Craig Counsell

[Warning Track Power]

I have seen this topic slip into a few other topics recently and I think it is time to give it its own thread.

 

The big question I am grappling with related to the Brewers: Is Craig Counsell regressing as a manager?

 

This is not to question whether or not Counsell should remain as the manager. He should. I think he is the best manager the Brewers have had that I can recall in my 39 years on this planet. However, after watching last season, as well as the first 7 games into this season, his decision-making during the game has started to remind me of later years Mike McCarthy with the Packers, where I am questioning more of his moves than I am in support of them and his approach is becoming increasingly stale.

 

It seems like Counsell has fallen a bit into the traditional manager role rather than being the cutting-edge manager he was in the earlier years of his tenure. Pulling Burnes at 86 pitches during his second start of the season is understandable but I would have given him until 100 pitches. Maybe he gets through the 7th, maybe you have to go to Williams early. Designating Williams as the 8th inning guy and Hader as the 9th inning guy is lazy managing to me and Counsell has fallen into this rut over the past season +. The bullpen can't just be Williams-Hader, but with the offense providing very little, you need to win ballgames the best way you can until it comes around. With Yardley and Rasmussen called on to protect a 1-0 lead, I think we all knew that the Brewers would need more than 1 run to win and that was going to be challenging given the offense's start to the season.

 

There were many more examples of this last year that I felt in the moment and can't remember specifics of today. Yesterday's game was a microcosm of how things have changed with Counsell in the last season +. In addition, the team's offensive slump over the past year cannot simply be ignored either. A manager and his coach's jobs are to aid and assist players when they are slumping. As an example, we can all see Hiura's swing has become way too much uppercut. Why aren't Counsell and Haines addressing? Are they coaching him to swing this way? If so, it isn't working.

 

Another example, Garcia's career OPS prior to playing in Milwaukee is .751 in 3000 PAs. In Milwaukee, it is .629 in 229 PAs. Small sample size sure, but in 58 games played he has 10 2B and 2 HR which translates to 28 2B and 6 HRs in a 162 game season. That is an expected Luis Urias line, not a $10m per year corner OF. So what has happened to Garcia? There appear to be no answers or solutions coming from the manager's office.

 

This may seem like a vent thread but it is not. It is more of an obvious observation that things aren't right in Brewers world and I think Counsell deserves more scrutiny than he is currently getting, both as an in-game manager and his coaching staff's abilities to solve issues.

[OldSchoolSnapper]

We've had 4 games where SP surrendered literally one hit, and we've lost two of them. We have to hit the ball. The expectation can't be that we shut people out. I don't like either call to remove Burnes or Woody when he did, and we won the latter, but we can't be this bad or the managing won't matter. We've got be at least mediocre at hitting this year.

[KeithStone53151]

I've seen the in game threads, I think people are making way too big a thing out of pulling Woodruff and Burnes when he did. These are the first couple starts of the season, Burnes is relatively young still and Woodruff got a late start to spring training. Taking it easy and pulling these guys in the mid 80s pitch counts is not unreasonable, if you look around the league it's not all that uncommon. Blake Snell has a 1.86 ERA and has thrown 86 and 87 pitches in his starts. Degrom got pulled after 77 pitches his first start. Regarding Burnes/Woodruff, both guys labored a bit in their last inning of work and both had said they were pretty tired and agreed with the manager in pulling them. They might have said that anyways, but CC has far more information than us. I suspect the same people griping about not letting them pitch further into the game are the same people that would gripe if CC left them in and they gave up a couple runs in their next inning of work. It's really easy to second guess these decisions after the fact.

 

I think CC has designated Hader as a more traditional closer this year, based on the make-up of the bullpen currently. They've sputtered a bit so far this season, but heading into the season Williams looked like a true lock-down reliever. And then CC has 3 or 4 guys ready to pitch 2-3 inning stretches if needed. Not sure how many managers came into the season with the strategy of having at least half their relievers prepared for multiple innings...such a strategy is far from traditional.

 

Also let's remember we are a week into the season as far as hitting goes. It's fair for the manager to bear some of the criticism here, but it's not fair this early.

[Warning Track Power]

I've seen the in game threads, I think people are making way too big a thing out of pulling Woodruff and Burnes when he did. These are the first couple starts of the season, Burnes is relatively young still and Woodruff got a late start to spring training. Taking it easy and pulling these guys in the mid 80s pitch counts is not unreasonable. Especially considering in both cases both guys labored a bit in their last inning of work and both had said they were pretty tired and agreed with the manager in pulling them. They might have said that anyways, but CC has far more information than us. I suspect the same people griping about not letting them pitch further into the game are the same people that would gripe if CC left them in and they gave up a couple runs in their next inning of work. It's really easy to second guess these decisions after the fact.

 

I think CC has designated Hader as a more traditional closer this year, based on the make-up of the bullpen currently. They've sputtered a bit so far this season, but heading into the season Williams looked like a true lock-down reliever. And then CC has 3 or 4 guys ready to pitch 2-3 inning stretches if needed. Not sure how many managers came into the season with the strategy of having at least half their relievers prepared for multiple innings...such a strategy is far from traditional.

 

Also let's remember we are a week into the season as far as hitting goes. It's fair for the manager to bear some of the criticism here, but it's not fair this early.

All good points that you make. Specific to the bold part, it is early, however the offense in the first week appears to be eerily similar to what it was in 2020. Fair or not, we as fans are going to be upset given that the Brewers FINALLY appear to have two potential Aces in Woodruff & Burnes, with a third possible in Peralta, and now they cannot hit at all.

[Ron Robinsons Beard]

I've seen the in game threads, I think people are making way too big a thing out of pulling Woodruff and Burnes when he did. These are the first couple starts of the season, Burnes is relatively young still and Woodruff got a late start to spring training. Taking it easy and pulling these guys in the mid 80s pitch counts is not unreasonable. Especially considering in both cases both guys labored a bit in their last inning of work and both had said they were pretty tired and agreed with the manager in pulling them. They might have said that anyways, but CC has far more information than us. I suspect the same people griping about not letting them pitch further into the game are the same people that would gripe if CC left them in and they gave up a couple runs in their next inning of work. It's really easy to second guess these decisions after the fact.

 

I think CC has designated Hader as a more traditional closer this year, based on the make-up of the bullpen currently. They've sputtered a bit so far this season, but heading into the season Williams looked like a true lock-down reliever. And then CC has 3 or 4 guys ready to pitch 2-3 inning stretches if needed. Not sure how many managers came into the season with the strategy of having at least half their relievers prepared for multiple innings...such a strategy is far from traditional.

 

Also let's remember we are a week into the season as far as hitting goes. It's fair for the manager to bear some of the criticism here, but it's not fair this early.

All good points that you make. Specific to the bold part, it is early however the offense in the first week appears to be eerily similar to what it was in 2020. Fair or not, we as fans are going to be upset given that the Brewers FINALLY appear to have two potential Aces in Woodruff & Burnes, with a third possible in Peralta, and now they cannot hit at all.

 

With all the additions they've made to the lineup, this team's offensive success is still going to come down to Yelich being Yelich, and Hiura not being a black hole. It's not a coincidence that the offense hasn't done much yet with those two starting off a little cold. Yelich has at least started to pick it up in the last couple days.

[OldSchoolSnapper]

Hard to blame the team when two of the biggest culprits are your prized prospect who OPS'd .940 as a rookie and now can't play baseball, and the franchise cornerstone in some kind of power outage. Those two have to be better than they are. It's a long season and you just have to hope they get going.

[owbc]

I think CC has always managed for a 162-game season and his early-season management style has paid huge dividends in August and September.

[Warning Track Power]

I think CC has always managed for a 162-game season and his early-season management style has paid huge dividends in August and September.

This is fair and the Brewers under Counsell tend to get hot in August and September. The only issue with that is that in order to make up games in the standings it is REQUIRED they get hot. If they don't, games like yesterday sting a lot more in retrospect.

[MrTPlush]

CC has a really tough job. He has so little room for error because it is far from an offense first team. The team doesn’t put up the runs to hide manager decisions that don’t work out.

 

I don’t think he is that bad. Maybe not a brilliant manger, but I don’t think that really exists. Either you have the offense to cover your mistakes or your team is so good they make you brilliant regardless of what you do.

[KeithStone53151]

CC has a really tough job. He has so little room for error because it is far from an offense first team. The team doesn’t put up the runs to hide manager decisions that don’t work out.

 

I don’t think he is that bad. Maybe not a brilliant manger, but I don’t think that really exists. Either you have the offense to cover your mistakes or your team is so good they make you brilliant regardless of what you do.

 

I'd agree with this, CC is solid but unspectacular. And he's not in a situation like Dave Roberts to look like a genius no matter who starts, as his 26th man probably starts on 2/3 of mlb rosters and his 3rd best reliever would close for 2/3 of teams.

 

Just remember, before CC we had Yost, Macha, Runnin Ron, and Sveum. CC is head and shoulders better than any of them at his job in my opinion. And Yost went on to get carried to a WS title by probably one of the best bullpens of all time. A trash team can make a great manager look terrible, and a WS caliber team can make Yost look like a genius.

[Roderick]

"Sick of the pitch count BS. 86 pitches and hasn't given up a hit since the 1st inning. They finally have a couple really good starters for what, another 3-4 years if they don't trade them off? Let him throw when he's unhittable."

 

The above is what someone said in the in-game thread yesterday. I would actually say that having two studs through the 2024 season, that is a reason to handle them a little gently in the first 2-3 starts. We want to see a lot of them over the next four years. If it is a 32 year old veteran on a one year contract, then go ahead and push that pitch count if he is doing well in a game and the bullpen is still undecided on who can do what.

[KeithStone53151]

"Sick of the pitch count BS. 86 pitches and hasn't given up a hit since the 1st inning. They finally have a couple really good starters for what, another 3-4 years if they don't trade them off? Let him throw when he's unhittable."

 

The above is what someone said in the in-game thread yesterday. I would actually say that having two studs through the 2024 season, that is a reason to handle them a little gently in the first 2-3 starts. We want to see a lot of them over the next four years. If it is a 32 year old veteran on a one year contract, then go ahead and push that pitch count if he is doing well in a game and the bullpen is still undecided on who can do what.

 

Agreed, I'd be more than happy to let Brett Anderson throw 200 pitches if he's effective for all 200.

[tmwiese55]

I'd say my biggest 'complaint', which is a stretch, would be somewhat resorting back to traditional bullpen roles as opposed to the mass creativity in the NLCS year. Brewers and Rays were kind of on the cutting edge there and we've kind of pulled back since then. Who knows, could be just due to personnel now vs then. Or maybe someone like Hader has said he'd prefer this route for whatever reason (contract, health, etc).

 

Overall CC is good manager and the nature of playings tons of close low scoring games is there is going to be bullpen decisions to nitpick. There is simply no way to get them correct 100% of the time and as fans we latch onto the ones that don't work while glossing over all the times they do. It also makes the decisions even more difficult due to having to plan on the whole year and not overrusing. I think its fair to say with his track record on this stuff and how the Septs have gone, CC should get the benefit the doubt.

 

Bottom line, the offense has to hit and really not sure how to blame him on that too much. Yelich and Hiura have to hit.

[OldSchoolSnapper]

We got beyond lucky in 2018. We built a good team, but got lightning in a bottle with multiple guys like Shaw and a few months of Aguilar hitting like Prince Fielder. We will likely need that kind of good fortune to ever close the deal, but the chips really fell for us, with the exception of getting Schoop.

[umphrey]

I hated when he was playing Arcia at 3B, but that’s a non issue now. We’ll see what he does with Hiura - platoon, demotion, dropped in the order, if his struggles continue.

[pacopete4]

Pitch counts are not going away and there is no manager that goes against them really. And really, with how fragile these guys are these days, I get it.

[adambr2]

I'd say my biggest 'complaint', which is a stretch, would be somewhat resorting back to traditional bullpen roles as opposed to the mass creativity in the NLCS year. Brewers and Rays were kind of on the cutting edge there and we've kind of pulled back since then. Who knows, could be just due to personnel now vs then. Or maybe someone like Hader has said he'd prefer this route for whatever reason (contract, health, etc).

 

Overall CC is good manager and the nature of playings tons of close low scoring games is there is going to be bullpen decisions to nitpick. There is simply no way to get them correct 100% of the time and as fans we latch onto the ones that don't work while glossing over all the times they do. It also makes the decisions even more difficult due to having to plan on the whole year and not overrusing. I think its fair to say with his track record on this stuff and how the Septs have gone, CC should get the benefit the doubt.

 

Bottom line, the offense has to hit and really not sure how to blame him on that too much. Yelich and Hiura have to hit.

 

I'd agree with this. I like Counsell, but I liked him a lot better when he was innovative with his pen and to me he's just kind of inexplicably gone back 15 years with the pen usage from how he used to use them.

 

Maybe it's a lack of options compared to '18, but if that's the case you're going to need to lean on your starters a little more than you have been. We can't play the game to get to our pen like we used to because we just don't have the right personnel for that anymore.

 

I don't think we really did enough in the offseason to strengthen the middle to back end of our pen, and with CCs management style I think that kind of hampers him. I still believe in Williams and having him and Hader at the top is as good as it gets, but they can't pitch every day and once you start getting deeper in the pen they just don't have any really good options. I think we have 3 or 4 guys in the pen that a good bullpen really can only have 1 or 2 of at the back to eat up innings.

[owbc]

We got beyond lucky in 2018. We built a good team, but got lightning in a bottle with multiple guys like Shaw and a few months of Aguilar hitting like Prince Fielder. We will likely need that kind of good fortune to ever close the deal, but the chips really fell for us, with the exception of getting Schoop.

 

Meh, getting lucky doesn't win you 96 regular season games with one of the lowest payrolls in MLB.

 

I'm a bit confused where all this concern is coming from. The 2021 team looks pretty good so far. We all knew they were going to struggle with a tough schedule in April but if they can continue to float around .500 they will be fine. Several important pieces -- Shaw and Narvaez -- are off to good starts. They finally got rid of Arcia, everyone had been asking for that for years. They are not going to leave their starters in for 100+ pitches this early. Nobody does that. They will reshuffle bullpen roles if certain guy struggle. What else is there to do barely one week into the season? It's 162, not 60 this year. There's time.

 

As for the low OPS, that's nearly all Hiura at this point.

[FVBrewerFan]

I think we're over-estimating CC's role in managing the SP outings, line-up, etc. Analytics dept., training staff, and ultimately Stearns has a lot to say about it. CC doesn't just randomly decide Hiura is going to hit 2nd, and especially not decide on his own how many pitches/ innings a starter is going in the 2nd start of the season.

[OldSchoolSnapper]

We got beyond lucky in 2018. We built a good team, but got lightning in a bottle with multiple guys like Shaw and a few months of Aguilar hitting like Prince Fielder. We will likely need that kind of good fortune to ever close the deal, but the chips really fell for us, with the exception of getting Schoop.

 

Meh, getting lucky doesn't win you 96 regular season games with one of the lowest payrolls in MLB.

 

I'm a bit confused where all this concern is coming from. The 2021 team looks pretty good so far. We all knew they were going to struggle with a tough schedule in April but if they can continue to float around .500 they will be fine. Several important pieces -- Shaw and Narvaez -- are off to good starts. They finally got rid of Arcia, everyone had been asking for that for years. They are not going to leave their starters in for 100+ pitches this early. Nobody does that. They will reshuffle bullpen roles if certain guy struggle. What else is there to do barely one week into the season? It's 162, not 60 this year. There's time.

 

As for the low OPS, that's nearly all Hiura at this point.

 

Getting lucky can take you from 90 to 96 though, and it almost definitely did that season, and does for at least one team ever year. It's part of the game, always has been. It's hard to say they weren't lucky with Aguilar, and Shaw to a lesser extent. The stars really aligned for us that season in many ways, from multiple plug-in options working out wonderfully, to a guy falling down while heading home in a pivotal September game. They had bad luck, too, of course, but the last month had a definite magic feel to it.

[igor67]

I think it is worth recognizing how unprecedented managing pitching is this season. I was double checking the 94 strike and teams still got in over 110 games before the strike (so pretty close to a full AAA season) followed by a 144 game schedule in 95. I'm a little more skeptical of the universality of the 30 inning increase 'rule' for pitchers, but our starters are all young and going from a 60 game schedule to 162 is more than enough to give pause to any certainty in what the best strategy is. I would guess the Brewers tried to look at how individual pitchers in the past have handled big jumps in innings and are somehow incorporating that for the entire staff, but even a lot of data on individual pitcher seasons is different from the whole staff all at once.

[brewcrewdue80]

Counsell is definitely pressing more of the wrong buttons. I don't have the biggest problems with bullpen usage in terms of who hes using. Just the occasional, let the starter pitch in the inning. He seems to give up on them when having a low pitch output game andoverworks the bullpen just because 6innings is all he seems to think matter and any pitching in the 7th needs to come from bullpen.

My issue with Counsell is his constant lineup cards where a guy who hit a HR or 2 or multiple hits too often sits the next day just because analytic side says tomorrows lineup should set up this way. Not rewarding good days from bad stretches. Batting Hiura 2nd vs Yelich, Narvaez not batting 3rd or 4th. Cain yesterday not batting 2nd over Hiura? Hits 2 HRs, was your leadoff bat, bat 2nd highest on team and you have him what? 6th and bat someone with a near 000 average and ks over 50pct thus far? RP are required to pitch to 3batters now, so some of the L-R on and on is just too much overthinking matchups and its literally gotten to a point where its too predictable. Lime you can see the lineup card and basically say Counsell will PH this guy first or double move the pitcher with this player for this player. Needs to install more gut feeling. Leaving Yardley to pitch after clearly struggling. See with Hader no longer his 1plus inning go to, he sticks with Yardley because he's got the moves planned already and hes not going to adjust it seems until it has gone to hell and forced to. Why wasn't Lindblom up warming up during both Yardley and Rasmussen innings? Probably because Lindblom will pitch in the 4th-7th innings next game depending how well Houser or Anderson do. Decision already made.

[wallus]

Counsell would have a pick of multiple managerial jobs if he were let go. He is not the problem on this team. The season is long and it is way too early to make any judgements based on the few games we have played. Well, maybe that Hiura looks terrible is fair.

[timpep]

Coming into the season I thought Counsel would be a big advantage because outside the box strategies might be important in another weird year. He seems like he's at the point now where he makes the same decisions pretty much every manager would. I don't see a lot of outside the box stuff anymore. Maybe using Suter in games they're down a run instead of having him for a 7th inning lead? Idk, he seems stale, I hope he gets back to thinking outside the box.

[mtsportsfan]

Counsell is absolutely a good manager , had some decisions backfire so far this season , but there is not any manager that would look good with this offense. One thing that does kinda worry me Is the rule change for relievers. He won't be able to manipulate the staff like he did in the past. All will be mute if we don't start to hit.