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Where Did The Playoff Teams Get Their Best Relievers?

reedThere’s a lot of talk about what the Mets should or shouldn’t be doing this offseason. Relievers are a popular request. That makes sense as no team ever has enough relievers and with a possible suspension to Familia, the Mets could certainly benefit from another quality arm or two.

Still, it’s January and relievers are volatile. The top relievers from one year are sometimes complete unknowns the year before, and guys fall off cliffs fast. Relievers get so few innings that sometimes the stats can be misleading as the samples size is small. We’ve all seen the Mets give significant deals to relievers only to have them be sub-par, whereas random minor league deals turn out big dividends.

So, where did last year’s playoff teams get their best relievers, by fWAR? All these teams, which include the Mets, were in the position the Mets are in right now–trying to find the final pieces for a championship. So did they go out and sign high price relievers, promote from within, make trades, 3D print them or get them from Earth 2?

Mets
Addison Reed was their best reliever.
Acquired August 30th, 2015 for Miller Diaz (minors) and Matt Koch.

Do you remember Diaz or Koch? Have you heard about them since? Probably not. This was the stretch run pick up for 2015 that worked out, and the Mets kept him around.

Jeurys Familia was the second-best reliever, and he was drafted by the Mets as a starter and converted.

Cubs
Aroldis Chapman
Trade with Yankees on July 27th.

Their best reliever was literally only on the team two months.

Pedro Strop
Came over in the Arrieta deal from Cleveland in July 2013.

Strop was a nice reliever they’ve had for years who really flourished in Chicago.

Indians
Dan Otero
They got Otero last offseason, on December 18th, for cash from the Phillies. He was an under-control guy not yet in arbitration.

Otero pitched great for them but there is no way they were counting on that. They took a flyer on a guy and it worked.

Andrew Miller
2016 deadline trade with the Yankees.

Another guy that put up great numbers in two months.

Cody Allen
He was drafted by the Indians in 2011.

Allen was a little off in 2016, giving up a lot more home runs than usual, but was still reliable.

Red Sox
Craig Kimbrel
They grabbed Kimbrel last offseason, 11/31/2015, from the Padres.

Kimbrel had a sizable contract through 2017 with a 2018 option so this fits the ‘pay for a big name’ model, and the Red Sox gave up quite a few prospects for this as well. Kimbrel was still very good, but his ERA rose, as did his walk rate. His ground ball percentage dropped. Was it worth the expense? Hard to say.

Brad Ziegler
7/9/2016 trade with Arizona.
Over the full season, Ziegler was better than Kimbrel. The Red Sox used him and let him walk in free agency, where he went to Miami.

Blue Jays
Roberto Osuna
Signed as 16 year old in 2011.

Basically a prospect they brought up through their system.

Joe Biagini
Rule 5 pick from Giants last offseason.
Biagini was mostly an unexceptional AA guy the previous year but the Blue Jays must have saw something they could work with. They got good value from him despite a sub-par strikeout rate.

Joaquin Benoit
7/26/16 trade with Mariners.
Benoit was garbage with Seattle and the Blue Jays got him for Drew Storen, who was garbage with the Blue Jays. Storen pitched alright with the Mariners, but Benoit was amazing for the Jays before getting hurt just before the playoffs. He pitched 23.2 innings and allowed one run. One. Benoit has been a good reliever for a while, but he did turn 39 on the day of this trade so it’s easy to see where he might just have been done, instead he was key in getting the Blue Jays to the postseason. The Phillies signed him for a one year and nearly eight million after the season.

Orioles
Zach Britton
Drafted 2006

Britton had an absurdly good year, and should get into that Wild Card game any moment now.

Brad Brach
11/25/2013 trade with the Padres.

Brach is a pre-Free Agent. He was pretty good in previous years but really stepped up last year.

Rangers
Matt Bush
Signed to Minor league deal on 12/18/2015
Bush is a unique case as personal issues and jail time kept him away from the game after being drafted in 2004. The Rangers gave him a chance, and he started in the minors, succeeded, and was promoted.

Sam Dyson
7/31/2015 with Marlins
2015 deadline deal and 2016 closer for the Rangers. 2017 is his first arbitration year.

Giants
Derek Law
Drafted 2011
Major League debut in 2016, and he pitched well.

Hunter Strickland
Signed off waivers from Pirates in April 2013
Giants grabbed Strickland in 2013 after the Pirates gave up on the 24 year old in AA, sent him down a level, and managed to turn him into a useful pitcher.

Dodgers
Kenley Jansen
Drafted 2004
Jansen has been a solid Dodgers reliever for years. They just re-signed him to a long 5/$80 deal with an opt-out.

Joe Blanton
1/19/16 for 4mm off first year of relief.
Back end rotation guy turned reliever with the Royals and Pirates in 2015 got a $4 million dollar deal with the Dodgers and pitched pretty well as he now strikes out a lot more batters. He remains unsigned for 2017.

Adam Liberatore
11/20/2014 trade with Rays
Came over with Joel Peralta. Wasn’t great in 2015 but improved for 2016. Had surgery this offseason but he’s still pre-arb.

Nationals
Shawn Kelley
3 year deal signed on 12/11/2015
Kelley’s one of the few free agent signings on this list. He’s on a relatively inexpensive 3/$15 deal that has already paid off through a successful 2016 with the Nats. He had a career high K/9 rate as well as a career low BB/9, though hitting the zone that much seems to have led to a few more home runs.

Mark Melancon
7/30/16 trade with Pirates
Melancon pitched really well for the Nationals down the stretch and then left for the Giants and a 4/$62 deal.

How about previous Mets teams?

2014-2015 Jeurys Familia – Drafted
2014 Mejia – Drafted
2013 Parnell – Drafted
2013- Latroy Hawkins – 1/31/2013 minor league deal
2006 – Wagner – FA, Heilman – drafted, Bradford – FA.

Perusing this list leads to the conclusion that it’s hard to determine who your best reliever is going to be in an upcoming season. Many teams acquired a great reliever sometime between the end of the last season and the trade deadline, but it was rarely a heralded free agent.

It seem just as likely that you’ll find a quality reliever as a throw-in for a trade, as a flyer on the waiver wire, or simply in your own minor league system. It could be a minor league free agent that you had no real expectations of. Additionally, plenty of the major league free agent relievers signed did not end up pitching in the playoffs or even pitch that well. Antonio Bastardo, Joakim Soria, Tony Sipp, Tyler Clippard to name a few.

So there’s every chance that the Mets minor league signings of Ben Rowen and Cory Burns could pay dividends. We certainly shouldn’t dismiss them out of hand. Sandy Alderson has been pretty active over the playoff seasons with moving smaller pieces around and I wouldn’t be surprised to see a few more relievers show up by the time the season really gets going. Or maybe the Mets starters all stay healthy and someone like Wheeler or Lugo gets some quality time in as a reliever.

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Things Sure Are Different

The Mets lost on Opening Day for the first time in years yesterday.  This seems like the first sign that things are different this year.

 

Really, it’s just one game.  One game doesn’t mean anything in the grand scheme of a season.  There were plenty of good signs.

 

Emaus, in the middle of a rally in his Major League debut, worked the count and drew a walk to bring the tying run to the plate.

 

The Mets offense, the second Josh Johnson got a little tired, jumped all over him.

 

Carlos Beltran looked fine in right field, better than some of the Marlins looked defensively at positions they’d played for years.

 

Watching the disaster that the Astros closer was yesterday makes me happy that the Mets look to have a good bullpen, particularly one of the best relievers in the game.

 

This team had a lot of turnover from last year, and a new managing core.  It might take them some time to get their legs under them.  It may take a little while before they learned all their own strengths and weaknesses, and how they work best together.  Reyes and Emaus haven’t worked together up the middle that long.   Pitchers are still building up arm strength, and the bullpen will settle into more defined roles as they get some innings in.

 

Okay, time to fry some fish.  Still plenty of opportunity to win this series.

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RyanHoward-Rod

I like my title, shame you won’t see that on the back pages of the Post.

K-Rod.

Pretty much the best closer in the game. At least arguably. Definitely the bets Free Agent relief pitcher on the market, and as much as I’m reluctant to always try to ‘buy’ the best team, this was the right move. I’m not nearly as excited about it as I was Santana, but I’m fully of the mind that if Wagner doesn’t get hurt, the Mets win the division, and probably the Phillies don’t win the Series.

Omar filled the biggest hole with the biggest plug. We still need a a bunch of relievers, but I don’t think they need to be big name guys. Pull in a bunch of guys from the minors, waivers, other teams, rule-5, wherever, and see who can thrive in this system with these coaches and players.

The last two starters should be the next priority. I wouldn’t be against Pedro/Ollie. Not both, but one of them. Perez is probably the better option, but his consistency is infuriating and overly taxing on the bullpen’s piece of mind. I don’t trust Niese to step in and be a reliable 5th starter. I think they should assume he’ll be the guy that’ll get called up when they need a 6th, or a fill in guy when someone needs to skip a start. I’m not overly concerned with who it is, but It’d be nice to have another big innings guys so the bullpens innings can be kept down.

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A Perez Idea

An Idea

This is just an idea I had yesterday while watching the game. Oliver Perez was obviously struggling, again, late in the game. I don’t really have a problem with Willie pulling him, although I would’ve left him in, but something needs to be done with this guy. I was thinking about this in the 5th, and here’s what I would’ve liked to see.

Just leave him in.

Let him give up 15 runs. Go to the mound, tell him Heilman and Sosa are sitting back and having a soda and he’s finishing six innings no matter what happens. Perez has strived in pressure situations right? So take away the ‘safety net’ so to speak. Let him learn something about himself, and figure out how to get himself out of these situations, because it’s an important lesson a good pitcher needs to learn.

Would this be an irreparable blow to his confidence if he did give up 15 runs? I don’t really buy into that irreparable stuff anyway, but Perez has already had those in Pittsburgh before coming to the Mets and he managed to bounce back. We know he has great stuff, the problem is it’s a coin flip on whether he’ll be able to throw those great pitches. What will make him take that step to a great pitcher is being able to climb back to that peak after he’s fallen out of stride during a game/inning/batter.

With Santana, Willie can prepare to use the best guys out of the bullpen and mentally prepare for which guys are going to come in that day, because Santana will pitch to within an inning or so of expectation nine out of ten times. Even John Maine usually can be expected to be pretty consistent, even if that consistency is a lower amount of reliable innings. However, with Perez there is still always that possibility that he walks 14 batters in the second inning and you need to piece together the rest of the game. If Willie leaves Perez in there last night, maybe he learns something. Or maybe we lose the game, which we did anyway, and the bullpen gets an extra inning of rest that it might need for tonight.

Getting Perez and most of the starters an extra inning or two I think could be the biggest key to this season. It would allow Willie to use his relievers that are struggling less, and able to go with the hot guys. It doesn’t matter what bullpen you have, if you have to use too many pitchers in one game, likely someone won’t be on his game that day.

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I Trust Omar Minaya

“To me, it’s about quality. It’s not so much getting a guy. We will not be afraid to give our young kids a chance to pitch instead of going out there and paying a lot of money for a guy who gives a lot of innings – but they’re not quality innings. There’s a lot of demand for those guys. I’ve gotten a lot of hits on our young guys.”

This quote from Omar Minaya means a lot to me. Despite some issues I’ve had with him and some of his decisions, I’m actually pretty comfortable with him as a GM. I’m not afraid of starting the season the way the Mets are now. Pedro, El Duque, Maine, Perez, Pelfrey is fine to me. I think Pelfrey continued to grow last season, and his September was good. I think he’s a good player with confidence being one of his bigger issues last year. Maine, in my opinion, is excellent, and I’d actually lean towards him as being the 2nd starter, as little as those designations really mean anything. It’s not even so much talent, as it is that El Duque’s not going to pitch 33 starts next year, he never does. Maine could, so it makes sense to designate more starts to him before the season, as he’s more likely to meet the expectations.

Billy Wagner, among others, questions the replacement of Tom “I wouldn’t call it devasting” Glavine’s win total from last year. Number one, I don’t think Glavine is the one that’s going to match that total anyway, and number two, I think Pedro is capable of that. Even being babied, he showed me a lot last year near the end of the season, and I really feel he has a lot left. If I could put money on Pedro having a better season than Glavine, I would.

So do we need that Livan Hernandez type guy, who would be able to pitch a good amount of innings to relieve our bullpen? I still think so, but I’m not sold on overpaying these guys either. I think it can be done with what we have.

On another note of confidence in Omar Minaya, has anyone noticed how many second-hand pitchers he’s signed? He’s gotten a bunch of guys who have fallen out of favor, for almost nothing. Maybe we find that diamond in the rough with one of them, or maybe one of them really gels with how Peterson teaches. If not, it’s so easy to cut them loose, you may not even remember they were Mets.

Still over two months until spring training…

P.S. Would it kill the Mets to actually market and make John Maine and Oliver Perez Jersey’s? I want a Maine Jersey, but it requires actually getting a custom one made with 33 and Maine on the back, unless someone has seen one somewhere? I certainly haven’t.

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a sigh of relief?

Resounding weekend. I left work Friday with the magic number at 9. I arrive at work today and it’s at 5. Three Mets wins, and even though it doesn’t feel like a winning streak, it still is. It is said that good teams find a way to win, and nothing defines that than a bottom of the 11th featuring Aaron Sele, and Scott Schoeneweis for the save and the third consecutive win, on a day when the Phillies had lost. Delgado has his power stroke, which is the most important part of his game, Wright has another game-winning RBI, Alou is still hitting everything, and somehow, the bullpen’s gotten some outs.

Plenty to worry about still, but hopefully they can get these 5 games out of the way, and be able to rest bullpen and injuries the final weekend.

As for the Phillies…I was in Washington DC this weekend to see the final two games of RFK Stadium, against the Phillies. The Nationals are really a bad team, and Saturday was at best 50/50 Nats fans to Phillies fans. Predictably, once the Phillies scored three in the top of the 10th, most of the Nationals fans left. Me and my friend decided to make our way towards the right field part of the stadium to be closer to the stairs we needed to exit from. As we walked around the stadium, each section noticed our Mets stuff, and took the opportunity to yell and boo us. It’s an interesting feeling listening to most of the upper deck of a stadium booing you, It was like a wave of boos as we walked around. Of course I got in my “First place!”, and “Better luck next year!” yells in, as well as pointing at the Mets score on the out of town scoreboard. Oddly, I didn’t hear anything from the Phillies fans on Sunday.

Let’s see the Mets come out swinging tonight, picking up that extra half game with the Phillies off, and go into the final 6 games with a decent lead.

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Down the Stretch

I wrote an article recently about a team’s transfer from old stadium to new ballpark. In it I mention the Home Run Apple. I’ve heard of a campaign to move the actual apple from Shea to Citi, and I thought about it a bit, and I don’t quite agree.

Recently brought to my attention was a campaign to keep the home run apple when the Mets move to Citi Field. Whenever a Mets player hits a home run at home a red apple rises out of a black top hat, lit up to display the Mets logo on the front. I’ve been talking about this for a while, but I don’t want the old apple at the new Shea. I want a new apple, a fresh apple, and most importantly, a real apple. An apple with the newness of Citi Field. A digital apple would just be a disgrace.

John Maine just looks tired, as I watch this second game of the Pirates series. He’s struggled through five innings, and I imagine he’s done. With the Mets up 5-3, at least he has a shot at a win. This would be game three in a row, on the way to trying to finally top their season-high four game winning streak. Hopefully the Mets can find a way to get a little more of a lead in the division, allow them to rest Maine and Perez, rather than risk burning them out.

They need to address the bullpen a little too, and I’m afraid big contracts in the likes of Mota and Schoeneweis will prevent them from figuring out what would be best. They’ve got a guy or two down in the minors like Willie Collazo who I wouldn’t mind seeing. Joe Smith has only thrown five innings since going down; it might be time to bring him back up too. Jorge Sosa has pitched well out of the bullpen, maybe that’s a gem that we can count on where we weren’t expecting it.

Pedro threw his second rehab outing, did well, felt good, and continued on his path towards returning. It seems likely that he’ll be back in a couple of weeks, and maybe can provide that spark and energy that’s been so lacking so far. It’s going to be a fun night when he returns, and it’ll also be the night he gets 3000 strikeouts.

The Mets have just over six weeks remaining, and hopefully they can put behind this so-so season by coming on strong and playing like the playoff team they almost certainly will be.

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Smith, Delgado, Pelfrey and the trading deadline

At first I was a little upset that Joe Smith got sent down. I know he’s been struggling as of late, but I still think he’s a good pitcher. I’ve gotten over it though, and I hope he can work on some adjustments down in AAA that will aid the Mets down the stretch. I feel the Mets need a reliever and contract situations make that tough, so if Joe Smith could be a solid playoff contributor, it would go a long way.

The trading deadline is approaching, and while I feel like we need a move, I’m not quite sure exactly what it should be. There are a lot of underachieving parts on this team, and it’s a tough spot to figure out which parts are going to come around, and which could use a backup or replacement. Should we get a decent reserve infielder that can spot Delgado at times? Do we need another decent outfield bat? Another reliever? I don’t relish Omar Minaya’s job this year, he’s got a lot of tough choices. I have faith in him though, based on what he’s done so far.

Mike Pelfrey is getting the start tonight, a game in which I’ll be in attendance. I have a strange feeling he’ll be good. He managed to pitch himself onto this team in the spring against expectation, and he is in that situation again tonight. With Sosa no longer exceeding expectation, I feel like Pelfrey could steal his spot with a gem tonight. Hopefully he’ll only be keeping it warm for Pedro, but until Pedro’s throw a game or two, It’s hard to talk about him.

Carlos Delgado is hitting .333 this July. He’s got a .394 OBP this month. Hopefully this is a turning point for him. Whatever the struggles were early, he’s looking like he might start turning it around for real. If he plays well the rest of the way, I don’t care what happened early this year. Maybe he just struggled to get into his groove, but we’re in first place, and if he keeps playing well, it’ll stay that way.

This team isn’t playing great, but that doesn’t mean they can’t. Almost everybody is having a poor season, and that just means that they all are capable of playing better. Better than four games up in the division is a good thing, and I expect that at least some of the underachievers will step it up down the stretch and in the playoffs. It’s going to be a successful year, I can feel it.

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Bullpen Exhaustion, Aaron Heilman and the Mets Classics

Tonight was a bad game, mainly because you can deal with one night when the offense struggles, but two nights starts to make a bad habit of things. At least the Mets are going on the road to three great hitters ballparks. The other issue is bullpen fatigue.

I think Schoeneweis was the right move in that situation. I think he sucks, and I wish he wasn’t on the team anymore, but given that he is on the team, and you can’t not use guys on the team, it was probably the right move. The problem now becomes fatigue. Two extra inning games have started to tax the bullpen. Willie’s kept his starters in longer than I think he would have probably would have any other time, to help save the bullpen for a taxing weekend in Philadelphia. The only other option I see for that inning is Aaron Sele, and I wonder if they’re entertaining the idea of him starting one of Friday’s games, and holding him back. Aaron Sele however hasn’t exactly been an excellent reliever anyway.

I think the Mets need to make some changes. I know it’s tough to find bullpen help, and I think Omar is working on it, but it can’t happen overnight. Maybe we traded away too many relief prospects in the spring this year. I think it’s drawing to a time where you have to do something with Schoeneweis. I doubt he can be optioned down to New Orleans, and from all accounts putting him on the disabled list isn’t going to heal his tendon, if it’s even the tendon that’s making him suck. I want to see some of these relievers that are down in AAA, if we can somehow get them up here on the roster. The Zephyrs have a couple of guys that might be decent. Willie Collazo has a 2.75 ERA, Steve Schmoll has a 3.18 ERA, and even Jon Adkins’ ERA is 3.68. Now, I saw some of Adkins in spring training, but I really don’t know anything about these guys, but in my mind they can’t pitch worse than Schoeneweis, or even Aaron Sele, who I think at least has options.

I’m kind of amused that Aaron Heilman has six wins and leagues the majors in relief wins. He has as many as the rest of the Mets relievers combined. He wants to be a starter, but it’s arguable that he’d actually have less wins if he was in the rotation. It’s probably just a statistical quirk, but I find it amusing.

The Mets NLDS win over the Dodgers is going to be played on Mets Classics on SNY. I watched one of these games a couple of weeks ago, and it was fun to watch, except for one thing. Especially as a replay, the ESPN and Fox announcers really take some of the juice out of watching these games. Part of the charm is having the guys that we know and have been doing the games all year, continue into the playoffs. I wonder if it’s possible to mute these games, and splice in the audio stream from the radio broadcast. I’d much rather listen to Tom, Howie and Gary’s radio broadcast while watching these replays.