FanPost

Baseball- A Question About Starting Pitcher Rotation

In getting ready to follow the Bruins baseball team this weekend at Arizona State, I was thinking about last weekend's 2-1 series victory over Cal.

That got me looking at the results for this season in general.

I broke the season down as follows-

Friday results- 3 game series 3-2 avg runs scored 3 avg runs allowed 4

Saturday results- 3 game series 4-1 6 2

Sunday results- 3 game series 5-0 8 2

Midweek results 3-0 7 3

Dodgertown tourney 2-1 3 2

There is clearly a danger in computing averages using only 5 games. Another way to look at the results, however, is that in the Friday games of 3 game series we have only held our opponent to 2 runs or less 1 time in 5 tries, while we have held our same opponent on Saturday to 2 runs or less 3 times in 5 tries, and our same opponent on Sunday to 3 runs or less 4 times in 5 tries.

I assume that our runs scored goes up from Friday to Saturday to Sunday because we move from the pitcher who is typically the other team's ace to their 2nd starter to their 3rd starter. The results clearly seem to demonstrate that we have had greater pitching depth over a weekend than our opponents.

But the fact that we give up more runs on Friday than on Saturday or Sunday surprises me, if we use the same logic of ace to 2nd starter to 3rd starter. The same results held in 2011, when Trevor Bauer's W-L and ERA were better than Gerrit Cole's.

I certainly do not want to imply any questioning of how Coach Savage sets up his rotation. I am just curious, as a casual fan, as to why we are seeing these results.

I imagine that a pitcher is going to be more loose, and possibly more effective, if his hitters have given him a big cushion, as appears to happen on Saturday or Sunday. On Friday, also, it would appear to be more likely that you would have to bring the infield in during a tight game, where you are tied or behind by 1, which could lead to a bigger inning for the other side, whereas the tight game doesn't occur on Saturday or Sunday.

Again, I am just curious why this pattern seems to be in play, where we score more as the weekend progresses, but also give up fewer as the weekend progresses.

Thanks in advance for explanation. Love following this baseball team- action is between the lines, not in the press or the locker room.

This is a FanPost and does not necessarily reflect the views of BruinsNation's (BN) editors. It does reflect the views of this particular fan though, which is as important as the views of BN's editors.

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