Great post! You are spot on. Having a long guy finish out a blow out to give the rest of the pen a break is tremendous. Gorzellany is our low leverage guy, this was a low leverage inning, he did his job, it keeps him stretched out.
Davey has done a first rate job of conserving his key bullpen pieces. There are about 30 pitchers who have appeared in 10 or more games, and none are Nats. There are about 60 pitchers who have appeared in more games than Clippard this year, with only 2 from the Nats (HRod and Mattheus at 9). I'd love to compare his usage of Clippard to last year for Riggles through the first two months.
Clippard appeared in 13 of the 26 games through March/April in 2011, so 50% of the games.
Clippard has appeared in 8 of the 18 games through March/April in 2012, so 44% of the games.
