FanPost

Behold: A Beaten Horse

This is just a poll (or three) regarding the string of very good work of analysis regarding Wright's contact problems.

One possibility that has not been mentioned (because it is rather far-fetched) is that Wright's struggles might be partially caused by managerial unpreparedness. All teams arrive to the park with a game-plan on how they are going to approach the other team's starter and relief staff, and it is possible that Jerry Manuel's being an utter ass places our players at a unique disadvantage here. Note that Wright had his best year with Hojo as hitting coach for the majority of the season, but that his struggles with fastballs and the strike zone truly began in late 2008 (although he hit curves well enough to be productive regardless). Wright's wFB/C (run production per 100 fastballs) tanked in 2009, but it also fell sharply in 2008 from his career marks. Notice that in 2010, his fastball production has rebounded, but everything else has tanked. This is consistent with observations of Wright missing hittable fastballs late in 2008.

Now, citing the managerial change as coincident to the decline of Wright's approach is a pretty egregious commission of the post-hoc, ergo proper-hoc fallacy. But it does give all of us another excuse, however redundant and faint, to get rid of Jerry.

Being a bit out of my depth, I present this as a poll to the AA community:

This FanPost was contributed by a member of the community and was not subject to any vetting or approval process.