched pitchers after Stanton\u2019s at-bat or before Rosario\u2019s, the game\u2019s outcome might have been different. Yes, two of the first three hits Leiter Jr. gave up were not hit hard, but they still found grass resulting in base runners and runs scored.<\/p>\n
Right now, it feels like right-hander Justin Sterner and left-hander Hogan Harris are the A\u2019s two most reliable relievers. Right-hander Elvis Alvarado could join them as he certainly has closer stuff, although his tendency to walk batters remains a problem.<\/p>\n
While it\u2019s still early in the season, time remains for the A\u2019s to resolve this bullpen problem as the current mix of guys is not working. Kotsay and the team\u2019s general manager David Forst must make the necessary roster moves or role changes sooner rather than later as this team has too talented of an offense to watch late leads disappear every single game.<\/p>\n
What do you think needs to happen for the A\u2019s bullpen to perform better or will this be a problem that lasts the whole season? Is it too early to make wholesale changes? Can they find anyone willing to come who will be any better? Or do we just chalk this up to another rebuilding year?<\/p>\n
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A\u2019s Coverage:MLB News and Interest:Best of X<\/p>\n
Starting pitcher Aaron Civale is off to a great start with the Athletics. He has pitched well in two straight starts against tough opponents.<\/p>\n
How many blown saves do you think A\u2019s pitchers will have accumulated by the end of the season?<\/p>\n
The Athletics need a couple guys to step up and prove they can handle the pressure that comes with pitching in the eighth and ninth innings of MLB games.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Entering the season, the concern among Athletics\u2019 fans and baseball experts was that the team had not done…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":572001,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[97890,4818,251970,63114,53348,250030,105271,28633,105270,31043,76814,37886,363,369,146133,99,187168,79537],"class_list":{"0":"post-572000","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-aaron-civale","9":"tag-athletics","10":"tag-ben-joyce","11":"tag-drew-pomeranz","12":"tag-eighth-inning","13":"tag-elvis-alvarado","14":"tag-hogan-harris","15":"tag-jordan-romano","16":"tag-justin-sterner","17":"tag-mark-kotsay","18":"tag-mark-leiter-jr","19":"tag-mason-miller","20":"tag-mlb","21":"tag-new-york-yankees","22":"tag-scott-barlow","23":"tag-sports","24":"tag-the-astros","25":"tag-the-athletics"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572000","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=572000"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572000\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/572001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=572000"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=572000"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=572000"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}