As far as Henderson and his decision making- it's apples and oranges being the pitching coach and the head coach. Plus last year our staff was so injury riddled that anyone would get a pass on that.

That may answer the second question.

But the thing about closers is right or wrong in this day and age most of them like to start with a clean inning. For them it's about preparation more than anything and knowing how to get ready mentally. There aren't very many Andrew Miller's in baseball that can just do whatever. And a lot of coaches like to define roles because it helps to reduce injuries because you don't want a guy throwing a complete game in the bullpen getting him up and down and that sort of thing.

If you by chance do start an inning with your LH guy and you have him face a RH hitter you only do that because you want your LOOGY to face the in this case LH hitter on deck. Henderson didn't do that- and while yes, France got the LH hitter out, why not just start with France if you're not going to match up with the LH hitter with your LOOGY? Or Smith since he's your closer. And sometimes you do even in this day and age have to go by feel a little bit. And the way France looked last night combined with how he threw the weekend before plus how Smith threw the weekend before I and I think most baseball managers would have stayed with France. France was according to the radar gun was throwing 95 and pretty much blew his guy away and looked pretty confident to me at that point.

I did think it was funny after the game that Henderson said he could see where Bianco was coming from with walking Mangum. That's usually a sign that the decision was pretty questionable.

I just don't think Henderson has a very good feel for the game and what to do in certain situations and it leads to craziness happening sometimes. I think he's a good pitching coach and to be honest from a strategy standpoint a bad manager. It's not mutually exclusive though.