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More About Last Night: Why Derek Holland Pitched And Why He Came Out When He Did

ANAHEIM, Calif. - The Rangers made two decisions in Tuesday’s come-from-behind 8-5 win over Los Angeles that seemed to caused lots of internet chatter. They were:

• The decision to pitch LHP Derek Holland in the first place.

• And then the decision to pull Holland out when he was pitching so well.

Turns out there was plenty of thought on both decisions and plenty of logic behind those thoughts.

The Rangers decided to shift Holland back to the bullpen and announced that before Tuesday’s game, which got one segment of the readership riled up before he threw a pitch. There are those upset that he is not pitching every fifth day. There are others who think he can’t develop his secondary stuff, which manager Ron Washington pointed out as an issue, from the bullpen.

First thing to remember: Everything is fluid with the Rangers roster and what happens this week may – and often does – take a dramatic turn the following week. Orlando “El Duque” Hernandez can take his release on July 20 if not in the majors, so it’s entirely possible that when the Rangers come back from the All-Star break, Holland might go to the minors and start while the Rangers see if Hernandez can help them. It’s also just as possible that another pitcher will break down and Holland will move back into the rotation.

And the third thing: Yes, it is possible that Tommy Hunter is a better starting option than Holland right now. Hunter is a couple of months older than Holland, entered the system as a more refined pitcher thanks to his college prep at Alabama and has a more well-rounded repertoire right now. Don’t be fooled by three awful starts last year. That was a case of the Rangers rushing a pitcher because they absolutely had to. Hunter has rebounded and made some adjustments. So, yes, he might just be the better short-term option than Holland. Holland still has to do much of the growing that Hunter did after getting knocked around last year.

That said, let’s go back to the two decisions last night:

Pitching him in the first place: After the Rangers burned through long men Jason Grilli and Doug Mathis on Monday, pitching coach Mike Maddux decided not to have Holland throw his regular bullpen session. Instead, Maddux had Holland prepared to throw that “bullpen” in game in case the Rangers ran into a need for an extra inning since starter RHP Dustin Nippert was going to be limited to about 90 pitches.

When Nippert got into trouble in the fourth, the Rangers elected to warm Holland up, an abbreviated version of his bullpen and then thought they could get about 20 pitches out of him in the game. That’s usually the equivalent of about four outs. Holland got his four outs on 11 pitches. And the Rangers had taken a three-run lead, do the Rangers opted to send him out for another 8-10 pitches. He needed just five pitches to get the first two outs of the sixth and nearly had the third before Jarrod Saltalamacchia dropped a pop up.

Pulling him out when they did: At that point, Holland had 19 pitches and, in Mike Napoli, had a right-handed hitter coming to the plate who kills lefties (.457 batting average, 1.371 on-base-plus-slugging). The Rangers turned to Jason Jennings. The inning turned precarious because Jennings had trouble getting the ball down in the zone, but he didn’t enter the game purely because of a matchup. He entered because the Rangers were trying to take care of Holland’s health.

The only question I had was whether putting Holland back into the game after he’d sat down twice between innings was a risk. If there was any concern in my mind, it was not that Holland shouldn’t have been pulled out when he was, but that he never should have started the sixth in the first place.