Bullpen Report: September 18, 2014

A relatively slow night out of the bullpens as the MLB season is coming close to an end. Here are a few things that came to mind on Thursday:

Addison Reed served up a ninth-inning walk-off tater to Wilin Rosario to blow his sixth save of the season. That’s now seven earned runs that Reed has surrendered in his last five trips to the hill. Not good. The Diamondbacks’ closer is now 1-7 on the year with 31 saves in 37 chances with a 4.40 ERA (4.15 FIP) and owned a 21.1% K% entering Thursday. The right-hander’s 13.3% HR/FB% prior to tonight’s longball represents a career high and appears to be one of the primary culprits for the spike in ERA. And with roughly half of his home games at Chase Field and a good chunk at Coors, maybe this is more of the Addison Reed we should expect going forward with respect to ratios — not the 2013 version.

The beneficiary of both Addison Reed’s blowup and Wilin Rosario’s homer was LaTroy Hawkins. The 41-year-old notched his 22nd save in 25 chances, doing so without recording a strikeout. Hawkins needed just nine pitches to retire the Diamondbacks in the visitor’s half the of the ninth and did so with a line out, fly out and a foul out. I’m not sure how this guy continues to defy age, but one may assume the Rockies will pick up the old man’s affordable club option ($2.25M) for next season.

Mark Melancon notched his 30th save of the season as the Pirates continue to surge towards the playoffs with the season quickly coming to a close. Tonight, Gerrit Cole dished a gem, shortening up the game for the Bucs and providing the skipper to throw Tony Watson and finish with Melancon to seal the 3-2 victory. Melancon is now 30-of-34 in save chances this season with a 1.88 ERA (2.06 FIP) and a K-BB% at just over 21%. He’s missing more bats this year (13.8% SwStr%, 10.9% SwStr% for his career) and encouraging hitters to reach for pitches out of the zone (43.6% O-Swing%) more than he’s done in the past.

Quick Hitters: David Robertson picked up his third win of the season in a one-inning, 13-pitch effort in the Bronx. Robertson fanned two of the three Blue Jays and upped his K% to 37.5% on the year. He’ll be a top ten close once again in 2015 as long as health is on his side. Cody Allen surrendered a hit but fanned two en route to his 22nd save of the ‘14 campaign.

Closer Grid:

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