Bullpen Report: July 21, 2016

To kick off this relatively brief installment of the Bullpen Report, let’s chat about some minor changes made to the chart:

Koji Uehara joined teammates Craig Kimbrel, Carson Smith and Junichi Tazawa on the disabled list, so he’ll get bumped from the chart for now since there’s only room for one in that column. Ziegler and Barnes slide to the left with Robbie Ross making the second chair for the time being. Normally would seem like a “red” situation, but Ziegler is experienced in the ninth, so we’ll call that yellow.

The Cubs landed the left-handed reliever they coveted yesterday in Mike Montgomery from the Mariners — not the Andrew Miller or Aroldis Chapman they’ve been linked to as of late — in exchange for left-handed slugger Dan Vogelbach as the primary pieces exchanged. Montgomery will join fellow southpaws Travis Wood and Clayton Richards out of the ‘pen in Chicago for the time being. The lefty hurler went 3-4 in 32 appearances (two starts) for the Mariners, posting a 2.34 ERA (3.20 FIP) and a 14.4% K-BB% with three holds. Some of the keys to his success this season are a significant spike in velocity, ground ball rate and ability to induce soft contact. Montgomery failed to appear on our chart for Seattle, but could take a seat for the Cubbies once we determine how he’ll be utilized. Second chair? For now, things will go unchanged for both squads.

Green for Alex Colome.

A pair of other bullpens I’m monitoring a bit closer than normal are the Brewers and Angels. Huston Street has been less than stellar, posting a 5.03 K/9, 5.03 BB/9 and a 5.03 ERA with eight saves in 10 chances. Starting to make me feel yellow, but don’t feel confident he’ll lose a role, so green it. Please welcome Cam Bedrosian to the chart with a nice round of applause! He’ll unseat Fernando Salas for the time being. The Brew Crew seem to be shopping their relievers, so I’d abandon ship where I could.

Quick Hitters: Zach Britton notched his 30th save tonight to remain perfect on the season. Britton needed just 12 pitches to close the door on the Yankees, 4-1. Mark Melancon fanned one batter on 14 pitches en route to his 28th save in 31 opportunities. Kenley Jansen surrendered a one-out single to Bryce Harper in the final frame, but induced one strikeout to pick up his 28th save in 32 chances. Jansen now owns a 1.30 ERA (1.49 FIP) and a 11.45 K/9 in 43 appearances (41.1 IP) this season. Ryan Buchter allowed four earned runs for the Padres tonight (his ERA jumped from 2.36 to 3.14), but along with teammate Brad Hand, could still make sense for some teams (Cleveland?) looking to add a left-handed reliever at the deadline if they don’t want to afford the Miller/Chapman types. Shane Greene earned his second save of the season for the Tigers in a game that was called in the 7th, an odd one. And Carlos Estevez picked up the two-pitch save for the Rockies, his seventh of the season.

Just wrote this on short rest, so if by chance I’ve crossed up my signs be sure to make a mound visit in the comments to discuss. Thanks and cheers!

Closer Grid:

	Closer	First	Second	DL/Minors
Arizona	Tyler Clippard	Daniel Hudson	Jake Barrett
Atlanta	Jim Johnson	Mauricio Cabrera	Hunter Cervenka	Arodys Vizcaino
Baltimore	Zach Britton	Brad Brach	Mychal Givens	Darren O’Day
Boston	Brad Ziegler	Matt Barnes	Robbie Ross Jr.	Craig Kimbrel
CHI (NL)	Hector Rondon	Pedro Strop	Justin Grimm
CHI (AL)	David Robertson	Nate Jones	Zach Duke
Cincy	Tony Cingrani	Ross Ohlendorf	Raisel Iglesias
Cleveland	Cody Allen	Bryan Shaw	Dan Otero
Colorado	Carlos Estevez	Jake McGee	Adam Ottavino
Detroit	Francisco Rodriguez	Justin Wilson	Shane Greene	Bruce Rondon
Houston	Will Harris	Ken Giles	Luke Gregerson
KC	Wade Davis	Kelvin Herrera	Joakim Soria
LAA	Huston Street	Joe Smith	Cam Bedrosian
LAD	Kenley Jansen	Joe Blanton	Adam Libatore	Yimi Garcia
Miami	A.J. Ramos	Fernando Rodney	David Phelps
Milwaukee	Jeremy Jeffress	Tyler Thornburg	Will Smith
Minnesota	Brandon Kintzler	Fernando Abad	Ryan Pressly	Glen Perkins
NY (NL)	Jeurys Familia	Addison Reed	Hansel Robles	Jim Henderson
NY (AL)	Aroldis Chapman	Andrew Miller	Dellin Betances
Oakland	Ryan Madson	John Axford	Ryan Dull	Sean Doolittle
Philly	Jeanmar Gomez	Hector Neris	David Hernandez
Pittsburgh	Mark Melancon	Neftali Feliz	Tony Watson
St. Louis	Seung Hwan Oh	Jonathan Broxton	Kevin Siegrist
SD	Brandon Maurer	Ryan Buchter	Kevin Quackenbush
SF	Santiago Casilla	Sergio Romo	Hunter Strickland
Seattle	Steve Cishek	Joaquin Benoit	Edwin Diaz	Nick Vincent
TB	Alex Colome	Xavier Cedeno	Erasmo Ramirez
Texas	Sam Dyson	Keone Kela	Matt Bush	Jake Diekman
Toronto	Roberto Osuna	Jason Grilli	Jesse Chavez
Wash.	Jonathan Papelbon	Shawn Kelley	Blake Treinen

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