Bullpen Report: August 11, 2017

Given how abysmally he had pitched over the last two-and-a-half weeks, it seemed clear that Bud Norris was going to lose his job as the Angels’ closer. Given how Mike Scioscia had been using his relievers, it seemed nearly as clear that Blake Parker was going to replace him. Parker had been pitching frequently in the eighth inning, usually in close games. Erstwhile closer Cam Bedrosian had recently been relegated to the middle innings, and when he pitched the eighth inning on Tuesday, setting up Keynan Middleton’s first career save, it was because Scioscia was trying to manage Parker’s workload (as mentioned in Wednesday’s Bullpen Report).

So naturally, when Scioscia replaced Tyler Skaggs in the seventh inning of Thursday’s game against the Mariners and needed to call on someone to preserve a 3-0 lead, he brought Parker out. And when he needed a closer in the bottom of the ninth, he used Bedrosian, who incidentally provided a perfect inning.

The Angels put themselves in another save situation on Friday, but even though Bedrosian had not pitched on back-to-back days since before the All-Star break, Scioscia chose Yusmeiro Petit for the ninth inning. He breezed through a perfect frame, getting an infield fly and two strikeouts.

Any one of Parker, Bedrosian or Petit would probably make a good closer, but for now, it looks like they will be sharing the role, perhaps with Middleton as well.

Remember how concerned we were about Aroldis Chapman just after the All-Star break? He had a difficult series against the Red Sox, which seemed to be the culmination of struggles he had since his mid-June return from a DL stint for rotator cuff inflammation. Those worries had been largely forgotten, as Chapman had allowed only one run over 8 2/3 innings since that Boston series, and he recorded 10 strikeouts while throwing 73 percent of his pitches for strikes.

That recent stretch needs to be remembered to keep Chapman’s latest meltdown against the Red Sox in perspective. On Friday, he began the ninth inning by walking the bases loaded, and while a two-run lead was cut in half by an Andrew Benintendi sacrifice fly, Chapman was bailed out by a strong throw from Aaron Hicks and some questionable baserunning by Eduardo Nunez, who was nabbed at third base.

Control betrayed Chapman in this outing, as he threw eight strikes out of 20 pitches. However, not only had he shown strong control in recent appearances, but his velocity had rebounded as well. Friday’s performance marked the seventh straight time that Chapman met or exceeded an average fastball velocity above 100 mph. He did not get any swings and misses on Friday, and his swinging strike rate since his DL stay is an un-Chapman-like 10.4 percent. He may no longer be as dominant as he once was, and implosions will happen, but they should be few and far between.

Just as Chapman is having to make do without his best stuff, Alex Claudio showed us what his results could look like if he was missing the best part of his game. The Rangers’ closer entered Friday’s contest with a 69.7 percent ground ball rate, but against the Astros, he did not induce a single grounder on five hit balls allowed. Entering the eighth inning with two outs and a 6-2 lead, Claudio managed to escape with a two-run lead, but it could have been worse. Like Chapman, he was rescued by a strong defensive play, as Nomar Mazara made an improbable lunging catch on a Brian McCann line drive.

To cap off his bizarro night, Claudio got all three outs in the ninth inning by way of a strikeout, two of which were achieved with a swinging strike. Entering the game, Claudio had a 16.5 percent strikeout rate and 9.2 percent swinging strike rate.

Hector Neris had his roughest outing in a few weeks, allowing three hits and taking the loss against the Mets on Friday. The decisive run was an Amed Rosario leadoff homer — the first home run of Rosario’s career. It was also the first home run Neris had allowed since June 21, and since that time, he has a 1.99 ERA.

Trevor Rosenthal had pitched on Wednesday and Thursday, and Seung Hwan Oh had been used on three straight days, so Mike Matheny turned to Matt Bowman for the save in the Cardinals’ Friday night game against the Braves. He successfully converted his second save of the season, getting all three batters to fly out.

Closer Grid:

	Closer	First	Second	DL/Minors
ARI	Fernando Rodney	Archie Bradley	David Hernandez
ATL	Arodys Vizcaino	Jim Johnson	Jose Ramirez
BAL	Zach Britton	Mychal Givens	Brad Brach
BOS	Craig Kimbrel	Addison Reed	Matt Barnes	Carson Smith
CHC	Wade Davis	Justin Wilson	Carl Edwards Jr.
CWS	Tyler Clippard	Gregory Infante	Jake Petricka	Nate Jones
CIN	Raisel Iglesias	Michael Lorenzen	Drew Storen
CLE	Cody Allen	Joe Smith	Bryan Shaw	Andrew Miller
COL	Greg Holland	Pat Neshek	Adam Ottavino
DET	Shane Greene	Alex Wilson	Bruce Rondon
HOU	Ken Giles	Chris Devenski	Luke Gregerson	Will Harris
KC	Kelvin Herrera	Joakim Soria	Brandon Maurer
LAA	Cam Bedrosian	Blake Parker	Yusmeiro Petit	Huston Street
LAD	Kenley Jansen	Tony Watson	Pedro Baez
MIA	Brad Ziegler	Junichi Tazawa	Drew Steckenrider	Kyle Barraclough
MIL	Corey Knebel	Anthony Swarzak	Jacob Barnes
MIN	Matt Belisle	Taylor Rogers	Trevor Hildenberger	Glen Perkins
NYM	A.J. Ramos	Paul Sewald	Jerry Blevins	Jeurys Familia
NYY	Aroldis Chapman	Dellin Betances	David Robertson
OAK	Blake Treinen	Ryan Dull	Santiago Casilla
PHI	Hector Neris	Luis Garcia	Jesen Therrien
PIT	Felipe Rivero	Juan Nicasio	Joaquin Benoit
STL	Trevor Rosenthal	Seung Hwan Oh	Matt Bowman
SD	Brad Hand	Kirby Yates	Phil Maton
SF	Sam Dyson	Hunter Strickland	Albert Suarez	Mark Melancon
SEA	Edwin Diaz	Nick Vincent	Tony Zych	David Phelps
TB	Alex Colome	Tommy Hunter	Steve Cishek
TEX	Alex Claudio	Jose Leclerc	Matt Bush	Keone Kela
TOR	Roberto Osuna	Ryan Tepera	Dominic Leone	Danny Barnes
WSH	Sean Doolittle	Ryan Madson	Brandon Kintzler	Koda Glover

[Green light, yellow light, red light: the colors represent the volatility of the bullpen order.]