Bullpen Report: July 6, 2014

Extremely brief notes in a pinch-hit effort this evening:

With the potential tying run in the on-deck circle for the Tigers in the bottom of the ninth, Joe Maddon pulled starter David Price in favor of flamethrowing Jake McGee to finish the game. And McGee did just that, fanning Austin Jackson on five pitches to notch his fifth save of the season. The 27-year-old southpaw now owns a 1.16 ERA to go along with a ~31% K% in just under 39 innings on the bump. We’ve discussed McGee and the possibility of the Rays wanting to keep him from notching too many saves to keep his arbitration numbers down — which could still be the case — but don’t let that keep you from adding him in your mixed leagues. Jake McGee is available in 64% of Yahoo! leagues at the time of this writing and will bring the heat in the ratio and strikeout categories while picking up the occasional scab win even if the Rays’ brass plays games with his role out of the bullpen.

Aroldis Chapman wasn’t available for the Reds on Sunday due to a tweaked hamstring, so Jonathan Broxton earned the nod in the save situation. Broxton needed just nine pitches to induce three consecutive groundouts en route to his sixth save of the year. The husky right-handed set-up man is now 6-of-8 in save opportunities this season with a 0.64 ERA and an ~18% K%. Although Bryan Price hopes his All-Star closer will be available for Monday’s game, it wouldn’t be surprising if the Reds asked Broxton to fill-in a few more times until Chapman is 100%.

David Robertson (21), Rafael Soriano (21), Addison Reed (20) and Zach Britton (14) each notched saves today. The Orioles have used their closer in three of the last four days, so if by chance Baltimore is in a save situation tomorrow in Washington, Darren O’Day or Tommy Hunter could get a look.

Santiago Casilla picked up his third save of the season tonight, leading the Giants’ skipper, Bruce Bochy, to name Casilla the “closer for now” in San Francisco. The right-hander is available in 68% of Yahoo! leagues at the moment.

Quick Hits: Sean Doolittle surrendered a pinch-hit home run to Steve Tolleson, but escaped the ninth-inning with his 13th save on the year for the Athletics. Cody Allen picked up a two out save in relief of Corey Kluber, his ninth save on the season. Allen, available in more than 40% of Yahoo! leagues, is 9-of-10 in save chances with a 2.39 ERA (2.93 FIP) and a ~31% K. Jake Petricka notched his third save of the year in a two-inning, two strikeout effort.

Closer Grid:

	Closer	First	Second	DL/Minors
Arizona	Addison Reed	Brad Ziegler	Oliver Perez
Atlanta	Craig Kimbrel	Jordan Walden	Shae Simmons
Baltimore	Zach Britton	Tommy Hunter	Darren O’Day
Boston	Koji Uehara	Junichi Tazawa	Andrew Miller
CHI (NL)	Hector Rondon	Neil Ramirez	Pedro Strop
CHI (AL)	Zach Putnam	Jacob Petricka	Javy Guerra	Matt Lindstrom
Cincy	Aroldis Chapman	Jonathan Broxton	Sam LeCure	Sean Marshall
Cleveland	Cody Allen	Bryan Shaw	John Axford
Colorado	LaTroy Hawkins	Adam Ottavino	Rex Brothers
Detroit	Joe Nathan	Joba Chamberlain	Al Alburquerque	Joel Hanrahan
Houston	Chad Qualls	Tony Sipp	Josh Fields
KC	Greg Holland	Wade Davis	Aaron Crow
LAA	Joe Smith	Jason Grilli	Kevin Jepsen
LAD	Kenley Jansen	Chris Perez	Brian Wilson
Miami	Steve Cishek	A.J. Ramos	Mike Dunn
Milwaukee	Francisco Rodriguez	Will Smith	Brandon Kintzler	Jim Henderson
Minnesota	Glen Perkins	Jared Burton	Casey Fien
NY (NL)	Jenrry Mejia	Jeurys Familia	Vic Black	Bobby Parnell
NY (AL)	David Robertson	Dellin Betances	Adam Warren
Oakland	Sean Doolittle	Luke Gregerson	Dan Otero
Philly	Jonathan Papelbon	Antonio Bastardo	Ken Giles	Mike Adams
Pittsburgh	Mark Melancon	Tony Watson	Ernesto Frieri
St. Louis	Trevor Rosenthal	Pat Neshek	Jason Motte
SD	Huston Street	Joaquin Benoit	Alex Torres
SF	Santiago Casilla	Jeremy Affeldt	Sergio Romo
Seattle	Fernando Rodney	Danny Farquhar	Dominic Leone
TB	Jake McGee	Grant Balfour	Joel Peralta
Texas	Joakim Soria	Jason Frasor	Neftali Feliz
Toronto	Casey Janssen	Sergio Santos	Aaron Loup	Brett Cecil
Wash.	Rafael Soriano	Tyler Clippard	Drew Storen

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