Game 85: Brewers 5 Pirates 4

I think from now on, I’m just not going to watch Pirate games that Ryan Doumit is involved in. You probably think I’m kidding, but I’m deadly serious about this. It completely baffles my mind that someone can be a Major League catcher while only throwing out ten percent of base stealers. He’s the only catcher in baseball who’d actually be better served throwing a base ahead of the runner to prevent situations like the ninth inning tonight. If you missed it, Carlos Gomez stole second, Doumit’s throw came in a time zone behind him and a mile over Ronny Cedeno’s head, and Gomez cruised to third. That forced the Pirates to pull the infield in to protect their three-run lead, so George Kotteras’s game-ending groundout actually turned into a triple down the first base line (also, “defensive replacement” Ryan Church just kind of ran into right field and got swallowed by the Saarlaac pit or something instead of getting the ball quickly back into the infield). THEN, Doumit let another pitch get by him and the only reason Kotteras didn’t score is that he’s an awful baserunner who happened to be winded from tripling through the Pirates’ inept defense seconds earlier. Which is presumably exactly how we drew things up in the dugout. But since the Pirates’ offense is the Pirates’ offense, it was only a matter of time before the Brewers scored again and won (but not before Evan Meek made something like five consecutive pickoff throws to hold Rickie Weeks close to first but RYAN DOUMIT STILL COULDN’T THROW THE GUY OUT AT SECOND BASE).

Here is Ryan Doumit’s CS% in 2010 before tonight: 10%

Here are Ryan Doumit’s CS% in 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, and 2009: 40%, 27%, 22%, 27%, and 31%

Here is my question: WHAT IS RYAN DOUMIT DOING DIFFERENTLY THIS YEAR AND WHY CAN’T OUR COACHING STAFF, WHICH INCLUDES A MANAGER THAT IS A FORMER MAJOR LEAGUE CATCHER, FIGURE OUT WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH A GUY THAT’S ACTUALLY MORE USELESS THAN A PANEL OF WOOD BEHIND THE PLATE BECAUSE AT LEAST THE PANEL OF WOOD WOULD NEVER THROW THE BALL INTO CENTER FIELD?

Seriously, if that’s not what a coaching staff is for, then what is a coaching staff for?