The Relief Brief: Friday, July 22nd

by Collin Campbell (collinman005@gmail.com) Last Updated 2016-07-23 03:01:11

Somewhere around 35% of at bats come against a team’s bullpen. Most DFSers, however, pay attention only to the matchup an offense has with starting pitchers.

In order to give RotoGrinders readers an edge on the field, we have developed a Bullpen Pitching article that focuses on bullpen usage and skill, as well as the elements that may come into play on that day in terms of the bullpen pitchers an offense is likeliest to see. Although we developed this article as part of our Premium Content Package, we decided to make this article free to all readers for the remainder of the 2016 MLB season!

This article will feature three main topics.

1. Bullpen Highlights

— Bad SP combined with bad/tired bullpen
— Bad SP combined with elite bullpen
— Elite SP combined with bad/tired bullpen

2. Bullpen Personnel Movement

— Call-ups & Expectations
— Other Roster Movement (ie Clay Buchholz moving to bullpen)

3. Other Notes and insights that I find along the way.

Feel free to comment with any other ideas for this article that you would find useful in your own daily research.

Friday night features a full 15 game slate. While I won’t break down all 30 bullpen situations, we will begin with the highlights as described above. Let’s get to it!

Pitch1 = Pitches thrown one day ago
Pitch2 = Pitches thrown two days ago
Pitch3 = Pitches thrown three days ago

1. Bullpen Highlights

Madison Bumgarner faces off against the Yankees tonight in New York. Here we have a case of an elite pitcher with an average to sub average bullpen. The Giants did have a beneficial day off yesterday, but they may be in a situation where their bullpen will be getting two days off. The last time that Bumgarner threw fewer than six innings was April 15th, in his third start of the season. This man defines the term “workhorse” when it comes to starting pitching. While the environment in Yankee Stadium is not pitcher friendly, the Yankees as a team have the fourth lowest wOBA vs LHP on the season.

Masahiro Tanaka gets the start against MadBum and the Giants tonight. Make no mistake, Tanaka is the ace of this staff and he is a workhorse in his own right. In fact, Tanaka has gone for at least six innings in ten of his last 11 starts. I love watching aces face off against each other, as it often brings out the very best in each. This game should feature very few runs, and very good pitching. The Yankees will be hoping for another six inning outing from Tanaka, and if he provides six innings and has a lead, we’ll see the late inning magic of DMC (Dellin, Miller, Chapman).

Dylan Bundy gets the call against Cleveland tonight. This is a situation to pay attention to. Hey! Pay attention to this, ok? Dylan Bundy is not a starting pitcher. In AA this season, Bundy started eight games. Guess how many innings he threw in all eight starts combined. He threw 22 innings. I’m no mathematician, but I’m pretty sure that 22 innings over eight starts averages out to less than three innings per start. In his one start in the majors this season, he lasted just over three innings while giving up four runs and three dongs. If you’ve been reading this article since Wendesday, you know that the Orioles bullpen actually isn’t that good. Zach Britton is great, the rest of the ‘pen is not. Expect the Indians offense to see a vast majority of bullpen from Baltimore tonight.

James Paxton finds himself in a less than ideal situation tonight, facing off against the Blue Jays. While Toronto isn’t crushing LHP like they did last season, they’re still a very above average offense. Paxton has been a fairly reliable source of innings this season, though his underlying numbers are not encouraging. Should the Blue Jays force his pitch count up and strike for some runs (which I would anticipate), it leaves us in an interesting conundrum – the Mariners bullpen has the third best SIERA, the second best strikeout rate (27%, which trails only the Yankees), but is also prone to giving up the long ball (sixth worst HR/9). I anticipate somewhere around five difficult innings of work for Paxton, and a healthy dose of the ‘pen. This leaves Toronto in a boom or bust position where we will certainly see some K’s, but we could very well see some late inning fireworks from Josh Dongaldson (not a typo) and co.

Kyle Gibson gets the unfortunate task of taking on the Red Sox in Boston. I’m not going to dive in too deep here. Gibson isn’t a terrible pitcher, but he’s a far cry from elite. He is another ground-ball pitcher (like poor Tyler Duffey last night) with a low strikeout rate – the type of pitcher that the Red Sox offense feasts upon. Combine that with the fact that the Twins bullpen threw three of their best arms for over 20 pitches each last night, and this could be a massive blow-up spot. I’d advise taking a Boston bat or two, at least for cash games.

Brandon McCarthy gets his fourth start of the season tonight as he take on the Cardinals. While McCarthy isn’t a bad pitcher, he’s in a tricky spot tonight. Kenley Jansen has thrown in two of the last three days, including 21 pitches yesterday. Joe Blanton threw 32 pitches yesterday. Louis Coleman has thrown double digit pitches in back-to-back days. J.P. Howell and Luis Avilan have also thrown on consecutive days. Adam Liberatore has thrown double digit pitches in two of the last three days! That is arguably the six most reliable arms in the Dodger bullpen that will be anywhere from unavailable to fatigued. We may very well see some Carlos Frias tonight should McCarthy need long relief. Either way, this is an intriguing spot to target some Cardinals bats against a mediocre starting pitcher and a very fatigued bullpen.

Luis Perdomo started the season coming out of the bullpen, but has been called upon to start since early June. Tonight, he faces off against the Nationals. Since he began starting back in June, Perdomo has been hovering around five to six innings per start. He’s shown heavy ground-ball tendencies, but has been giving up a ton of hard contact to lefties (41.5%). Meanwhile, the Padres bullpen has a bottom ten SIERA. Meanwhile, the Padres best lefty out of the ‘pen (Ryan Buchter) has thrown over 20 pitches in each of the last two days. That leaves Brad Hand and a badly struggling Matt Thornton as the only lefties in the ‘pen.

Last time out, Yu Darvish dazzled against the Cubs in his first start in over a month. He racked up nine strikeouts and allowed two runs against a potent offense. That sounds good doesn’t it? In reality, Darvish lasted only four and a third innings, in which he walked four Cubs and ended up throwing 90 pitches. As we have documented, the Rangers bullpen is horrendous. The natural thing that many DFS players will do is completely fade the Royals offense because they see Darvish as the SP. While the Royals will face a tough starter, if Darvish struggles with his control again, the Royals may see a healthy dose of the worst bullpen in the AL, and that is worth your consideration.

In his previous start, Julio Teheran went seven strong against the Rockies, while allowing three hits, zero runs and striking out five. That’s all that needs to be said, right? Probably not. Tonight, Teheran pitches in Coors Field, not the friendly confines of Turner Field. In reality, Teheran has been solid lately. He has seven straight starts of at least six innings, including five starts of seven innings or more during that seven game span. I could see Teheran tossing a quality start here, but if he doesn’t, he will hand it over to his bullpen, who own the seventh worst SIERA in baseball. (More on this in Other Notes and Insights…).

Jon Gray faced the Braves in his previous spot as well. His stat line looked like this – seven innings, five hits, zero runs, three walks, eight K’s. Again, Turner Field is not Coors Field. Gray has actually pitched admirably in his home ballpark this season, and he has done so by inducing a healthy amount of ground-balls. In his last five starts in Coors Field, Gray has gone at least six innings. During that five game stretch of home starts, he has only allowed more that two earned runs once (against Toronto). The Rockies bullpen could use more rest after a taxing series against Tampa Bay (Motte, Logan and Ottavino threw yesterday as well), and I would not be surprised to see Gray deliver a strong start tonight, even in such a volatile environment.

Sean Manaea starts against the Tampa Bay Rays tonight. In his last five starts, Manaea has exceeded six innings only once. Meanwhile, the Tampa Bay Rays own the fifth best wOBA against LHP on the season. The Athletics bullpen is right around league average in most statistical categories, but they have seen a lot of work lately and have had several roster shuffles (more details below) among relief pitchers as well. This bullpen may very well be a bit out of sorts tonight, putting the Rays in play even more.

2. Bullpen Personnel Movement

Buddy Boshers was recalled by the Twins. Boshers is a lefty who pitched well earlier in the season. He should provide Minnesota with middle relief.

The Boston Red Sox sent Noe Ramirez back to AAA in order to make room for Junichi Tazawa. Tazawa will be a decent boost to a bullpen that has been ravaged by injury of late.

Oakland sent Patrick Schuster back to AAA and called Zach Neal up to take his place. Schuster ate up some innings for the A’s on Wednesday, but was hit hard. Neal may not have a lot more success, as his numbers are not encouraging. At the very least, Neal will provide a fresh arm.

3. Other Notes and insights that I find along the way.

While the Atlanta Braves bullpen does have the seventh worst SIERA in the league, they have the third best HR/9 rate in the league. This undoubtedly has to do with Turner Field having the second lowest HR ballpark factor in baseball.

Coors Field has the fifth highest HR ballpark factor in baseball.

Clay Buchholz pitched a scoreless ninth inning last night for the Red Sox. The Red Sox happened to have an eleven run lead at the time.

Thanks for reading, and keep the feedback coming!

Feel free to follow me and ask me questions on Twitter – @collinman005

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