12 outs needed to be made. Say duran gets the 6th and maybe 7th. Lopez and (?) are going to have to get the last 6 outs. Lopez and jax have been bad for a month. Stewart has been good but playing high above his career average. Moran is hit/miss. The weaker guys (aka everyone except duran) are going to have to pitch. You don’t trust them in the 6/7 but you trust them in 8/9? Moran was brought in to face 6-7-8 batters. If they’re going to blow the lead, I’d heck of a lot rather blow it before the 8th inning. That way you could maybe run your strategy a bit differently than if you fall behind in the 9th. Plus, I believe it’s a mental letdown to blow a 9th inning lead. Rarely do I see the home team score in the bottom after blowing a 9th inning lead. Plus I like duran for a possible 10th inning with the manfred rule, being a high strikeout guy.
We’re just arguing about chair placement on the titanic at the end of the day. You can’t have one trustworthy guy in the bullpen. It’s just never going to work. It looked good early on with thielbar and lopez, but it’s reverted to form. Can’t have a bullpen with one solid reliever.