Archive for Brandon Morrow

It was Zach Britton, and not Dellin Betances, who got the save for the Yankees in their 3-2 win over the Red Sox in Tuesday night’s series opener. I have made Britton and Betances co-closers in the grid below, with both receiving the “Hot Seat” label. However, it’s not Britton’s adventure of an inning or Betances’ recent struggles that have put them on the hot seat, but rather that Aroldis Chapman could return as soon as Wednesday. It appears that Chapman’s worst-case scenario is a Thursday return, in the event that Aaron Boone wants to give the lefty an additional day of rest following Monday’s sim game.
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The long-anticipated trade of Brad Hand finally went down on Thursday. The Padres dealt him and Adam Cimber to the Indians for Francisco Mejia, effectively remaking both teams’ bullpens.

The Indians find themselves in a similar spot to where they were two years ago, when they acquired Andrew Miller at the trade deadline. With Hand, they now have an elite lefty reliever who has performed better than Cody Allen, who has been the incumbent closer in both situations. Terry Francona is expected to stick with Allen as his primary closer, just as he did upon the team’s acquisition of Miller.
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Among yesterday’s developments, I was pretty certain nothing was going to top the Cubs losing their closer due to an injury sustained while taking his pants off. I was wrong.

After blowing a save against the Marlins on Monday night, Hunter Strickland then lost a fight with a door. The Giants’ closer punched said door and broke his right hand. He underwent surgery on his right pinky finger on Tuesday and is expected to be out for six-to-eight weeks. Bruce Bochy wasted little time in anointing Sam Dyson as his new primary closer, and promptly used him to nail down a save against the Marlins on Tuesday night. With Tony Watson apparently off after pitching on consecutive days, Will Smith pitched the eighth inning and stayed in to begin the ninth with lefties J.B. Shuck and Derek Dietrich due up, but after walking pinch hitter Yadiel Rivera and striking out Dietrich, he gave way to Dyson. The sinkerballer, who happens to have a 64.8 percent ground ball rate, got Brian Anderson to hit into a game-ending double play.
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Bullpen Report – March, 30th 2018

With only eight wins on the season, the Orioles closer job has been pretty tough to speculate on so far this season. However, manager Buck Showalter did fantasy owners a big favor Sunday night by laying his cards on the table in their 5-3 victory over the Detroit Tigers.

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Brandon Morrow is now a perfect 4 for 4 in save chances, but his most recent save was far from perfect. In Sunday’s series finale against the Rockies, Morrow allowed a pair of singles to Nolan Arenado and Trevor Story and then loaded the bases with a two-out walk to David Dahl. With Ian Desmond at the plate, Morrow uncorked a wild pitch that initially appeared to allow the Rockies to slice the Cubs’ two-run lead in half. Arenado had been called safe on a close play at the plate, but he was called out on review.
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This post continues our Depth Chart Discussions. In an effort to suss out every team, we’ve divided them into four parts (infield, outfield, rotation, and bullpen) and will continue to break them down for you over the next few weeks. You can find the Depth Chart Discussion posts gathered here.

The San Diego Padres’ bullpen lacks name brand appeal, but it’s glorious. Friars’ relievers ranked just 14th in WAR (3.4), but boasted exceptional ranks in other categories ranking tied for third in SIERA (3.07), third in WHIP (1.14), and second in K-BB% (16.4%) and FIP (3.09). Those numbers are partly inflated by the brilliant 33 innings thrown by former closer Huston Street, who was dealt in July, but even in his absence this is a fantastic group. Read the rest of this entry »

The San Diego Padres have probably created more buzz than any other Major League Baseball team this offseason. New GM A.J. Preller added to his club a few position players who are pretty good in fantasy baseball terms – a couple of them really good, a couple of them who could be (but could also not be). The change in home venue for each doesn’t really affect his projection on offense negatively, either. The new guys all used to play in pretty pitcher-friendly yards.

A cool fantasy baseball thing related to the new guys’ pitcher-friendly yard, Petco Park, is that it has long helped its team to be a sort of fantasy goldmine. When fantasy baseball players search for pitching sleepers and fliers, they usually check San Diego’s roster for youngsters, retreads, and anyone else the Friars might give a shot that year. Petco Park has always had good park factors for hurlers, and the club’s coaching staffs (latest edition led by manager Bud Black and pitching coach Darren Balsley) have good reputations, too.

Now, :-(. The source of the Padres’ newfound buzz will make the cool fantasy baseball thing less cool. Perhaps a lot less.

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The closer grid is updated below, but first up is your current rankings for 5×5 (W,SO,ERA,WHIP,SV), 6×6 (+HLD) and rate-stat (K/9, BB/9, HR/9, H/9, ERA) leagues using z-scores (rate stats adjusted by IP) for each category. It’s currently sorted by the standard 5×5 format. Scroll to the right for all of the individual z-scores in gray. I highlighted the relievers in green:

Here is yesterday morning’s review of Friday’s games including a grundle-grab reference, Edward Mujica probably sticking at closer, Drew Storen definitely sticking at closer, a White Sox closer swap rewarded with shakiness, and an update on Glen Glen Glen!

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Right-hander Brandon Morrow has been a fantasy sleeper since transitioning to the starting rotation full-time in 2010. He’s always been a guy with electric stuff, huge strikeout rates and solid FIPs/SIERAs — but his ERA has never seemingly lived up to the billing due to low strand rates and poor command. For many owners, he became the quintessential fantasy tease the past few years: a guy with enormous potential who always disappointed in the end.

As they say…

Fool me once — 4.49 ERA in 2010 — shame on you.
Fool me twice — 4.72 ERA in 2011 — shame on me.

Fool me three times … well, that wasn’t going to happen for many owners. Consecutive years of disappointment proved too much. In fact, several people I know blacklisted Morrow and simply refused to draft him for the 2012 season.

However, those fantasy owners who drafted the right-hander last year and trusted Morrow would finally deliver on his potential were rewarded. He compiled a 2.96 ERA, cut his walk rate to a career-best 2.96 BB/9, and posted the tenth-best WHIP (1.11) among all starters who threw at least 100 innings. Injuries held him back from a top-tier fantasy season, but the message came through loud and clear: Brandon Morrow has finally arrived.

But perhaps that was the wrong message to hear.

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Every year, at about this time, I like to go back and check in on certain strategies employed on draft day and see how they have served me thus far.  Is it a strategy worth employing again?  What tweaks to it are needed for the next time, if indeed there is a next time?  One strategy in particular, the one that seems to always spur the most discussion, that deserves to be re-visited is the one where I, because of the incredible depth at pitching, draft a beast-like offense first and wait until closer to the middle rounds to pick up my starters.  Nothing but bats to start things off and somewhere around the 10th or 11th round, I grab my first pitcher. Read the rest of this entry »