Tigers season - why they were fourth.

With a new manager it is always difficult for Tigers to perform well in the first year but previous choices have managed to turn this around in their second year. So how has the much reviled Mayumi performed? This is actually not an easy question to answer and it relies on how he has handled the management task rather than his actual game handling. Taking the various aspects of the game one can see examples of short-sightedness which do not bode well for the future.

Pitching
Once again Tigers failed to develop their young pitchers and relied instead on old stagers. This proved to be a serious mistake with one or two bright spots. One of the bright spots was Nohmi - finally he showed his potential and pitched very well at times. At first he was his old nervous self but the coaches stuck with him and he began to blossom. Some of his pitching was pure brilliance and by the end of the season he was a confident starter with a winning record. Another bright spot was Kubo who came in a trade for Hashimoto from the fools at Lotte. How anyone can give up a pitcher of his quality for Hashimoto is one of the great unanswered questions of the year and after initial difficulties he started winning. Normally, Pacific League pitchers take a year to adjust to Central League conditions so his adjustment was excellent. Now the less bright spots - Andoh who had a decent year in 2008 but was over-pitched also returned as a starter. He wasn't so good this year and whilst he was with Kanoh performed OK but then went downhill when paired with Yano. The inability to get rid of superannuated and fading players would be a big problem for the Tigers. Shimoyanagi was clearly over the hill and even though Kanoh did well in guiding him he also deteriorated when paired with Yano. He did not figure in the final stages of the season and it would be too much to ask him back. Fukuhara was just terrible and one has to ask whether a role can be found for him. Iwata had a quiet year but is still one of the best pitchers Tigers have - most of the time he was sidelined by injury.
Mayumi's tactic was to ask the starting pitchers to go deep and not to rely so much on the relief. However, here he exhibited his greatest failing in a complete under-valuation of the relief. The way he and Kido treated their bullpen almost bordered on contempt and they were repaid by poor performances. Kubota, Watanabe and Abe ended up being unuseable and these three fine relief pitchers would have been very valuable. Egusa and Atchison were over-pitched and Egusa in particular showed signs of fatigue in the later stages of the season. The signing of Cheng was wasted as the coaches demonstrated a complete inability to use this potent pitcher at all. It was incompetence of the highest order. Tsutsui blossomed into a nice relief pitcher but even he fell prey to one of the more stupid experiments of the Mayumi regime - that of converting relief pitchers to starters. This had been tried in 2008 with ex-MLB pitchers (Atchison and Resop) and hadn't worked then. But we saw Abe, Tsutsui and Kubota tried as starters. None of them prospered, Kubota lasted one game and was clearly out of his depth and then disappeared for the rest of the season. Both Abe and Tsutsui lasted two games and whilst the latter bounced back, the former was shattered and also dropped down to the second team. Though this was also to hide the coaches embarrassment and trying such a stupid scheme. The thing was Tigers have a batch of young pitchers who should be in the first team, Ishikawa, Uezono and Kojima. They all appeared in one game and should have had more chances - it is better to give them experience than to destroy the bullpen. Another sign of the inability of the coaching team was their handling of Cheng. One of the most talented pitchers in Taiwan and the subject of much interest from MLB, Cheng signed to Tigers before the start of the season. Straight away the coaching team couldn't decide how to use him. He started three games and pitched very well but he was also used as a relief. In fact he would have made a fine starter and given that the lamentable Fukuhara was given many starts one can only shake ones head in wonder at the short sightedness and stupidity of the coaches. A lot of reliance was also placed on Williams who unfortunately continued his decline of the previous season. He eventually left for surgery in America mid-season though it is doubtful that this has happened and one must think that his playing days for Tigers are over. This creates a huge gap in Tigers relief and through the coaches messing up of the bullpen it is unlikely to be filled. Of course we saw the obligatory start for Sugiyama and whilst Tigers managed to dump some of their ineffective pitchers they retained him. He was as useless as ever. Kanemura converted to a relief pitcher and proved very effective - one can see him being a very useful addition to the bullpen as long as the coaches don't mess up. To be honest Tigers pitching choices were affected too much by prejudice. Kubo and Kido don't really know much about the pitchers they have and if they can persevere with Nohmi they can do so with others. Instead they went with old tired options and missed the chance to build one of the most exciting pitching lineups in Japan. Still one must say that this task is beyond them.

Catching
Here Tigers were lucky - Noguchi left to join the BayStars and Yano was injured so they had to rely on Kanoh. This was a stroke of luck as Kanoh was brilliant and imaginative. A real find his refreshing and varied approach saved many games for Tigers. His batting was reasonable though it does need to improve. More worrying was his understudy, Okazaki who proved to be one dimensional and not equipped for top team work. Initially, his pairing with Kubo prevented the latter from getting his first win. Shimizu would have been the better choice. Yano returned later in the season and wasn't improved. He pitched with the older pitchers and poor Andoh who rapidly built up a losing record with Yano (Kanoh/Andoh 6-6, Yano/Andoh 2-6). Kanoh though is the face of the future but Tigers need to bring Shimizu into the equation as well.

Batting
With Wada as batting coach Tigers under-performed. An inability to hit with runners on and over-conservative base running (something Mayumi was supposed to have cured) saw lots of opportunities wasted. The bombardment of Kawamoto (Swallows catcher) in the game of October 3rd showed what aggressive base running could accomplish but this was too rare. Tigers start wasn't good and in fact the coaches rapidly lost control and incurred the opposition of players. Kido was the main culprit here and Mayumi was too weak to resist him. Various disciplinary measures were tried such as benching Toritani and shifting Arai around but eventually higher management intervened and the coaching team had to work out a modus vivendi with the team. This led to a better performance after the All-Star break. I should stress that this breakdown was serious and one of the options canvassed by Sakai-owner was a mid-season replacement of Mayumi and his team. It was very close to being adopted.
The bright spots of the batting were Brazell and Asai. The former was signed mid-season to replace Kevin Mench. He was Tigers latest foreign signing to fail and fail miserably he did. He couldn't cope at all and in desperation Tigers turned to Brazell who had been dropped by Seibu the year before. This was a great move as Brazell hit and hit and ended up with 49 RBIs. Injury prevented him from getting more but he was a good signing. One wonders why Tigers did not sign him at the beginning of the season. Asai was also a bright spot. Originally he was a catcher and converted to an outfielder. At first a lightweight batter, he did have the distinction of being the first Tigers batter to drive in runs off Kroon he was a revalation this season. Hitting with power and confidence he changed the course of games and was a good leadoff. A pulled muscle brought an early end to the season for him and indicated that over-training was a problem for Tigers (other players also got injured like this).
Tigers clean up was disappointing, Kanemoto after an incredible start went into a three month slump and both Toritani and Arai revolted against the coaching team by not performing. Attempts to discipline them failed and only after the All-Star break did they perform as they should. Of the other potential clean up members, Katsuragi did not live up to his potential, Imaoka failed again and this must be his last season with the Tigers. Takahashi settled into the pinch hit role nicely.

Coaching
Mayumi failed as a kantoku - whilst harsh this judgement is appropriate. He needed to show foresight, understanding of the situation and a knowledge of his resources. He showed none of these. Several times his decisions smacked of panic and his reliance on Kido opened up a rift between him and the team. He failed to replace non-performing pitchers and despite his avowed intention to use young talent followed Kubo's prejudices. His experiments also failed, Fujimoto did not have the ability to become a regular and kept the more talented Hirano out of the side too long. Kido's management style put a lot of the team against him. Only when he was reigned in were Tigers able to play better and really he needs to be sacked. To be honest Mayumi needs to go now as his decision making shows that he hasn't learned from his mistakes. Tigers need new management to realise their potential and to bring on the young pitchers. More imagination and tactical knowledge is also required particularly in game direction.