You may remember last year’s Detroit bullpen as being something of a mess, especially once Bruce Rondon proved that he was not going to be able to grab the closer’s job right out of camp as the Tigers as hoped. They tried to bring back Jose Valverde, with disastrous results, Phil Coke got a brief shot, and they picked up Jose Veras for depth, but the majority of saves ended up going to Joaquin Benoit, who proved effective in the role after being bumped up from his setup man spot.

Now, Benoit is off to San Diego. Veras is with the Cubs. Valverde is trying to make the Mets. Drew Smyly is in the rotation, replacing Doug Fister. Darin Downs is in Houston. Of the five most-used Tiger relievers in 2013, three are no longer in the Detroit bullpen, replaced by several new names. It’s a bullpen in transition. Let’s get to it. Read the rest of this entry »

While the Orioles are making headlines with signings of Ubaldo Jimenez and Nelson Cruz, it’s time to take a look at another aspect of the team in which they’ve made some changes. Gone is Jim Johnson, a two-time 50-save closer for the O’s and while they were all set to bring in free agent Grant Balfour, they were unhappy with the results of his physical and opted to fill the vacancy in-house. So let’s take a look at what Baltimore’s bullpen is looking like right now. Read the rest of this entry »

As the Philadelphia Phillies look to improve a bullpen that finished 26th in baseball last year in WAR, they’ll hope that their two setup men are able to stay on the field and a collection of young pitchers matures as the team enters a rebuilding era. Unfortunately for fantasy owners, there isn’t is a lot to choose from among Philly’s reliever corps as spring training gets underway.

Read the rest of this entry »

It’s been an interesting ride for the Twins veteran southpaw Glen Perkins. After about a season and a half’s worth of starts back in 2008 and 2009, the organization apparently decided that they had seen enough. Can you blame them? Sure, he suffered from elbow and shoulder issues that could have hampered his performance, but he also endured two straight years of sub-4.5 K/9 marks! That’s not going to get it done. He then spent the majority of the 2010 season pitching for the Triple-A club.

Read the rest of this entry »

After the Indians released incumbent closer Chris Perez at the end of last season, the team was without a stopper heading into the offseason. The team decided to cross that off their shopping list by signing former Brewers closer John Axford. After three seasons of saving games in Milwaukee, Axford lost his job so early in 2013 that he failed to record even one save. Now, Cleveland is hoping that he rebounds and that the mechanical changes he made while in St. Louis not only sticks, but was actually the root cause of his struggles in the first place.

Read the rest of this entry »

There seems to be plenty to love about the Cardinals bullpen here in 2014, particularly from a fantasy standpoint. And we’re not just talking about saves here. Should your league count holds and use stats such as K/9 or HRA, then this is the pen you want to sift through on draft day. The arms are young, electric and should miss an awful lot of bats this season. Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve seen it said that bullpens win championships, but I think it’s probably just the last piece of the puzzle for a contending team. That’d be hard to tease out in the numbers, but it certainly doesn’t make sense for a team like the Astros to spend resources on their bullpen. They’ve taken it to the extreme in some cases, by trading any and every reliever that had any interest on the market.

That’s how you get an Astros bullpen that was by far the worst in the league last year. By a large margin. At 5.09, their FIP was almost a full run worse than second-worst (Cubs, 4.23). And they ‘accrued’ -5.4 wins. The other four teams with below-replacement pens lost .2 wins or less to their relievers as a group. So, yeah, it was a really bad bullpen.

Two thoughts come to mind about a bad bullpen. The first is that there’s always opportunity in situations like those. Bad teams make for sleepers, since the traditional media focuses on better teams and those players get more name recognition. So don’t ignore the team. But! Bad teams — especially those that don’t score a lot of runs and have bad bullpens around the closer — bad teams do not provide a lot of save opportunities.

Read the rest of this entry »

When the Angels acquired Ernesto Frieri from the Padres in May of 2012, they knew they were getting a strikeout machine, but were aware that those strikeouts came with a cost — namely, walks and lots and lots of fly balls. And at the time, he was just a middle reliever who had shown the overall skills to close, but had yet to be afforded such an opportunity. He then continued to dominate and eventually became the undisputed man at the end of the bullpen for the Halos.

Read the rest of this entry »

Equal parts infuriating to fantasy baseball players and exciting to forward-thinking baseball fans, this Rangers bullpen has it all. Instead of some boring free agent acquisition to fill the role, or a lucky prospect turned into dominant reliever, the Rangers have turned to a collection of quantity (all with quirks). And quantity is always the best option in the bullpen, where quality usually costs too much money. Deciding which guy saves the most games for the Rangers this year will be tough though.

Read the rest of this entry »

Adding Holds as a category to any fantasy league opens up a new pool of pitchers to the mix. No longer are teams focused just on just starters and closers, now middle relievers have more value. Holds are an impossible category to predict, but today I will give some ideas about guesstimating Holds and some pitchers who may accumulate them in 2014.

If a reliever comes into a game to protect a lead, gets at least one out and leaves without giving up that lead, he gets a hold.

MLB Miscellany: Rules, regulations and statistics

Two things must exist for a pitcher to a get a Hold, opportunity and talent. Starting with opportunity: Holds are just like Saves, the manager must trust the pitcher enough to put them in a Hold situation. Two types of pitchers are given Hold opportunities, stud setup men and LOOGYs. A setup man will pitch the seventh and/or eighth since their peripheral data is similar to a closer. They will throw one inning and be done. LOOGY’s will be used to get one or two tough left-handed batters out and be done.

Read the rest of this entry »