Bullpen Report: Sunday, May 10

The Rangers bullpen kept their order intact today, as they closed out the Rays 2-1. Not a lot has been written about the Texas pen, probably because it’s the Texas pen, but their moms deserve to hear some love sprinkled on their sons. First, Keone Kela struck out two in the seventh, and he got the W when the Rangers scored a run in the top of the eighth. Don’t be fooled by his 1.93 ERA. That’s helped by an 84.3% LOB rate. His 4.18 xFIP is kind of gross, and his 10.3% K%-BB% is definitely gross. He is the Rangers seventh inning guy, and if something happens to these next two guys, he’s probably next in line. Shawn Tolleson got his fifth hold of the year. One reason that number is so low, is because he’s on the Rangers, and they haven’t provided him with a ton of opportunities. He’s the opposite of Kela. Don’t be fooled by his 4.85 ERA. It’s inflated by a 58.8% LOB rate. His xFIP of 2.10 shows signs of promise, and his 31.3% K%-BB% is downright lovely. Neftali Feliz worked around a couple of hits and got his sixth save of the year.

Jason Grilli was unavailable with back spasms, but it doesn’t really matter anyway the way the Braves are going right now. Jim Johnson didn’t pitch, and Cody Martin was called upon for the second day in a row to face the Nats toughest hitters. He gave up a walk-off homer to the molten-hot Bryce Harper on a not-terrible pitch yesterday, and today he came on in the eighth with a one-run lead. He gave up a single to Ian Desmond and then walked Jayson Werth. That brought up Martin killer Harper. He got him to pop up to short on a heater up and in. Crisis averted! Until he gave up a bouncer up the middle to Ryan Zimmerman, and then a slicing double to Wilson Ramos that just evaded the Glold Glove of Nick Markakis. With the Nats up a run heading into the ninth, they called on Drew Storen to retire the Braves in order for his ninth save.

I was very excited to see David Robertson come in to close out the Reds with a 3-1 lead in the ninth. His FIP of -0.08(negative zero point zero eight) coming into action on Sunday, coupled with his absurd 45.5% K%-BB% meant that domination was a pretty sure bet. BrooksBaseball.net had him throwing his four-seamer for nine of his sixteen pitches. It also has him throwing zero four-seamers coming into today’s action. He touched 95 with the pitch, but he also gave up a couple of singles and a game-tying double, before he recovered to retire the next three hitters, two via the strikeout and ending the inning on a Joey Votto groundout. Which led to Aroldis Chapman coming in to pitch the bottom of the ninth of a tie game on the road! First up was fellow Cuban Jose Abreu. He struck him out. Adam LaRoche came up next, and why Adam LaRoche would come up to face Aroldis Chapman is beyond me. He grounded out and the game was in the bag. His scoreless streak of 28.3 innings was safe for another day. Until he gave up back-to-back singles to Avisail Garcia and Alexei Ramirez, followed that with a wild pitch(his first on the year), and topped it off by surrendering a single to Gordon Beckham, bringing home the winning run.

Steve Cishek’s velocity is still down from where it was at last season. He didn’t have a good outing Sunday in San Francisco, blowing his third save of the season. He gave up three hits and walked two, including walking in the tying run. Matt Duffy walked them off one batter later. Is A.J. Ramos going to get some consideration for the closer spot in Miami? His 1.06 ERA is made up of a 23.1% K%-BB%, .216 BABIP and 86.7% LOB rate. If Mike Redmond decides to look at changing things up, Ramos would have to be first in line, but there is nothing indicating that Redmond is going to go that route just yet.

Of note: Dellin Betances retired five Orioles to finish them off in a non-save situation. Two more strikeouts and he’s yet to surrender an earned run on the season. Koji Uehara closed out the Blue Jays by baffling them with splitters. Ten of his fifteen offerings were of the split-fingered variety. Cody Allen kept his ERA at an even 9.00 by giving up another earned run in his inning of work today. Alex Torres and Carlos Torres(Torii?), held the lead for the Mets, allowing Jeurys Familia to nail down his thirteenth save. Mark Melancon topped out at 91 mph today, only got one whiff on his sixteen pitches and gave up two hits, but he still earned his seventh save by retiring 60% of the Cardinals he faced. His one whiff was a third strike to Jason Heyward. Huston Street saved his tenth game for the Angels in his first appearance since blowing a save against the same Astros on Thursday night. He pitched a perfect inning and added a strikeout. Fernando Rodney earned his ninth save of the year and upped his ERA to 5.40 by giving up a run in his inning of work. Are you joking? Arizona closer Addison Reed got only his second save of the season on Sunday? His second?!?! No other Diamondback has a save in 2015. Mark Melancon has two in the last two days! Chris Martin is on the DL for the Yankees. So who will replace him on the closer grid? I want to put Chasen Shreve in there, but we all know he isn’t closing games for the Yankees. If the worst things ever happened, it would be Esmil Rogers.

Notes from Saturday: Mark Melancon earned his sixth save of the season for the Pirates, and he threw as hard as he has all year, touching 92.5 mph with his fastball. Craig Kimbrel blew his first save of the year, which is a little surprising seeing as how his ERA is now a Dan Kolb-esque 5.68. His velo is fine and he’s getting whiffs on the curve, he’s just getting hit. He’s given up two homers, which is as many as he gave up all of last season. His xFIP is sitting at 2.87, which isn’t far off the 2.24 he sported in 2014. He’s in no danger of losing his closer role. Jeurys Familia notched his twelfth save, and Glen Perkins got his eleventh.

Closer Grid:

	Closer	First	Second	DL/Minors
Arizona	Addison Reed	Brad Ziegler	Evan Marshall
Atlanta	Jason Grilli	Jim Johnson	Cody Martin
Baltimore	Zach Britton	Darren O’Day	Tommy Hunter
Boston	Koji Uehara	Alexi Ogando	Junichi Tazawa
CHI (NL)	Hector Rondon	Pedro Strop	Jason Motte
CHI (AL)	David Robertson	Jacob Petricka	Zach Duke
Cincy	Aroldis Chapman	Jumbo Diaz	Tony Cingrani	Sean Marshall
Cleveland	Cody Allen	Bryan Shaw	Scott Atchison
Colorado	John Axford	Rafael Betancourt	Boone Logan	Adam Ottavino
Detroit	Joakim Soria	Al Alburquerque	Joba Chamberlain	Joe Nathan
Houston	Luke Gregerson	Chad Qualls	Pat Neshek
KC	Greg Holland	Wade Davis	Kelvin Herrera
LAA	Huston Street	Joe Smith	Vinnie Pestano
LAD	Yimi Garcia	Chris Hatcher	Pedro Baez	Kenley Jansen
Miami	Steve Cishek	A.J. Ramos	Mike Dunn
Milwaukee	Francisco Rodriguez	Jonathan Broxton	Will Smith
Minnesota	Glen Perkins	Brian Duensing	Blaine Boyer	Casey Fien
NY (NL)	Jeurys Familia	Carlos Torres	Buddy Carlyle	Jenrry Mejia
NY (AL)	Andrew Miller	Dellin Betances	Esmil Rogers	Chris Martin
Oakland	Tyler Clippard	Evan Scribner	Dan Otero	Sean Doolittle
Philly	Jonathan Papelbon	Ken Giles	Luis Garcia
Pittsburgh	Mark Melancon	Tony Watson	Arquimedes Caminero
St. Louis	Trevor Rosenthal	Seth Maness	Matt Belisle	Jordan Walden
SD	Craig Kimbrel	Joaquin Benoit	Dale Thayer
SF	Santiago Casilla	Sergio Romo	Jeremy Affeldt
Seattle	Fernando Rodney	Danny Farquhar	Carson Smith
TB	Brad Boxberger	Kevin Jepsen	Ernesto Frieri	Jake McGee
Texas	Neftali Feliz	Keone Kela	Shawn Tolleson	Tanner Scheppers
Toronto	Brett Cecil	Roberto Osuna	Steve Delabar	Miguel Castro
Wash.	Drew Storen	Aaron Barrett	Blake Treinen	Casey Janssen

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