Bullpen Report: June 16, 2017

Just as it looked like Felipe Rivero might have the Pirates’ closer job all to himself, Clint Hurdle made good on his word to have him share the role with Juan Nicasio. With a 4-3 lead, Hurdle summoned Rivero for the eighth inning, as the top of the Cubs’ order was due up. However, the lefty needed 20 pitches to work through Anthony Rizzo, Ian Happ, Kyle Schwarber and Addison Russell.

But work through them he did, allowing only a Happ double. The ninth inning, then, belonged to Nicasio, who allowed a pair of doubles and a single and issued an intentional walk to Kris Bryant. He departed the game with a blown save and no outs recorded. Nicasio was followed by deposed closer Tony Watson, who allowed all three inherited runners to score (saddling Nicasio with the loss), plus two more runs to create a 9-4 deficit.

In his post-game comments, Hurdle indicated that using Rivero for a two-inning save was considered, but he made too many pitches in the eighth inning. After Nicasio’s implosion, it will be interesting to see if Hurdle uses Rivero outside of the ninth inning again. While it’s entirely possible he will, Nicasio did not make a great case for eating into Rivero’s save chances.

Handed a five-run lead, Wade Davis pitched the bottom of the ninth for the Cubs in a non-save situation. He started off similarly to Nicasio, allowing each of the first three batters to get a base hit, and the Pirates closed the gap to 9-5. Unlike Nicasio, Davis stuck around to finish out the inning.

After breezing through the first quarter of the season without having given up an earned run, Davis has allowed four earned runs over his last six innings. Over this mini-slump, Davis has been throwing strikes, and the double he allowed to Andrew McCutchen was only the second extra-base hit he allowed during this period. There is no apparent cause for concern.

The same cannot be said for Greg Holland, who notched his major-league leading 24th save on Friday against the Giants. He allowed two hits — a Gorkys Hernandez triple and Austin Slater RBI single — and walked Buster Posey on four straight pitches, but Holland got out of the inning without further damage. Fortunately, he was given a three-run lead, unlike on Thursday, when Holland gave up the game-tying run that resulted in his first blown save of the season.

Holland still has a svelte 1.40 ERA, but his recent performance could point to more ERA growth and blown saves in the near future. After throwing 68 percent of his pitches for strikes through the end of May, Holland has just a 54 percent strikes-thrown rate in seven June innings. Heading into Friday, he had located only 34.3 percent of his pitches in the zone this month, and only six relievers had a lower rate. The extreme wildness doesn’t mean that Holland is doomed to failure; after all, Roberto Osuna and Jose Leclerc are two of the relievers who have been even wilder. However, none of the six relievers with a lower Zone% in June have a lower O-Swing% than Holland’s 30.8 percent. (Incredibly, Osuna’s is 65.9 percent.)

Either Holland has to start pitching in the zone more, or he has to induce more chases. Otherwise, he could be in for some rocky times ahead.

The ride appears to be nearly over for Dellin Betances as the Yankees’ fill-in closer. Aroldis Chapman, who is on a Double-A rehab assignment, told MLB.com he expects to be activated Sunday.

Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald reported that the Marlins could trade A.J. Ramos and David Phelps if the team does not put itself in position to contend soon. Since the Marlins are 10 1/2 games out of first place in the NL East as well as the second wild card slot, the odds seems long against Ramos and Phelps remaining with the team. Nick Wittgren has pitched well of late and has been used frequently in the seventh and eighth innings, but after a difficult month of May, Kyle Barraclough is looking like a closer-in-waiting again. He has not allowed a run over his last six appearances totaling seven innings, giving up four hits and one walk with seven strikeouts.

Closer Grid:

	Closer	First	Second	DL/Minors
ARI	Fernando Rodney	Archie Bradley	JJ Hoover
ATL	Jim Johnson	Arodys Vizcaino	Jose Ramirez
BAL	Brad Brach	Mychal Givens	Richard Bleier	Zach Britton
BOS	Craig Kimbrel	Matt Barnes	Heath Hembree	Carson Smith
CHC	Wade Davis	Koji Uehara	Carl Edwards Jr.
CWS	David Robertson	Tommy Kahnle	Anthony Swarzak	Nate Jones
CIN	Raisel Iglesias	Michael Lorenzen	Drew Storen
CLE	Cody Allen	Andrew Miller	Bryan Shaw
COL	Greg Holland	Adam Ottavino	Jake McGee
DET	Justin Wilson	Alex Wilson	Shane Greene
HOU	Ken Giles	Will Harris	Michael Feliz
KC	Kelvin Herrera	Joakim Soria	Mike Minor
LAA	Bud Norris	David Hernandez	Blake Parker	Cam Bedrosian
LAD	Kenley Jansen	Pedro Baez	Josh Fields
MIA	A.J. Ramos	David Phelps	Kyle Barraclough
MIL	Corey Knebel	Jacob Barnes	Carlos Torres
MIN	Brandon Kintzler	Matt Belisle	Taylor Rogers	Glen Perkins
NYM	Addison Reed	Jerry Blevins	Paul Sewald	Jeurys Familia
NYY	Dellin Betances	Tyler Clippard	Jonathan Holder	Aroldis Chapman
OAK	Santiago Casilla	Ryan Madson	Sean Doolittle
PHI	Hector Neris	Pat Neshek	Joaquin Benoit
PIT	Felipe Rivero	Juan Nicasio	Daniel Hudson
STL	Seung Hwan Oh	Trevor Rosenthal	Matt Bowman
SD	Brandon Maurer	Brad Hand	Ryan Buchter	Carter Capps
SF	Mark Melancon	Derek Law	Hunter Strickland
SEA	Edwin Diaz	James Pazos	Nick Vincent
TB	Alex Colome	Danny Farquhar	Tommy Hunter	Brad Boxberger
TEX	Matt Bush	Keone Kela	Jose Leclerc
TOR	Roberto Osuna	Joe Smith	Ryan Tepera
WSH	Matt Albers	Shawn Kelley	Oliver Perez	Koda Glover

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