Ariel Cohen’s 2020 TGFBI Recap – Pitchers

Last year, pitching was pushed up in drafts considerably … and it was pushed up even more so this year.

With the very first pick of league #15, Dave Anderson selected Gerrit Cole. Wow! The top 5 pitchers were essentially all first round players – up from 3 in 2019. There were 8 pitchers selected consistently in the first two rounds of TGFBI. If we include Blake Snell and Chris Sale who had ADPs of approximately 31 – essentially 10 out of the first 30 picks were pitchers.

This jives with some of the recent prevailing strategies such as “Pocket Aces” – where you select not one, but TWO starting pitchers with your first few selections. I wrote an article last year entitled, “The Case for an Ace” – where I demonstrated that elite starting pitchers earned the highest returns on investment, and thus were excellent uses of fantasy capital. The fantasy world took heed of this concept and pushed it even further in 2020.

Closers

Now let’s take a look at a comparison of where fantasy owners took closers in 2019 vs. 2020:

Aside from a poor June & July, Eflin looked quite decent in ’19. He was sent down to the minors in the middle of last season, and it seemed to have had a positive effect on him for the latter half of 2019. He seemed worthy to me of a final round selection.

Closers

• Edwin Diaz (Round 7.15 / Overall 105)
• Keone Kela (Round 12.1 / Overall 166)
• Sean Doolittle (Round 13.15 / Overall 195)

With only 30 closer roles in Major League Baseball, theoretically, the average number of closers that each fantasy team will roster in a 15-team league is two. I bought three closers!

An important concept that I would like to discuss is closer volatility.

The general concept is that closers are volatile creatures. Blake Treinen did not start 2018 as the team’s closer – but he ended up as one of the top relief options in baseball in the end. He was one of the most profitable waiver wire pickups of that season. However, 2019 did not treat Treinen as that well. He racked up a 4.91 ERA and 1.62 WHIP, and ultimately lost his role to Liam Hendricks – who was 2019’s most profitable waiver wire pickup.

Unlike elite starting pitching, closers are far from certain to return their investment. A closer’s stock will plummet to zero if they lose their role. Managers may change a player’s exposure to a certain leverage index to maximize use of the bullpen. Relief pitchers are not guaranteed save opportunities.

As seen in my closer article last year – “The Case for a Second Tier Closer” – there are many different approaches to handling the closer situation. Matthew Berry’s famous adage was, “Never. Pay. For. Saves.” Lenny Melnick is famous for never picking a closer in a fantasy auction. Zach Steinhorn chooses to continually spend high on elite closer talent – if he thinks the player has a lock on the role. I showed that securing a second-tier closer option had the best return on investments of the group – although the probability of success isn’t all that high.

But I would like to point out one other item about closer volatility. It is backloaded, not frontload. That is to say, drafted closers compile more saves in the earlier part of the season, rather than later on. A closer has his role secure for at least a few outings, even if not guaranteed all season long. It is often better to draft quantity over quality for saves.

In TGFBI, I chose to draft 3 closers – Edwin Diaz, Keona Kela and Sean Doolittle.

Edwin Diaz had a nightmarish first season in the Big Apple. He allowed an incredible 15 homeruns and compiled a disastrous 5.59 ERA. So far, the trade for him isn’t working out the way that the Mets had hoped.

Still, Diaz had a 97.5 MPH average fastball velocity in 2019, which even grew as the year went on. He had a super-elite 18.5% swinging strike rate – and amassed 99 Ks. He was somewhat unlucky; his HR/FB% rate nearly tripled from the previous season. He had a .377 BABIP which can be found in the stratosphere, and his strand rate was the lowest of his career. I expect a bounce back and believe that he will stick with the closer role all year long.

Keone Kela – 2.12 ERA and 1.01 WHIP in 29.2 innings last year. His 2^nd half was even better – 18 IP, 0.50 ERA, 0.83 WHIP. Kela is not new to the closer role. He saved 24 games in 2018. After his manager dubbed him fairly early on in the off-season as the team’s closer – Kela was my #2 closer choice.

In round 13, I couldn’t pass up the chance to acquire the closer on the reigning World Series champion team. Health has been an issue for Sean Doolittle, but he came back to pitch well in 8 September innings (and of course in the World Series). With his selection, I am hoping to get a half a season of saves out of this selection, with some excellent ratios for his relief innings.

Complete Roster