Archive for raisel iglesias

It would not be a Saturday edition of the Bullpen Report without a litany of questions which pervade the saves landscape. Starting in Chicago, the Cubs failed to convert a save chance leading to a loss. Steve Cishek entered this outing riding a 13.1 inning scoreless streak and failed to record an out. He walked Joey Votto prior to serving up the go ahead two run home run to Eugenio Suarez. Cishek then hit Jesse Winker with a pitch before being replaced by James Norwood. This marks Cishek’s second loss and second blown save of the season. During his scoreless streak, Cishek limited hitters to a .133 batting average against (six-for-45) but did not fare well on Friday, which coincides with the possible return of Pedro Strop on Sunday. Brad Brach also incurred his second blown save giving up four hits, an earned runand a walk with three strikeouts in 1.2 innings. Read the rest of this entry »

I’m sorry, Luke Jackson, wasn’t sure you were for real.

But you sealed the Braves’ Sunday win.

Now you’re at the head of the closer grid.

This is why I write fantasy columns and not parody songs.
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May the fourth be with you, and the force be strong in the unyielding chase for saves. During a game with twists and turns in the win probabilities, the Giants outlasted the Reds despite trailing by eight runs at the end of the third inning. Raisel Iglesias incurred his second blown save giving up a game tying home run to Stephen Vogt in the top of the ninth inning. It’s been a tumultuous season for Iglesias, who seemed to be turning the corner of late, but he’s been asked to record more than three outs in three of his last four outings and five times of his 14 outings this season.

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It seems the more we think to know about the Red Sox bullpen, perhaps the less we do? Matt Barnes opened the season as the highest leverage reliever, capable of appearing at any point when needed by manager Alex Cora. Last night, this happened, but with Ryan Brasier entering the game in the top of the seventh with runners on second and third base with two outs, taking on the A’s most dangerous hitter, Khris Davis. Brasier retired Davis with a strikeout, then threw a clean eighth getting the win in relief for his efforts. After Boston extended its lead, Hector Velasquez opened the ninth but only recorded one out while loading the bases on a hit and two walks. This pressed Barnes into duty and he responded with his second save. Read the rest of this entry »

Since writing the initial 2019 Bullpen Report after the Mariners-Athletics series in Tokyo, three closer competitions have been decided. As expected by many owners, Will Smith and Alex Colome respectively nailed down the Giants’ and White Sox’s closer jobs. In a much more surprising move, Torey Lovullo chose Greg Holland as the Diamondbacks’ closer over Archie Bradley and Yoshihisa Hirano. Fantasy owners are starting to warm up to Holland, as he is now owned in 44 percent of CBS leagues and 20 percent of ESPN leagues. I recently made the case for adding him, so rather than present that argument here, I simply refer you to the piece I wrote on him.
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Raisel Iglesias has been steady as the Reds’ closer, so speculating on his potential replacement has seemed like a largely intellectual exercise. Now that speculation could have some consequences for fantasy owners, as the Reds placed their closer on the 10-day disabled list with a strained left biceps.

Jim Riggleman has taken some of the guesswork away from us, as he has already cited Jared Hughes, Amir Garrett, Wandy Peralta and the just-activated Michael Lorenzen as possible replacement options. His lack of commitment to a single replacement makes it less attractive to speculate on any one reliever as a future source of saves. Riggleman’s comments about the nature and severity of Iglesias’ injury also suggest that he may not be out long, making it even less urgent to try to add one of the foursome. The interim manager told reporters that “Iglesias’ left biceps has been bothering him for some days. It’s just tender…Rather than continue to deal with it, we’re just going to DL him…”
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There were some ninth-inning adventures on Wednesday, but of the 10 relievers with save chances in the final frame, eight managed to come through.

Then there was Sam Dyson. In last night’s bullpen report, Benjamin Pasinkoff made note of Dyson’s meltdown in the Rangers’ season opener against the Indians, as well as his diminished velocity. Whereas Dyson averaged 93.9 mph on his fastball on Monday, this time around he raised it up to 94.7 mph. However, he lost the strike zone, walking Abraham Almonte and Carlos Santana back-to-back, and throwing strikes on just 10 of his 22 pitches. Francisco Lindor made Dyson pay for the walks, hitting a grand slam that left him with a blown save.

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Folks, if you want to do something else we can totally forget about this. Right?

Sigh. The whole reason people like making predictions is that they garner a ton of traffic — power rankings, anyone? — and almost nobody ever holds them to reviewing them because the damn season is so long. It’s like a dog returning to its vomit or whatever, I think.

But anyway, here’s my a review of my word vomit from back in March:

1. Kyle Gibson holds top-50 value in leagues this season.

Welp. It was a disastrous season for Gibson, who saw a drop in groundball rate and strikeout rate and a jump in walk rate, leading to an ERA in excess of 5.00. Basically speaking, all the strides he appeared to be making late last year lapsed, despite his slider and changeup becoming even better pitches this year than last. Inexplicably, he threw both of them a lot less than in 2015. (0/1) Read the rest of this entry »

In this week’s edition of Deep League Waiver Wire, we’re doin’ a little plumbin’. Got to plumb! Plumb the depths, the depths of hell 18 team leagues and deeper. If you’re in a 14, 15, or 16 team league, you might be wise to pass on these players or just add them to your watch list but for those in leagues with 18+ teams or extremely large benches, I hope these guys are available. If not, let me know and the next time I’ll plumb further.

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These predictions are specifically based on Ottoneu FGpt scoring. Perhaps “Bold” isn’t defined clearly enough, but my hope is that this is structured in such a way that my thought process can provide some benefit (even if the predictions seem a little extreme at face value.)

1. Domingo Santana will be a top 15 OF.

Nelson Cruz, Yasiel Puig, Carlos Gonzalez, Charlie Blackmon, Starling Marte, Adam Jones…  If you looked at our FGpt OF rankings, these are the 15-20^th ranked outfielders. Which is to say, I think Domingo Santana could be better than all of them (and the rest of those listed below him in our rankings) in 2016. The Brewers do not look like a good team (yet…) so – unless he gets injured – expect a full slate of playing time, a great home park, and lots of power (three things that are gold in linear weights scoring.) The obvious hole in his game is the strikeouts (34% in 2015), but if he can reign that in at all, the upside is tremendous.

2. John Jaso will be a viable 2nd OF

The obvious issue has been playing time (70, 99, 70 games played over the past 3 seasons), but given that he slated to play 1B, I feel fairly confident he will play more games than he has in any of the past 3 seasons.  If he does, he could easily produce value which is expected of many #2 OF in FGpts. The Pirates’ outfield is set, so don’t expect him to retain eligibility for 2017, but he should be incredibly useful for this season. Alex Gordon, Starling Marte, Adam Jones, Christian Yelich, Charlie Blackmon, and Yoenis Cespedes are all projected to be within 5 points of wOBA of Jaso. Those players will cost $18-$25 apiece. If he can stay on the field, Jaso has a good chance to be in that tier, and you can get him for about a third of that price.

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