IIRC, Greinke was strictly limited on innings that year, or at least down the stretch. He was looking for an excuse to pull him. Harriss was lights out in relief that year. Even the pitch Howie hit was absurdly good, which made the homer more amazing. The idea was Harris to bail Greinke out after he had been pushed further than he had been by bringing in the relief ace, then have Cole start a clean inning to cruise home.
Pardon the SABR-length response:
Grienke was a 36 year old starter who was pitching in his fifth postseason game that season. He had been up and down, and both the Rays and the Yankees had gotten to him. In game three, the Nats made him work, as he threw 95 pitches in 4 2/3 innings, with Josh James getting the win as one of five pitchers that followed.
One might recall how heavily the Asterisks relied on analytics, as well as having the concept of scripts essentially following that and potentially overruling the manager and pitching coach’s gut. However, Grienke was at such a low pitch count late in the game with a two-run lead that all of the aforementioned factors seemed to make it reasonable on all fronts that he would still be there in the seventh, though it may have been pushing it on the analytics front because of other considerations.
As for me, I was hopeful with whoever they were putting in at the time that this particular group of Nats could get something done the third time through the lineup. We had seen Grienke look vulnerable in the playoffs, and it was getting late. We’d seen the Nats finally breakthrough late against Harris the night before and had seen how much he had been used.
As mentioned, this was also a postseason in which Will Harris had looked close to untouchable up until the night before. Because of the frequency of use, I seem to recall that Hinch had made comments that seem to essentially rule out Harris for game seven versus other options.
We’d also seen that Cole should not have been viewed as invincible as say a mid-late 90s Rivera would have coming in as early as the seventh or eighth – – something that appears to have been borne out in subsequent playoff appearances. Cole had been slightly more susceptible to the long ball issue than Scherzer that season. He had reportedly never made a relief appearance in the majors, and he pitched five times with an average of 110 pitches per start, including 110 in Game 5 three days earlier (where the one run against him was a home run by Soto in the seventh-inning).
Smoltz seemed to cover the presumed logic at the time of what was going on both before and after Rendon and Kendrick did their thing. Grienke had looked so dominant and had such a low pitch count with the two run lead, and they still had a mix of starters and relievers available if Grienke ran into any sign of trouble. IIRC, it was noted that they likely would’ve moved on in the script, but like in 2017’s World Series Game 7, Smoltz noted Hinch going with what he was seeing rather than solely sticking to a script.
However, Rendon’s home run and the Soto walk made problematic what had been discussed before about wanting Cole to come in at the top of a clean inning. Thus, with the tying run on base and the go-ahead run at the plate, Hinch was looking at somebody who was no longer in world beater mode and may have been bringing to mind some of his other performances that playoffs.
Combine that with the reported predilection to just go with the analytics, and a change came. Even though Cole was down in the bullpen in the fifth inning, he reportedly wasn’t warmed up or warming up in the seventh:
https://www.mlb.com/news/aj-hinch-gerrit-cole-game-7-lack-usage“Cole, who started and won Game 5 on Sunday in Washington, went to the bullpen in the fifth inning of Game 7 against the Nationals and began playing catch. Hinch said Cole was just getting loose on his own and wasn’t warming up to come into the game. The two had talked earlier on Wednesday and come up with a plan in which Cole was going to pitch.
“”There was some nervous energy, and he wanted to see where he was,” Hinch said.
“Hinch said Cole wasn’t going to enter the game in the middle of an inning, nor was he going to pitch unless the Astros had the lead. Hinch pulled starter Zack Greinke after he allowed a homer to Anthony Rendon and issued a walk with one out in the seventh. Reliever Will Harris promptly gave up a two-run homer to Howie Kendrick that put Washington ahead for good, 3-2.
“”He had never pitched in relief, he had never pitched on two days of rest,” Hinch said. “I wanted to be very fair to him and make sure that not only was he able to do it, but he was good.””
With Cole ruled off the table for that moment, they had Osuna who had gotten tagged big-time against the Red Sox in 2018 and who had given up some runs to both Tampa Bay and New York in his previous eight appearances in 2019’s postseason. Most of the rest of the options didn’t have a huge body of work in the postseason (and vet Verlander had been gotten to late the night before).
Thus, even with what had reportedly been said about not wanting to have to use Harris, his only postseason blemish was the night before against the hitter that had already batted that inning (and with Soto just having walked). With Eaton having made the first out of the inning, all they conceivably needed was a double play ball against Kendrick, and they were onto the eighth and could put in Cole – – against whom I still think these particular Nats could’ve made a comeback down just one run, though the number of outs to do so was dwindling.
All of this is to say that as much as people have made it about the pitching decisions, not only don’t I think that what Hinch did was simply a matter of incompetence, but it may diminish the reality that this particular team seemed to have it within to respond to just about any situation.
Look at how they put up five runs against someone largely considered by some as Mr. unstoppable in game 1. Look at game 2 and the late-inning explosion after a close game where different pitching decisions could’ve been made when a Hall of Fame starter did stay in and gave up four earned runs (followed by defensive miscues from someone in particular as the pressure shifted).
Look at the offensive explosions of game 6 and also not getting rattled with that whole ump basepath matter but ended up expanding the lead. This team when the DH was available to it averaged 7.5 runs against the Asterisks. All of what had occurred with that lineup was looming in the seventh-inning, as well as the comebacks against the Brewers and Dodgers that the opposition had to throw into their bag of analytics as well as their guts.
