Luis Ayala and cognitive dissonance

"Cognitive dissonance" is the psychological term for conflicting beliefs held simultaneously. We can identify it at work in almost any field, but since this is a baseball blog, I'll stick to baseball.

We see it in the strange case of Luis Ayala, who is said to have complained a few weeks ago to Ron Gardenhire that he wasn't being used as the primary eight-inning setup man.

The reason is fairly obvious:

Matt Guerrier: 0.86 WHIP, 2.76 ERA, 22K, 6 BB, 4 HR (32.6 IP)
Jose Mijares: 1.38 WHIP, 2.57 ERA, 17K, 10 BB, 3 HR (21 IP)
Luis Ayala: 1.42 WHIP, 4.18 ERA, 21K, 8 BB, 4HR (32.6 IP)

What there suggests Ayala deserved a more prominent role in the Twins bullpen?

Ayala was the primary set-up option for years with the Expos/Nationals, and fell into the closer role last September with the Mets, so one can understand why he's attached to the notion that he belongs in that role.

Clinging to that belief requires him to disregard the evidence.

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Monday's print column on possible bullpen trade targets was echoed, more or less, by this posting on NBC's Sports' Circling the Bases blog. It mentions several of the names I did Monday, and a few others — and contains details (such as the expanding salary of Takashi Saito) that I didn't have.

The Crain train detrailed

The moment I saw Jesse Crain warming up Sunday, I knew the Twins were in trouble.

And sure enough, four of the five men he faced in the bottom of the ninth reached safely, which was more than enough for the Cubs to break the 2-2 tie.

Crain this month has faced 17 batters, eight of whom have either gotten a hit or walk.

The telling quote from Ron Gardenhire after the game: "You try to find the right situation to put him in ballgames, but when you get to this point there is no right situation."

I have some sympathy for Gardy on this one: Matt Guerrier had pitched on June 8, 10, 11, 12 and 13 — five times in six days. Granted, most of those outings were brief — he totaled eight outs in those five games — but that's still excessive use. Luis Ayala had pitched the eighth — more on that later. And the Cubs had a string of right-handed hitters up, so it's understandable that he wanted to avoid calling on Sean Henn or Jose Mijares.

Which left Joe Nathan, Crain or R.A. Dickey. Nathan had pitched four times in five days himself, so he wasn't going to be asked to pitch multiple innings. And Dickey ...

Well, frankly, why not Dickey? I know: He's the long man. Well, guess what? He's been far more effective than Crain — his ERA since April is 1.52 — he's right-handed, and if the game goes extra innings, he's equipped to soak up the extra work. And he hadn't pitched in a week.

The underlying issue here remains bullpen depth. Guerrier has been far better than I could have hoped; Mijares has bounced back from his spring training disaster; Henn and Ayala are contributing in limited fashion; and Dickey has been marvelous in the long role.

Crain's supposed to be the eighth-inning right-handed power arm. And he's been useless.

The Gardenhire quote above sounds like he's running out of patience with Crain. A lot of fans reached that point a few weeks ago.

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Ayala had a perfect eighth inning Sunday — three up-three down, three first-pitch strikes, even a strikeout.

And somehow it took him 22 pitches to accomplish it, because there were 10 foul balls. The man just cannot miss bats.

Which is why I say he's useful in a limited fashion.

Twins 6, Oakland 3 (Wednesday night)

Last West Coast night game for a while. Now the Twins face four straight day games — one today (Thursday) in Oakland, three in Wrigley against the Cubs — which will be a test of their weak-bats-in-the-daytime pattern.

Comments on Wednday's game:

* Francisco Liriano continues to pitch better than his results. He allowed just eight baserunners in six innings (five hits, two walks, one HBP); he induced 20 swings-and-misses; he struck out seven. And three of his seven runners scored, because all five hits came in two innings. There's an old cliche about scattering hits; Lirano this year seems to bunch them.

There were flaws. He threw first-pitch strikes to just 13 of 25 hitters, further evidence of his lack of fastball command. Kurt Suzuki, the Oakland catcher, swiped two bases. 

* Luis Ayala had another scoreless inning and knocked his ERA down to 3.95. Eighteen pitches, 15 of them strikes. Eighteen pitches is a lot for a one-two-three inning, but the A's fouled off nine pitches. They didn't have a swing-and-miss. 

That's the kind of thing that continues to make me uneasy about Ayala. I want to see power arms in the bullpen, and he doesn't miss bats.

* Michael Cuddyer, center fielder. I doubt that Ron Gardenhire is eager to go with that defensive formation — Delmon Young in left, Cuddyer in center, Jason Kubel in right — often, but it's not known how long Denard Span will be out of action, and if they don't put him on the DL, they don't have a true CF behind Carlos Gomez.

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Draft stuff: Prominent among the Twins second-day selections was Gopher second baseman Derek McCallum.

He's got some gaudy stats, but he's an amateur second baseman, and few of them become standout big-leaguers. As a rule, if you have the mobility and throwing arm to be a second baseman in the major leagues, you were the best athlete on your amateur team, and you played shortstop. 

The Twins took a couple of college catchers in the fifth and sixth rounds (Tobias Streich of West Virginia and Chris Herrmann of Miami) and three more as they worked through the 30th round. Lots of pitchers and shortstops. Only two outfielders, and one of them, Eric Decker of the U of M, almost certainly isn't going to sign.  

Oakland 4, Twins 3 (Monday night)

About 10 days ago, there was a lot of chatter about the idea of Anthony Swarzak (right) displacing Francisco Liriano or Glen Perkins in the rotation.

I doubt that was ever seriously contemplated by the people with the responsibility of making such decisions. If it was, Swarzak's performance Monday night did much to discourage such a move.

He was wild. Officially, he threw more strikes than balls — 46 strikes, 35 balls  — but that was strictly because of the generosity of home plate umpire Wally Bell.  He bounced a pitch off Aaron Cunningham's helmet. His ERA is now 5.23, and he has walked nine batters in less than 21 innings in his four starts. 

That's no way to pitch your way into the Minnesota rotation. 

* Swarzak doesn't get the loss on his record; that goes to Luis Ayala, who gave up the home run to Jack Cust that put the A's ahead. I'm still not completely sold on him, but that was the first earned run charged to him since May 18, and he's taken his ERA down from 5.71 to 4.10. He had three strikeouts in 1.3 innings Monday, 21 strikes and just eight balls. It wasn't a horrid outing, but it's an "L" anyway. 

* Carlos Gomez had a very good bases-loaded at-bat in the fourth inning — taking every pitch and walking on the 3-1 pitch to bring home the first run. He supposedly spent the winter working on taking pitches, and I wondered if he's really seeing more pitches per plate appearance this year. Nope. Entering Monday, Gomez was seeing 3.35 pitches per trip to the plate; last season it was 3.41.

Delmon Young — another Twins outfielder with notoriously poor strike zone judgment — is seeing more pitches: 3.59 last season, 3.74 this year. Not that it's helping any. 

*Craig Breslow — speaking of people who've lowered the ERA — had a 6.28 ERA with the Twins, 2.16 since Oakland picked him up. He pitched Monday in the eighth inning; Joe Mauer singled, Justin Morneau flew out, and then the A's brought in a right-hander to get Michael Cuddyer to ground into a DP. Seven pitches for Breslow, four of them strikes. Not real impressive, but it got the job done.

* One final note: Jack Hannahan, former Mankato Masher and Minnesota Gopher, had the big three-run double after Swarzak's wildness set things up in the fourth. 

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The first two rounds of the amateur draft are to be held later tonight (I'm posting this after midnight); for a variety of reasons, personal and professional, I'm unlikely to comment on the Twins picks as soon as I have the past couple of years. I expect to get something up early Wednesday.