Archive for steve cishek

Alex Colomé was solid as the White Sox’s closer in 2019, going wire-to-wire in that role. He blew only three of his 33 save opportunities, but because he was short on strikeouts (55 in 61 innings) and had a merely good ERA (2.80) and WHIP (1.07), Colomé finished just 17th among relievers in 5×5 Roto value. Based on ADPs in NFBC drafts so far, that seems to be roughly where fantasy owners expect him to slot in among relievers in 2020. Colomé’s ADP of 160.0 places him 14th among relievers, so if anything, his 2019 performance has fantasy owners expecting a slightly better standing this season.

Many of us are likely to have some trepidation about any closer outside of the top six or so, meaning that Colomé’s ADP is not a sign of fantasy owners’ overwhelming confidence in him. Nonetheless, he is typically getting drafted ahead of Emilio Pagán, Brandon Workman, Hansel Robles, José Leclerc and Archie Bradley, so he is getting some respect. Also, no other White Sox reliever is getting drafted within the top 500 picks overall, as Aaron Bummer’s 586.6 ADP is the next closest. Colomé has engendered enough confidence that he is not viewed like Pagán, whose ADP is only 100 points higher than that of teammate Nick Anderson, or Mark Melancon, who is getting drafted 92 picks on average later than Will Smith, even though he is slated to be the Braves’ closer.
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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 »

Kyle Hendricks couldn’t quite finish out his gem of a start on Tuesday night against the Reds. When he walked Nick Senzel to lead off the bottom of the ninth inning, Joe Maddon turned to Kyle Ryan to keep the Cubs in front, 3-1. Ryan retired Joey Votto, but with right-handed Eugenio Suarez coming up next, Maddon called on Steve Cishek once again for the save. Ryan departed despite having held righties to a .233 wOBA this season and even though left-handed Jesse Winker was due up after Suarez.

Cishek is clearly Maddon’s top choice for save situations, and he cemented his position at the top of the Cubs’ bullpen hierarchy by getting both Suarez and Winker out.
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Remember when Joe Maddon had said that virtually every reliever in his bullpen could get a crack at some saves, with Pedro Strop (hamstring) on the IL? I’m starting to get a little skeptical.

Steve Cishek pitched a perfect ninth inning to close out the Cubs’ 4-1 win over the Brewers on Sunday night, and he has been Maddon’s choice to pitch in both save opportunities that have arisen since Strop sustained his injury. Maddon did show an openness to use other relievers in a closer-type situation on Saturday, when he summoned Brandon Kintzler and Kyle Ryan to pitch the top of the ninth in a 1-1 tie (with Cishek coming in for the 10th inning). However, it is looking clear that Cishek is Maddon’s preferred choice to close in Strop’s absence. For now, I am still designating the Cubs’ situation as a committee.
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The mystery of the Cubs’ bullpen usage from Tuesday night was solved on Wednesday. The team placed closer Pedro Strop on the IL with a strained left hamstring, which helps to explain why Joe Maddon went with Steve Cishek in the top of the ninth inning in a 2-2 game with the Marlins.

Maddon turned to Cishek for an actual save situation on Wednesday, but only after Kyle Ryan started off the top of the ninth to face switch-hitter Neil Walker, whose 14 plate appearances against lefties had produced one single this season. Ryan departed after allowing Walker’s second single against southpaws this season, so Cishek came in and still needed three outs to preserve a 2-1 lead. A Starlin Castro single, a wild pitch and a Miguel Rojas RBI groundout later, Cishek was tagged with his first blown save of 2019. The Cubs ultimately prevailed in 11 innings with Carl Edwards Jr. getting the win.
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Apparently if you get the save against the Blue Jays, they name the building after you. So probably because the portion of the Jays’ lineup that was due up against the Twins called for a lefty reliever, rather than a righty, their home park is not called Parker Centre.

With the Twins up 3-0 heading into the bottom of the ninth inning, Rocco Baldelli summoned Taylor Rogers to handle Justin Smoak (.216 Avg, .135 ISO versus lefties), the right-handed Randal Grichuk (.317 Avg, but a .122 ISO vs. LHP) and Rowdy Tellez. The choice nearly backfired, as Grichuk singled and then Rogers stayed in to face Vladimir Guerrero Jr. after retiring Tellez. Guerrero singled, putting runners on the corners, but Rogers induced a Billy McKinney grounder to end the game.
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Average Draft Position or ADP is very valuable. I weighed NFBC’s ADP into my personal NFBC Draft Champion rankings equally to my position-adjusted composite projections (Baseball HQ combined with RotoChamp composites (Steamer, ZIP’s, etc.)) and the results were great. I used this, our pitcher arsenal scores and these hitter analytics  as my three main draft tools.

I wanted to take evaluating draft position one step further. I want to understand how consistent each player is drafted near their ADP.

Howard Bender, who manages Mock Draft Army provided me with the raw draft results of 19 expert drafts (NFBC format: 2c-1b-2b-3b-ss-ci-mi-5of-9p). It’s not the largest sample, but they are expert drafts, and the drafts that I have taken part in definitely provided great references.

The Approach:

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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, bullpen, and rotation) and will continue to break them down for you over the next few weeks. You can find the Depth Chart Discussion posts gathered here.

Closer/Setup Men:

Fishing for a closer?

Draft Jenrry Mejia and you may feel like doing this:

Jenrry Mejia. So pumped. pic.twitter.com/iy8HR5yrZu

— MLB GIFS (@MLBGIFs) July 26, 2014

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Any day now, Zach Sanders (@zvsanders) will come out with his end-of-season FAVRz/Fantasy Rankings. Look out for them.

For this post, I will provide three sets of rankings using that same approach (summed up z-scores) for our end-of-season “Bullpen Report: Expected Fantasy Rankings”. The Bullpen Report team should follow up with role reports for each division in the coming weeks as well.

The first set of rankings you will find almost anywhere: on the fantasy sites that you use, via player-raters, etc. It’s the standard 5×5 fantasy value (Wins, ERA, WHIP, SO and Saves). The second grid will be for 6×6 leagues (addition of Holds). The last grid will be for 5×5 and 6×6 leagues, but instead of standard ERA and WHIP, we’ll look at rankings if you were to use expected ERA (via SIERA) and adjusted (adj)WHIP through BABIP differential: I will explain below.

1) 5×5 Rankings (Wins, ERA, WHIP, SO and Saves) – actual 5×5 value in column 4; expected 5×5 value in column 5:

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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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