• Andrew Miller left last night’s game and his knee tendinitis seems to be acting up again, causing a quick return to the DL. Joe Smith moves up a notch to the next-in-line and Bryan Shaw makes another return to the grid.  As far as saves go, this isn’t a major move as Cody Allen has been receiving most, if not all, of the save opportunities of late. However, there aren’t many setup men better than Andrew Miller so it’s naturally a big loss for those in holds leagues, duh. As we all saw in October, Cleveland used Miller quite a bit in the playoffs and with a five game lead in the division they have no reason to rush him back. There is no real timetable on Miller’s return but I wouldn’t rely on him pitching significant innings the rest of the year as the Indians prepare for him to be at his best in October again.

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• After getting the save in yesterday’s outing, Juan Minaya followed it up with another save today for the White Sox in the first half of a double header against the Twins. Minaya has converted the last three save opportunities he’s been handed and certainly looks to be the closer.  Minaya’s triple slash line of 4.50/4.57/4.26 doesn’t look too fancy but his 3.59 SIERA and 30.5% K% paints a more palatable picture. Not many saves to be expected for the rest of the season here, but I’m upgrading Minaya to yellow.

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Another busy weekend for bullpen activity around the major leagues. We’ll start with a few notes from Saturday:

• Yankees manager Joe Girardi announced on Saturday that Aroldis Chapman was removed from the closer role. Dellin Betances got save later that night, striking out two in a perfect inning. It’s been well documented that something doesn’t look right with Chapman this season, especially lately, and thankfully for the Yankees Betances is more than capable of filling in for the remainder of the season if need be. Despite struggling with command more than usual this season, Betances has an outstanding 40.5 percent strikeout rate, and he’s allowed just one home run this year in 47 innings. He’s been an superb reliever in his career, and this year doesn’t look very different except for the uptick in walks. Girardi didn’t “officially” name Betances the closer just yet (in fact, he said that David Robertson was also in the mix), but Betances should be the heavy favorite. Chapman pitched in the sixth and seventh on Sunday, allowing one walk and striking out two.

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It has now been a full week since Aroldis Chapman put himself in jeopardy of blowing a save against the Red Sox by starting the ninth inning with three consecutive walks. Little has gone right since then.

To recap, he blew a save on Sunday, recorded a save on Tuesday despite allowing an Amed Rosario two-run homer and sat out Wednesday and Thursday due to a hamstring injury. Though Joe Girardi has insisted that Chapman is still his closer, on Friday, he brought him in for the bottom of the eighth inning against the Red Sox even though the Yankees trailed by a run. Once again, Chapman dug himself a hole, allowing a leadoff single to Rafael Devers (who homered off him on Sunday), walking Christian Vazquez and then allowing a double steal. That set up a two-RBI single by Jackie Bradley, Jr., all before Chapman recorded his first out.
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In a tumultuous season for the Cardinals’ bullpen, it was starting to look like Trevor Rosenthal was creating some stability. He had rattled off seven consecutive saves over a 16-day period, the first six of which were scoreless.

On Wednesday night, it took just eight pitches to ruin that placid state. On his second pitch — a 91.4 mph four-seam fastball — Rosenthal gave up a home run to Xander Bogaerts. Six pitches later, Mitch Moreland took a free pass. Mike Matheny was sufficiently concerned that he removed Rosenthal for Zach Duke. Rosenthal averaged 94.3 mph on the six four-seam fastballs he threw, after he had hovered around 97 mph over his previous six appearances. Unfortunately for the Cardinals, Duke and John Brebbia didn’t fare much better, and the latter gave up Mookie Betts‘ walk-off double.
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• With Tyler Clippard moving to Houston the White Sox bullpen is a bit of a mess. Juan Minaya, Jake Petricka and Gregory Infante could all see the ninth but I’m going to roll out Juan Minaya to start. As of now we haven’t quite heard enough out of White Sox camp to make an exact call but Minaya is probably the best of the bunch. In 27.1 innings pitched Minaya has a 6.61/4.31/3.94 ERA/FIP/xFIP line but also has a 3.26 SIERA and a 31.9% K% and 10.6% BB%. You would like to see fewer walks but beggars can’t quite be choosers. Petricka and Infante aren’t particularly exciting or even usable for that matter in fantasy and I would look to grab Minaya first.

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The Twins blew an 11-6 seventh-inning lead on Saturday. Their new (interim?) closer Matt Belisle relieved Trevor Hildenberger in eighth after Hildenberger allowed a two-run homer with two outs. Belisle got a strikeout to end the inning, but then allowed a leadoff single and a walk-off home run to Justin Upton in the ninth.

The next day, Hildenberger was summoned with two outs in the eighth to face Upton, who represented the tying run. He struck him out on three pitches, then came back out for the bottom of the ninth. He remained very sharp as he struck out two and induced two weak ground balls for his first career save.

The strong appearance, coupled with Belisle’s struggles in the ninth on Saturday, mean that Hildenberger could seize the closer’s role and run with it. His numbers in his brief major league career are impressive: in 23 innings this year, Hildenberger has a 26.8 percent strikeout rate, a 3.1 percent walk rate, and a 58.5 percent ground ball rate. He has a 3.13 ERA/2.79 FIP/2.67 xFIP. He’s allowed just two home runs. He seems more than capable of handling the closer’s role, and he’s probably worth grabbing in all formats before he successfully converts a few more save chances and gains national attention. It’s worth noting that Glen Perkins is expected to return from the disabled list sometime this week, and his presence may further complicate the outlook for Belisle and Hildenberger. Read the rest of this entry »

Given how abysmally he had pitched over the last two-and-a-half weeks, it seemed clear that Bud Norris was going to lose his job as the Angels’ closer. Given how Mike Scioscia had been using his relievers, it seemed nearly as clear that Blake Parker was going to replace him. Parker had been pitching frequently in the eighth inning, usually in close games. Erstwhile closer Cam Bedrosian had recently been relegated to the middle innings, and when he pitched the eighth inning on Tuesday, setting up Keynan Middleton’s first career save, it was because Scioscia was trying to manage Parker’s workload (as mentioned in Wednesday’s Bullpen Report).

So naturally, when Scioscia replaced Tyler Skaggs in the seventh inning of Thursday’s game against the Mariners and needed to call on someone to preserve a 3-0 lead, he brought Parker out. And when he needed a closer in the bottom of the ninth, he used Bedrosian, who incidentally provided a perfect inning.
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In the aftermath of the Brandon Kintzler trade, the Twins were going to use a committee to close games, but those committee meetings have not been well-attended. Ever since the Twins dealt Kintzler on July 31, Matt Belisle has been the only closer the Twins have called upon (not including Dillon Gee’s four-inning save on Tuesday), and he is the only one they have needed.

Belisle was brought in for the ninth inning against the Brewers on Wednesday and he struck out the side, but with a four-run lead, he was not credited with a save. However, he closed out the series opener against the Brewers on Monday as well as the finale against the Rangers on Sunday. While Taylor Rogers has looked better in his last few outings, Belisle seems to have a firm grip on the job. He has not allowed an earned run since June 24, and since the beginning of June, he has a 1.61 ERA with one home run allowed.
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• Roberto Osuna has had a rough end of July into early August having allowed 9 earned runs in his previous five appearances but he threw a perfect ninth for his 29th save tonight. A slew of bad outings raised Osuna’s ERA which now stands at 3.40 but he still supports a 1.44/2.54 FIP/xFIP and a 2.04 SIERA proving he remains an elite option. Osuna has been an above average closer since he came onto the scene at age 20 and a few years later at age 22 he’s one of the best. He upped his Swinging Strike rate to 18.8% this year which ranks second among all qualified relievers, only trailing Craig Kimbrel and those swings and misses has led Osuna to a career high 35.4% K%. Given his ridiculously young age we expected Osuna could take the leap this year and he’s done exactly that. The Blue Jays might not offer the same amount of opportunities moving forward as a Kimbrel or Kenley Jansen but in 2018 and beyond, that’s the company he will keep.

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