Hold music

Sorry to stick another sports post in here, but this'll at least be quick. Back during the 2006 World Cup I had a brief discussion with Nemo about why I considered the hold to be the most worthless statistic in sports. I'm not necessarily going to make that exact same case a second time, but I recently saw a box score that made me question how the hold really makes any sense - or at least how it fits with the way scoring is otherwise calculated in baseball.

March 19, Cubs' split-squad vs. A's split-squad. The Cubs lead 2-0 going into the top of the eighth. The following happens:

Kevin Hart comes in to pitch the eighth. He loads the bases on two hits and a walk, then walks in one run to make it 2-1. He is pulled in favor of Carlos Marmol. Marmol walks the first batter he sees to tie the game, then allows an RBI single. The A's eventually win 5-2.

Now, what do you suppose happened?

If you know anything about baseball scoring, you would say, "Okay, Hart takes the loss - the third and winning run was put on base by Hart, so it would be charged to him."

You're right! Hart took the loss. But guess what? He also got a hold! Because the hold, for some reason, is only concerned with whether or not you gave up the hits that scored the runs. So even though the standard rules of baseball charge Hart with the loss (and, slightly less quirkily, Marmol with a blown save), the hold, a more modern stat, apparently isn't concerned with who "earned" the runs, just on whose watch they literally scored. And thus it's possible to get a hold and yet still take a loss. Wha?

I'm sorry: if you put the winning run on base, and then get yanked because you were too ineffective, as evidenced by the fact that you just put the winning run on base, you should not be getting a hold. A hold should be reserved for pitchers who come into the game with their team in position to win and leave without having hurt those chances. I mean, if you come into the game with your team in position to win and you give up the lead, you don't get a save. You get a blown save. Of course Hart, in a very literal sense, left the game with his team in a "position to win," and if Marmol induces a double play on the next pitch we're not having this discussion. But you know how if you come up with the bases loaded and no outs, and you ground into a double play and the guy on third scores, you don't get an RBI? Same deal here. If you come in with a lead, and you put the go-ahead run on base at any point, you don't get a hold unless you get out of that jam yourself. If Hart had walked in that first run, then struck out the next two guys, great; give that man a hold. I know it's kind of a sticky situation - after all, it's not up to Hart when he gets yanked - but I think that's a better solution than giving a hold to a guy who we're admitting was bad enough at his job to get the loss.

Thoughts? Impossibly snarky rejoinders (Nemo)? Desire for me to confine any and all baseball talk to the Cubs blog from here on out?