What’s the worst time for a pitcher? When the manager walks up to mound. It is sort of telling everyone in the stadium and the television audience that you are nearing the end of your run. That is happening today for John Kasich.

John Kasich’s D.C. allies are holding a large meet-and-greet political briefing Wednesday afternoon with GOP operatives and donors, according to multiple sources. Ohio Sen. Rob Portman is headlining the event. He will be joined by Kasich senior strategist John Weaver and veteran Republican operative Charlie Black at the 4 p.m. gathering at the American Trucking Association’s Capitol Hill townhouse. Black will be discussing Kasich’s convention strategy, according to the invite. The meeting comes as Texas Sen. Ted Cruz has repeatedly called for the Ohio governor to bow out of the GOP presidential contest, arguing that he is siphoning votes from him and helping Donald Trump become the nominee. … Bob Rusbuldt, co-chair of Kasich’s steering committee, said the session is intended to answer questions and encourage people to support Kasich.

In the vernacular: “bitch, puh-leeze.” No one uses the occasion of being thrashed in a state that the campaign had claimed was tailor made for the candidate to encourage people to support Kasich. Unless “encourage” is “wheedle, beg, and plead.”

Even though Kasich had a good personal fundraising month in February, it is doubtful that March has been as kind. Other than winning his home state, he still lags behind Marco Rubio in total votes and in delegates.

Noted in today’s Jolt, Rubio left race March 15, but he still remains about a half-million total votes ahead of Kasich. — jimgeraghty (@jimgeraghty) April 6, 2016

Kasich did beat Rubio this time. In votes I mean; they tied in delegates. — Phil Kerpen (@kerpen) April 6, 2016

Rubio finished closer to Kasich than Kasich did to Trump. Sad! https://t.co/YgReBXWAvK — Marcus Hawkins (@HawkinsUSA) April 6, 2016

In fact, in Arizona Kasich finished behind Rubio even though Rubio was out of the race. None of this screams “winner!” to donors.

If you are interested in more dispassionate information that available in Twitter snark, read this:

“In the 32 states to hold preference votes for the Republican nomination (including the District of Columbia), Kasich has only won his home state of Ohio. So that’s a record of 1 and 31, or a batting average of .031. Beyond that, he has had five 2nd place finishes; seven 3rd place finishes; nine 4th place finishes; nine 5th place finishes; and one 8th place finish… [I]n his second place finishes, he’s only come within single digits twice (in Vermont and D.C.). In New Hampshire, he came in second by 20 points; in Massachusetts by 31 points; and in Utah by 52 points.”

I don’t really understand why Kasich remains in the race other than as a sop to his rather substantial ego. It isn’t like he’s a competitive candidate.

Anyway, getting back to the baseball analogy. The manager has visited the mound once, now. It is going to happen again and when it does, I have visions of this happening: