Fantasy Baseball – FAAB Report, Wk.3

It’s tax day. So after you fill out the forms, I know you didn’t get on it early since everyone loves to procrastinate so much, here is my report on the just completed week of free agency for the main fantasy baseball leagues I’m doing this season.

TOUT WARS (15 team mixed): With Derek Jeter taking forever to get back out on the field, I’ve been using Luis Cruz for two weeks. No more. In his stead I added Ruben Tejada for $1. He hit .300 the past week with two runs scored and two RBIs. Hey, it’s better than Cruz has done in two weeks (he is hitting .091 with one run and one RBI). I also placed Zack Greinke on the DL and added two start hurler Eric Stults for a buck. He starts at the Dodgers Monday and then at the Giants on the 21st. Those aren’t world beating moves by any stretch of the imagination, but maybe I’ll get a good week or two out of them.

Trade: I gave up Howie Kendrick and Jon Jay for Kenley Jansen, David Murphy and $5 FAAB in a deal with Cory Schwartz of MLB.com. I need pen arms. Jose Veras isn’t getting it done and now Joel Hanrahan is dealing with that leg issue of his so I wanted to be a bit preemptive here (losing Greinke puts a damper on my SP hopes, so I thought I would attack the ratios with RPs). I can slot Daniel Murphy at second and then Emilio Bonifacio at the middle infield spot to cover up the hole Kendrick left. Oh, and I need power as well. David Murphy isn’t a huge power bat, but he could easily hit 10 more homers than Jay who I gave up. Plus, this is an OBP league and Murphy was actually 6th in the AL last season with a career best .380 OBP (except for that .384 mark he posted in 105 at-bats in 2007).

LABR (12 team, AL-only): This league has some different rules. If you remove one of the 23 starters from your lineup that were taken on draft day, then you have to release them. The only way you can change your lineup is to release a starter or to have one placed on the disabled (you can then obviously replace them in your lineup). Therefore, there doesn’t tend to be a ton of free agent movement each week (as an example I really want to replace Joe Blanton in my lineup right now, but I can’t because that would mean I would have to send him to the waiver-wire). There were six pickups this week: Eric Sogard ($6), Justin Grimm ($5), Hank Congar ($3), Munenori Kawasaki ($2), Steve Delabar ($1) and Joe Ortiz ($1).

FSTA (13 team mixed): Sean Marshall went to the DL to join Shaun Marcum and Hanley Ramirez. To take the two open roster spots this week (Marcum and Marshall) I added Matt Adams ($36) and Felix Doubront ($13). The Sox hurler is a two start arm this week (@CLE) and (KC) and Adams is killing it right now (11-for-18 with three homers). Isn’t it a matter of time before Allen Craig and or Carlos Beltran get hurt? There’s a 30 homer bat with Adams, though he doesn’t have a spot in the daily lineup so it’s more of a hopeful move than anything.

To see how others are evaluating players don’t forget to go to Fleaflicker.com where you can check out the owned percentages of all your favorite players.

SIRIUSXM EXPERTS (12 team mixed): I bid on two relievers, but both went for more than my bids. I tossed $7 at Jim Henderson. He went for $27. I then tried to add Kelvin Herrera for $6. He went for $18. A few others of note: Juan Francisco ($7), Evan Gattis ($6) and Paul Maholm ($6). In retrospect, I should have bid on Joaquin Benoit ($3) and Trevor Rosenthal ($1). This is what happens when you are in too many leagues. You sometimes don’t spend enough time looking over the waiver-wire.

SIRIUSXM LISTENER LG (11 team mixed): This is the only league with an open waiver-wire. Over the past few days I made a couple of moves. I dropped Edinson Volquez when Aaron Crow got a save on the off chance Crow might get a look in the 9th. He won’t. I then dropped Crow to add Sergio Santos later in the week. I then, and stop me if you notice a musical chairs situation with relievers, dropped Vinnie Pestano to add Josh Rutledge when Jose Reyes went down with injury. When Reyes was officially placed on the DL, we have two DL spots in this league, I put Reyes on the DL and then added Michael Saunders. I then put Saunders on the DL and added Wellington Castillo since Carlos Santana is still dealing with injury. Noticing that the Cards might go with Edward Mujica in the 9th inning, I then dropped Castillo and added Mujica. Oh, and then for good measure I dropped Santos and added Tony Cingrani when the Reds announced that Johnny Cueto could miss some serious time with a lat injury. See how much of a mess things can be when you have a first come, first serve waiver-wire?

K-BAD (12 team mixed): As the owner of Cishek, Jansen, Parnell, Storen and Robertson, I’m clearly loading up on big time arms that may or may not get saves. Thought I might as well add another to the mix so for $42 of $1000 I rostered Andrew Bailey. I didn’t have to drop anyone as I put Hanley Ramirez on the DL as I did with Gordon Beckham. I replaced the White Sox second sacker with Chris Getz for $14. Howard Bender went nutso in one of the most aggressive weeks of FAAB spending I have ever seen. Howard adding five players… at a cost of $497. Wow is right – Jeremy Guthrie ($71), Vernon Wells ($76), Justin Maxwell ($86), Justin Masterson ($163) and Cody Ross ($101). Talk about going for it. Two others of note that didn’t go to Howard included Yonder Alonso who went for $154 and Barry Zito who went for $91.

FANBALL (13 team mixed): I admit it. I went for the gusto. Going against my usual common sense approach, I decided to add a big armed, totally unproven arm in Tony Cingrani for $9. I dropped the struggling Edinson Volquez to do it. I don’t know how long Cingrani will stick around but thought I might as well take a shot on what could potentially be one of the biggest arms we see come up from the minors this week. Evan Gattis ($8), James Russell ($5), Cody Ross ($4), Jake Westbrook ($3) and Eric Sogard ($3) were the only other adds that cost more than $2.

By Ray Flowers

Trade Day Diary

The 2012 MLB Trade Deadline is upon us. At BaseballGuys.com there’s no way we could sit out the action which figures to be hot and heavy. We’ll be checking in throughout the day with some thoughts on all of the moves that you need to be made aware of as teams begin to set themselves up for the push for the playoffs.

COMPLETED DEALS

Dodgers Receive: Shane Victorino
Phillies Receive: RHP’s Josh Lindblom, Ethan Martin

The Dodgers get a much needed bat to his at the top of their order. An outfield of Andre Ethier, Matt Kemp and Victorino is the best trio in the NL. Victorino has had a bit of an up and down season but he’s been on top of his game since the All-Star break hitting .357 with five steals and 14 runs scored in 15 games. As a side note. The Phillies are going to call up Domonic Brown, so look for him to get a chance to play almost every day the rest of the way giving him solid value in NL-only leagues.

Rangers Receive: Geovanny Soto
Cubs Receive: RHP Jacob Brigham and some other stuff
(that “stuff” is either a PTBNL or cash).

Soto will slide into a backup job behind the dish since the Rangers already have Mike Napoli. Soto hasn’t hit since 2010, well he hit 17 homers and had 54 RBIs last year, but he also batted .228 last year and isn’t even hitting .200 this year with 35 hits in 176 at-bats (.199). He’ll obviously hold some AL-only value, but his days of even being a catcher #2 in 15 team, two catcher, mixed leagues appear done… at least for 2012. As a result of this deal the Rangers designated Yorvit Torrealba for assignment.

Dodgers Receive: Brandon League
Mariners Receive: RHP Logan Bawcom and OF Leon Landry

League obviously won’t be closing with Kenley Jansen already in town, but he should slide in very nicely in a support role in the Dodgers bullpen given that heavy, an I mean 16 lbs bowling ball heavy, fastball. Still, he’s sporting a 1.42 K/BB ratio in 44.2 innings, so I’m not a huge fan of dumping a lot of FAAB money to add him to an NL-only roster.

Phillies Receive: OF Nate Schierholtz, C Tommy Joseph, RHP Seth Rosin
Giants Receive: Hunter Pence and Cash

It’s about time the Giants added another power bat. Pence-Posey-Sandoval, when all healthy, finally gives the Giants a legitimate 3-4-5 set of bats in the middle of the order. The move to San Francisco doesn’t figure to help Pence much offensively though… or does it? The perception is that Philly is a great hitters park but check out the numbers which tell a different story. At home in 2012 Pence has a .721 OPS that is .121 below his .842 mark on the road.

Rangers Receive: Ryan Dempster
Cubs Receive: RHP Kyle Hendricks, 3B Christian Villanueva

The Cubs were in on Matt Garza too, but they deemed Dempster to be the better medical risk. Going to the AL to pitch in Texas isn’t going to do Dempster’s ratios any favors, not when he doesn’t deserve them in the first place. Still, it’s well worth spending big in AL-only leagues to acquire his services. As a result of his addition the mightily struggling Roy Oswalt has been sent to the bullpen, though the club might still need his services as a starter at some point after the club also announced that Neftali Feliz will have to undergo Tommy John surgery.

Reds Receive: Jonathan Broxton
Royals Receive: LHP Donnie Joseph, RHP J.C. Sulbaran

As a set up man with the Reds, Broxton’s fantasy value is in the total toilet. Given the massive regression in his K/9 this year there is no reason to bother having him on your roster in a mixed league unless you are looking for holds. Broxton should form a tremendous bridge to Aroldis Chapman alongside Sean Marshall. In KC, it seems like Aaron Crow or Greg Holland will be asked to close, though Kelvin Herrera is also in the mix. My money is on Holland.

Yankees Receive: Casey McGehee
Pirates Receive: Chad Qualls

McGehee will help to fill in while A-Rod misses time on the shelf. Hitting just .230 on the year with eight homers, the last time that McG was an impactful hitter for an extended period of time was 2010 when he hit .285 with 23 homers and 104 RBIs. Qualls may not even be worth adding in NL-only leagues.

Pirates Receive: Gaby Sanchez
Marlins Receive: Gorkys Hernandez, RHP Kyle Kaminska, a 2013

Sanchez hit .273 with 18 homers, 85 RBIs and 72 runs scored in 2010. Last year he hit .266 with 19 homers, 78 RBIs and 72 runs scored. This year he’s been hideous appearing in only 55 big league games (he’s spent a lot of time in the minors). In 183 at-bats Sanchez has hit .202 with three homers. A worthwhile gamble for the Pirates, but don’t expect much production the reest of this season.

Red Sox Receive: Craig Breslow
D’backs Receive: Scott Podsednik, Matt Albers 

The Sox sent out two spare parts for lefty who has been a very solid bullpen arm since entering the league in 2005. He’s enjoy a fine season this year with a 2.70 ERA, 1.18 WHIP and 3.23 K/BB ratio. None of these three is worth a look in anything other than league specific setups

Cardinals Receive: Edward Mujica
Marlins Receive: 3B Zack Cox

One more name removed for 9th inning work with the Marlins. Mujica had a 2.96 ERA in 67 games last season but his 6.00 K/9 mark is his lowest since 2007 and he continues to be plagued by the long ball. Cox was a first round selection in 2010, but he’s struggled to find consistency. This year he has hit a mere .254 with nine homers and an OPS of .716 at Triple-A.

NOT TRADED: Rafael Betancourt, Stephen Drew, Chase Headley, Josh Johnson, Matt Garza, Carlos Lee, Alfonso Soriano, Denard Span, Justin Upton

 By Ray Flowers

Slippers, Spirits & Success

No real preamble today, I’m just going to get to giving some of my thoughts on the world o’ baseball.

Jason Bay was finally hitting with a .317 mark, a .969 OPS and 13 RBI through 18 games in September. Of course, he’s now missed three games in a row with the flu. He’s no Justin Morneau, but it looks like Bay’s skills just disappeared, despite his nice three week run.

Lance Berkman has hit only seven homers with 28 RBI over his last 56 games, but on the year he is batting .300 with 31 homers, 91 RBI a .412 OBP and a .967 OPS, a rather phenomenal campaign from a guy who pretty much everyone thought was washed up. It’s being reported that he’s agreed to a one year deal worth $12 million to play with the Cardinals next season. I think it’s a fair deal for both sides, the Cardinals can’t risk losing Albert Pujols next year and not having someone who can hit in the middle of the lineup, but I think they’d be fooling themselves if their expectations were for Berkman to repeat this years effort next season.

Am I the only one that thinks that working a job that you can wear slippers to is about as good as it gets?

Vladimir Guerrero has long been on of my favorite players (perhaps it goes back to the days that he was on my minor league taxi squad). I even have a Vlad G. Montreal Expos jersey in my closet (you’re jealous aren’t you?). This season hasn’t gone as planned for Vlad, but that doesn’t mean that he is ready to hang up his cleats. In fact, he wants to play a couple of more seasons. “I feel I can play two or three more years,” he said. “And I just need to work a little harder this offseason when I go to the Dominican and see what happens.” Guerrero is three hits behind Julio Franco for the most hits every by a Dominican born player, he has 2,583. He’s also on quite a tear right now hitting .400 over his last 16 games to push his average up to .292. If he can get it to .300 it would be the 14th time in 15 seasons he hit that mark. However, with only 13 homers, this will be the first time in his career that he’s had 400 at-bats and failed to go deep 27 times.

The Marlins have placed closer Leo Nunez on the restricted list for “undisclosed reasons” (he has already  headed back to the Dominican Republic, so his 2011 season is over). Nunez will finish the year with middling ratios (4.06 ERA, 1.21 WHIP), but he did produce 36 saves in 42 chances. Edward Mujica might get a look in the ninth, after all he’s been great this year with a 0.97 WHIP and 4.69 K/BB ratio, but I would pick up Steve Cishek if I was looking for a few cheap saves.

I was watching Supernatural the other night and I noticed that Genevieve Courtese had a recurring role (OK, I’m a bit behind with the series – I’m only working on season IV right now). I admit it, I’m such a sucker for brunettes.

Ben Revere is hitting .263, has no homer,s sports a terrible .310 OBP and has a sickly .297 SLG (how awful is that?). So why am I wasting any time writing about him? His recent play of course. Over the last eight games Ben has produced 15 hits, including one in each outing, while he’s also swiped seven bags. That’s the type of a waiver-wire pickup that can win you your league. Reverse certainly has a lot of limitations on offense, but his late season push will certainly have him in the mix for a substantial role with the Twins next season.

Iwasn’t a big believer when the Rangers decided to move C.J. Wilson from the pen to the rotation. Consider my opinion to be in error. Wilson went 15-8 with a 3.35 ERA last year, and he’s been slightly better this year going 16-7 with a 2.97 ERA. He’s also upped his K mark this season to 8.38 per nine which has resulted in 206 punchouts. That dude is gonna get straight paid in the free agent market this offseason.

By Ray Flowers

The Strikeout: Relievers

We all love the strikeout. There is nothing more exciting than seeing a hurler unleash a 98 mph heater that a batter has no chance to catch up to as he swings feebly before heading back to the bench with his head down. Yesterday in The Strikeout: Starters, I touched on my overall thoughts about how to understand and evaluate the strikeout, while focusing on which starting pitchers might be undervalued entering the 2011 season. Today, in the same vein, I’ll break down which relievers appear lined up for solid fantasy efforts in the coming campaign even if they currently don’t appear headed for 9th inning work (remember, it often makes sense to targets skills over role).

Relief Pitchers

No discussion about relievers could begin anywhere else than the Cubs’ closer, Carlos Marmol. In a season unmatched in the annals of the game, Marmol had 138 strikeouts in in 77.2 innings. That K-rate equates to a K/9 mark of 15.99, and that is the best mark in baseball history of any pitcher who threw at least 50 innings, one full batter better Eric Gagne’s 14.98 mark in 2003. In fact, so great was Marmol’s K-rate that his total of 138 Ks was better than the marks posted by the following starting pitchers:

Derek Lowe 136 in 193.2 IP
Joe Blanton 134 in 175.2 IP
Jaime Garcia 132 in 163.1 IP
Fausto Carmona 124 in 2101. IP
Bronson Arroyo 121 in 215.2 IP

Since we’re focusing on relievers in this piece, not starters with moderate K-totals, here’s a list of the top pitchers in baseball last season in K/9 amongst those that tossed a minimum of 50-innings.

15.99 Carlos Marmol
13.50 Billy Wagner
12.92 Joel Hanrahan
12.85 Rafael Betancourt
12.18 Stephen Strasburg
12.02 Matt Thornton
11.79 John Axford
11.50 Takashi Saito
11.45 Carlos Villanueva
11.21 Brian Wilson
11.19 Joaquin Benoit
11.08 Tyler Clippard
11.06 Heath Bell
10.95 Hong-Chih Kuo
10.95 Brandon Morrow
10.87 Ryan Madson
10.85 Sean Marshall
10.83 J.J. Putz
10.55 Octavio Dotel
10.54 Jonathan Broxton
10.52 Francisco Rodriguez
10.42 Bobby Jenks
10.42 David Robertson
10.25 Frank Francisco
10.23 Luke Gregerson

Only two starters are on this list – Stephen Strasburg and Brandon Morrow (you can read more about Morrow in the starters piece linked to at the top of this piece).

Evaluating Relievers

A couple of weeks back in How to Evaluate Relievers I gave some simple “rules” to use when looking at bullpen arms. In that piece I listed the 17 relief arms that tossed at least 60-innings last season with a K/9 of at 7.50 and a BB/9 mark under 3.00. Some of the names were likely fairly obvious, but others certainly weren’t. Here is that list again.

Casey Janssen
Matt Thornton
Sean Burnett
Rafael Soriano
Joaquin Benoit
Luke Gregerson
Joakim Soria
Neftali Feliz
Darren Oliver
Kyle Farnsworth
Edward Mujica
Matt Belise
Billy Wagner
Sergio Romo
Rafael Betancourt
Hong-Chih Kuo
Joba Chamberlain

What follows are my thoughts on some of the less than obvious names on that list. Remember, we are focused on the strikeout in this piece, but that doesn’t mean we want to neglect the walk as all the K’s in the world don’t mean a heck of a lot if a pitcher is walking every third batter.

Rafael Betancourt: In 2010 this Rockies’ reliever had a 12.85 K/9, and a 11.13 K/BB – marks that would make any pitcher who has ever tossed the ball blush. Rafael has 497.1 IP in his career leaving him 2.2 innings from becoming the ONLY man in history with a 9.50 K/9 mark and a 4.35 K/BB in 500 career innings (his career marks are 9.53 and 4.36).

Edward Mujica: I already broke down his historically significant effort of last season when he became one of just the fourth man in the history of the game to do something that will blow your mind. If you want to know what he accomplished take a look at Radiant Relievers.

Darren Oliver: He is old, boring and never drafted except in league specific scenarios. Still he has a two year average of 8.69 in the K/9 department and a 3.51 K/BB ratio. There are worse options to round out a bullpen in league specific set ups.

Kyle Farnsworth: The potential closer for the Rays over guys like Jake McGee and Joel Peralta, Farnsworth owns a career 9.04 K/9, but walks are usually a concern (his career K/BB ratio is 2.33). Still, he has done a better job the past two years throwing strikes leading to a 3.12 K/BB ratio in that time.

Matt Belise: Given that he owns a career 6.64 K/9 mark his rate of 8.90 last year was a bit surprising. Already 30 years old, did it just take him a while to put it all together? After all, his K/BB ratio the past two seasons has been special (4.40 and 5.69).

Joba Chamberlain: In many ways Joba out-pitched Daniel Bard in 2010 (you can read about that comparison in Hot Stove: The Arms Race). Of course, there are now reports that Joba gained weight this offseason, and not in a good way, and that his roster spot could be in jeopardy. With Rafael Soriano in the mix, the best Joba could hope for to start the year is the 7th inning gig, and that pretty much tanks his fantasy outlook.

And finally…

Craig Kimbrel: Kimbrel is kind of cheating since he didn’t reach the threshold of 60-innings for the above list. Still, when you strike out 17.42 batters per nine innings you get a mention, even if you only pitched 20.2 innings. Moreover, that mark of 17.42 per nine is the highest mark in history of baseball for at least 20 IP (the next highest mark is Marmol’s 15.99). Be careful though as Kimbrel also walked a sickening total of 6.97 per nine. To compare, his minor league numbers include a K/9 of 14.42 K/9 and a BB/9 of 5.66. Still, he is slated to open the year as the Braves’ closer.

By Ray Flowers

Radiant Relievers

Yesterday in How to Evaluate Relievers, I gave my general theory with relievers – that is to target skills over role. While some spend their resources on draft day for Kevin Gregg and Brandon Lyon types, I’ve always been content to target power arms like Madson, Thornton and Hanrahan. Below, I’ll give my thoughts on some of the relievers I’m targeting this season – hopefully you won’t take them from me if we are in a league together.

Joel Hanrahan: This call is sort of cheating. Everyone knows who Hanrahan is, and there is at least a 50/50 chance that he will close at the start of the season for the Pirates over Evan Meek, but I love Joel’s arm (current ADP numbers from Mock Draft Central have Hanrahan at 337 and Meek at 383). Hanrahan certainly has better skills than guys being drafted ahead of him like Fernando Rodney (260), Brian Fuentes (271), Kevin Gregg (286) and Ryan Franklin (288), but people are worried about his role. Check out what Hanrahan did last year: 12.92 K/9 and 3.85 K/BB including a 13.50 K/9 and a 4.00 K/BB ratio over his last 33 appearances. I’m targeting this power righty.

Bobby Jenks: I wrote about Jenks when he signed his 2-year deal with the Red Sox in Hot Stove: Signings Galore. Most will overlook him on draft day because of the fact that he is behind Jonathan Papelbon, and potentially Daniel Bard, but Jenks was actually pretty darn good last season (check out the link for an explanation of that statement). In addition to the solid skills, I think that Jenks would be the fall back option in the 9th if Papelbon is hurt or dealt to another club, so that’s another feather in his cap.

Brandon League: In A Hip That Makes You Hop?, I broke down the Mariners’ bullpen situation and gave a litany of thoughts as to why I’m all about taking League late in drafts (397) instead of Aardsma much earlier (280). One more little diddy on League. Since he started his career in 2004 he owns a career GB/FB rate of 3.09. Amongst hurlers who have tossed at least 280-innings since then, League’s GB/FB mark is third in baseball behind Cla Meredith (3.66) and Brandon Webb (3.51).

Ryan Madson: I’m telling you, this guy is a burgeoning bullpen star. OK, he blows chunks half the time he is given a shot at pitching the 9th inning, but just look at the consistency he has brought in ERA and WHIP the last four years.

ERA: 3.05, 3.05, 3.26, 2.55
WHIP: 1.27, 1.23, 1.23, 1.04

Madson has also seen his K/9 mark rise in each of the past four seasons: 6.63, 6.91, 7.29, 9.08 and 10.87. Not surprisingly, he has seen his K/BB ratio improve each of he past three years: 1.87, 2.91, 3.55 and 4.92. Last time I checked, a K/9 of nearly 11.00 and a K/BB mark of nearly 5.00 are historically good numbers (only 12 hurlers have hit both of those numbers in the same season since the calendar flipped to 2000). Don’t be afraid to nab Madson late in drafts.

Edward Mujica: Another one of those wondrous arms from San Diego, Mujica was sent to the Marlins in the deal for Cameron Maybin (you can read about that deal in Four in One). Mujica was simply dynamic last season with a 9.30 K/9 rate and a 0.78 BB/9 rate which led to a stupendous 12.00 K/BB mark. Mujica was just the fourth pitcher in the history of baseball to have a season with a 12.00 K/BB mark while throwing at last 65 innings (Bert Dorr in 1882, Dennis Eckersley in 1990 and Mariano Rivera in 2008).

Chad Qualls: I’ve already explained why Qualls is a terrific bounce back option in Hot Stove: Rumor Mill, Dec. 29th. I look for him to rebound strongly in San Diego after signing a 1-year, $1.5 million deal.

Matt Thornton: I’m on record saying he has been the best left-handed reliever in baseball the past three years. I’ll let the numbers speak for themselves.

2008-10: 16-10, 2.67 ERA, 1.03 WHIP, 11.01 K/9, 4.15 K/BB, 6.60 H/9 in 200.1 IP

Dominating.

By Ray Flowers

How to Evaluate Relievers

About two weeks ago I wrote How to Evaluate A Player in which I described a quick and easy way to evaluate players performance. That piece dealt only with hitters. In today’s article I’ll detail some of the key points you’ll want to consider when you are attempting to evaluate relief pitchers for the 2011 fantasy baseball season.

Target Skills not Roles.
This is the hardest idiom to abide by on draft day because though it inherently makes sense to target skills, it doesn’t always result in the most fantasy value. Let me address that “fantasy value” issue first.

There are five main categories in fantasy baseball for pitchers: wins, ERA, WHIP, Ks and saves. Obviously only reliever can pick up saves, and that marks “closers” as premium targets on draft day. However, there are many issues associated with this.

(1) Closers don’t hold their roles all season in many cases making it a volatile position to predict with any certainty.

(2) There are always a handful of guys who rack up large save totals that come completely out of nowhere (think John Axford who had 24 saves last year despite having only 7.2 innings of big league experience prior to the start of the season).

(3) Closers often rack up saves despite pedestrian results.

Francisco Cordero had 40 saves despite a 1.43 WHIP.
Bobby Jenks had 27 saves with a 4.44 ERA.
Ryan Franklin had 27 saves with a mere 5.82 K/9 mark.

(4) Having success closing games year-to-year is much harder than you would think. If a guy had 20 saves he’d probably be considered a low end second reliever, right? Do you know how many hurlers have saved 20 games in each of the past three seasons? The answer is only 12. Simply, it’s a very volatile, and variable, position – closing that is.

(5) Pitching the ninth inning to gain a save is a random event that is nearly impossible to predict. Factors that you have to take into account include:

* Did the offense score enough to gain the lead, without scoring too much to get past the limit for saves (3 run lead).

* Which reliever will be called on? Will the manager go with his best arm? Will he play the righty/lefty matchup game? Will he lean on the veteran who has been there and done that even though he hasn’t been pitching well? Will the manager give his reliever some rope and allow him to remain in the game if he lets people on base?

And that last point is really the main point of this whole exercise. In many cases its patently obvious which reliever a team should turn to in the 9th inning. However, that doesn’t always mean that team does the right thing and slots their most effective reliever in a 9th inning role. The bottom line is that there is no way to predict the opportunities than any reliever will be given, nor is there any way to get inside the head of a manager to understand how he will deploy his pitchers from game to game.

Therefore, this is what I recommend – target skills not roles.

Skills aren’t susceptible to the whim of a manager.
Skills aren’t dependent on the game situation.
Skills pay the bills.

What skills should you look for? A quick primer follows.

Target at least a 7.50 K/9 mark.
You need a reliever who can get out of a jam with a punchout. Also, the fewer balls that are put in play, the better the chance is that the batter won’t produce a hit (a brilliant statement I know).

Target a BB/9 mark below 3.00.
You can’t have a reliever come into a game searching for the strike zone.

Those two simply targets may not seem like much, but adhering to just those two categories and their benchmarks will likely help you from rostering relievers that will not hurt your ratios. Amongst relievers that tossed 60-innings last year, here are the only names that racked up a K/9 mark over 7.50 with a BB/9 mark under 3.00.

Casey Janssen
Matt Thornton
Sean Burnett
Rafael Soriano
Joaquin Benoit
Luke Gregerson
Joakim Soria
Neftali Feliz
Darren Oliver
Kyle Farnsworth
Edward Mujica
Matt Belise
Billy Wagner
Sergio Romo
Rafael Betancourt
Hong-Chih Kuo
Joba Chamberlain

That’s a pretty darn small list isn’t it?

There is obviously more to pitching than this simply review, but in terms of relief pitchers this type of data is extremely relevant. Also make sure you keep an eye on the GB/FB column, I’d look for numbers of 1.25 or better there if you can (big flies are murder on relievers).

At the end of the day there are very few “locks” at the closers position. After the first 20 or so guys are off the board I think it makes more sense to roster high skill relievers with major upside versus slacker relievers who are lined up to begin the year as the closer for their team. Sooner or later the lack of skills will doom those guys to mediocrity while your “skills guys” should continue to have success no matter what role they are asked to fill .

By Ray Flowers