Three Teams That Should Try Unconventional Bullpen Strategies

A lot has been written about the role of the modern closer, and the fact that the position's usage is essentially driven by what many consider to be a flawed statistic, the save. It's been argued—and I'm not disagreeing with the premise—that the save has resulted in the unconventional scenario in which the rules governing a statistic are essentially dictating strategy for major league managers.

I'm not going to claim to be the first person to suggest a team should use their best relief pitcher in what I'll refer to as a pure fireman's role. In other words, bring him in when a high leverage situation dictates it, which more than likely will be to get the most important outs of the game, even if this occurs before the 9th inning.

Of course, the idea isn't unique to me. In fact, this was basically the Moneyball strategy Billy Beane was attempting with Chad Bradford a decade ago. What I am going to do is suggest a few teams who are in a position to employ such a strategy this year.

Let's face it. The baseball community can be pretty set in its ways about a lot of things, so there are definitely situations where this idea just isn't going to fly. For instance, it would just seem odd to me to suggest that the Yankees should remove Mariano Rivera from the closer's role, even if bringing your best relief pitcher into a more high leverage situation earlier in the game might make sense. Besides, the Yanks have a much younger guy in Rafael Soriano to potentially use in a more versatile role.

Which brings me to another point. There would seem to me to be a certain type of pitcher who is better equipped for the inconsistency of such a role. Most importantly, I think this kind of usage probably would suit a younger player, especially given the fact that he might not always have the ideal amount of time to get ready for his assignment.

So, you may be asking yourself, who do I have in mind? At least I hope you are. I'm sure there are potentially others, but there are three teams I'm focusing on here: the Toronto Blue Jays, Oakland Athletics and Cincinnati Reds.

Let's begin north of the border. The Jays closing situation is actually a little unsettled right now, as it looks as though injuries to Frank Francisco and Octavio Dotel will leave them out of action at the start of the season. But, neither should be out for long, making them ideal candidates for such a scenario.

Clearly the most talented arm in this bullpen belongs to Francisco, and it appears he would have been named the closer if not for the fact he's suffering from a sore pectoral muscle. He's posted a better than 3-to-1 K/BB ratio in each of the last three years, and his 2008 and 2009 OPS-against numbers were an impressive .634 and .639.

The only thing preventing similar results last year was bad luck, as his BABIP (batting average on balls in play) jumped from .270 and .274 in 2008 and 2009, respectively, to .321 in 2010. In fact, his FIP (fielding independent pitching), which attempts to measure what a pitcher's ERA would have been if not for factors mostly related to luck, was lower in 2010 than in both of the previous seasons.

Making this an easier decision for the Blue Jays is that they have two other relief pitchers who have been reasonably successful closers in the past. In fact, Jon Rauch, who will likely fill the role at the start of the season due to the Francisco and Dotel injuries, did a respectable job filling in for Joe Nathan with the Twins last year. He also served as the Nationals' closer for a good portion of the 2008 season.

Dotel never became the elite closer it looked like he would be when he was dominating as a setup man for Houston a decade ago. Injuries definitely had something to do with that, but when entrusted with the closer's role at various points throughout his 12-year career, he's done a solid job. So, if Rauch falters in the 9th inning role, Toronto can turn to Dotel without having to disrupt the strategy of using Francisco in the way the "fireman" was intended to be used: to put out fires.

At 31, Francisco is actually the oldest of the three relievers I'm suggesting be used in this manner. The others are Oakland's Andrew Bailey and Cincinnati's Aroldis Chapman.

Bailey's first two seasons have been nothing short of phenomenal. A 3.6 K/BB ratio and .501 OPS-against, the latter of which is better than Rivera over that time frame, pretty much speak for themselves. He's definitely the go-to guy in the Athletics' bullpen. But, they also signed Brian Fuentes in the off-season, and he's more than capable of being a solid 9th inning guy, which I think is all you really need, thus freeing up Bailey for a more strategic assignment.

Chapman might be a little more of a wild card than the other two, and of course, he has less of a track record by which to evaluate him. Plus, Francisco Cordero is already the incumbent closer. So, it won't be too difficult for the Reds to use him in the role I'm suggesting. But, there is talk that Chapman could be the team's future closer. I say his is the perfect situation to experiment with a true fireman's role.

I guess one common denominator among my suggestions is they involve teams whose second best reliever has experience as a fairly successful closer. I still think the 9th inning is important, even if sometimes the closer is handed the ball with a three-run lead, no one on base, and only three outs to get. But, I think in the three cases I've identified, another pitcher in each team's bullpen is the guy I'd go to in more crucial situations. Of course, that's not to say that situation will never be in the 9th. It's just that, it won't always be, and being more flexible with your best relief pitcher just seems to make strategic sense to me.

Big Apple Second Chances, Vegas Style

With the winter meetings in Las Vegas coming to an end this week, there's no question that the Yankees and the Mets stole the show. With each team making two key additions to address their respective areas of greatest need, they virtually assured that there will be a Subway Series in 2009. Alright, let's not get carried away here, but the two teams from New York were clearly the clubs looking for redemption, following disappointing 2008 seasons, in the "Capital of Second Chances".

The Yankees' signings of CC Sabathia and A.J. Burnett, while not necessarily the most economically sound moves, certainly have to make the rest of the league take notice. Despite missing the post-season last year with a payroll of over $2 million per victory, the Yankees still won 89 games while getting significantly less contribution from Chien-Ming Wang, Joba Chamberlain, Phil Hughes and Ian Kennedy than was expected. They will most likely get more out of Wang and Chamberlain this year, and despite the retirement of Mike Mussina, the additions of Sabathia and Burnett should easily put them back in the playoff picture.

Don't expect them to rest just yet, either. By the time they're done maneuvering, the Yankees, whether deserved or not, will be the favorite to win the AL East and, probably, the World Series. That distinction, of course, will be based on how the team looks on paper. Translating that to actual success is the thing the Yanks have had difficulty with in recent years.

Since I brought it up, we all know that making economically sound moves is not the Yankees' modus operandi. In an era where it's believed that championship contenders are built through a balance of developing good young talent and making key acquisitions of proven veteran performers, fans have become increasingly interested in whether or not their teams are spending their money wisely. That is, all except Yankees fans. Milwaukee Brewers loyalists know that, if they had signed Sabathia to a four-year, $100 million contract, and if he ended up contributing significantly less than being the hero he was last year, the team would not be able to overcome this. Even Red Sox, Mets, Angels and Dodgers fans know that their teams can ill afford to make a monumental mistake with a long-term free agent contract.

Yankees fans do not have this concern. They do not need to care whether or not Sabathia will be overpaid in the 5th, 6th and 7th years of this $161 million deal. If he is anything approaching the Sabathia of 2007 and 2008 for two or three years, he gives them a chance to climb back to the top of the heap. The Yankees have had several bad contracts on the books for quite a few years now, yet last year is the first that they fell short of the playoffs, and, even so, were still in contention for most of the year.

With a team payroll of $201 million for 2008, the Yankees spent $2.25 million per victory. Even the Mets, Tigers and Red Sox, all with payrolls in the vicinity of $138 million, would have been as bad as the Seattle Mariners, the worst team in baseball, at that rate. Yet, if the Yankees improve this "efficiency" to $2 million per, that would translate to 100 wins. Only the three aforementioned teams, plus the Chicago White Sox, would have won as many as 60 games by that calculation.

I think you get my point. The Yankees don't have to spend wisely to win. They do have to make better personnel decisions, though, and this is something that has eluded them in recent years. Will the Sabathia and Burnett signings, and whatever they do next, continue that trend, or will they finally hit the nail on the head with their major free agent acquisitions? We'll have to wait and see, but I have to say that A.J. Burnett, who just agreed to a five-year, $82.5 million deal, somehow reminds me of a cross between Kevin Brown and Kyle Farnsworth. Again, we'll have to wait and see.

The Mets still have some rotation issues to address, including their new #1 priority--the re-signing of Oliver Perez--but they could not have done a better job of shoring up their major area of weakness. The Francisco Rodriguez signing--three years, $37 million--was a no-brainer. With the Angels never making a serious attempt to re-sign him, beyond the contract extension they offered last winter, his move to Queens was a foregone conclusion. The market for closers this off-season was clearly a buyers' market, and the Mets were the club with the most purchasing power.

The Mets have had a closer of Rodriguez's caliber for the past three years, though, so would the K-Rod signing be enough to address the area that, inarguably, was the reason the Phillies were better in 2008? Apparently, they didn't think so. The Mets had setup problems last year, even before Billy Wagner went down with an injury that will keep him out through the 2009 season, so just a day removed from acquiring their new closer, they traded for J.J. Putz in a three-way deal involving the Indians and Mariners.

The Putz acquisition shows that the Mets mean business about not letting last year's downfall repeat itself. Not only does he instantly become the favorite for the best setup man in baseball, but Putz provides them with an insurance policy they wish they had last year. Well on his way to becoming one of the best closers in the American League--in fact, take a look at the 2007 numbers and try to convince me he wasn't the best--until injuries set him back last year, Putz gives the Mets a backup plan that no other team has right now.

So, while the Yankees did the most spending--and, some will say, gambling--in Vegas last week, the Mets come away the biggest winners, by playing the percentages and knowing when to double down.

When the Pilot Light is Out

Just a month removed from the Philadelphia Phillies' World Series celebration, the burner on the hot stove appears to have cooled off. All of the post-season awards have been announced, the Jake Peavy trade rumors have died down, and none of the major free agents seem to be in a hurry to find new homes. So, unless you're interested in more talk about the Mitchell report, or its spin-off, the Roger Clemens/Brian McNamee saga, then you need to look elsewhere for your winter baseball pick-me-up.

So, to help you with this, I bring you my recommendations for your off-season baseball-related reading. I'm going to break these down into a few categories, and hopefully my selections are far enough out of left field, so to speak, that they'll include a few that you might not have thought about reading otherwise.

Baseball Folk Tales

The Iowa Baseball Confederacy, by W.P. Kinsella
Often imitated but never duplicated, you really can't go wrong with W.P. Kinsella. I'm sure most everyone has heard of Kinsella's first novel and most famous work, Shoeless Joe, the book that inspired the movie Field of Dreams. But, in my opinion, his best work is his second novel. The Iowa Baseball Confederacy tells the story of Gideon Clarke, a man on a quest to prove, as his father had tried unsuccessfully before him, that the Chicago Cubs traveled to Onamata (formerly Big Inning), Iowa in 1908 for an exhibition game against the amateur all-stars from The Iowa Baseball Confederacy. Gideon is determined to set the record straight about a game that no one believes ever happened, one that was expected to be congenial and one-sided, but turned into a titanic struggle of over 2000 innings, played mostly in pouring rain over more than a month's time. Kinsella's knack for weaving fantastical tales that celebrate the spirituality of baseball, as well as life in the American midwest, is on full display here. As far as I'm concerned, there is no story that better captures the concept of baseball as a virtual fountain of youth, and celebrates its timeless nature that has the ability to make time stand still.

The Curious Case of Sidd Finch, by George Plimpton
The product of an April Fools' Day hoax perpetrated by Plimpton and Sports Illustrated, Sidd Finch was a fictional baseball player "discovered" by the New York Mets in the spring of 1985. An eccentric English-born buddhist monk, Finch has the ability to throw a baseball at the astounding rate of 168 mph, and is deciding whether to pursue a career as a major league pitcher or as a french horn player. The story is a humorous and pleasantly rambling narrative that is as wonderful as a baseball fairy tale can be.

Human Interest Autobiographies

Fear Strikes Out: The Jim Piersall Story, by Jim Piersall & Al Hirshberg
Jimmy Piersall was a promising outfielder for the Boston Red Sox in the 1950s, who is best known for his battles with bipolar disorder that resulted in a nervous breakdown during the 1952 season. Following completion of a seven-week program at Westboro State Hospital in Massachusetts, which caused him to miss most of that season, he returned in 1953 to finish 9th in American League MVP voting. This is a dramatic and heart-warming story of his courage and of the unconditional support he received from his manager, teammates, coaches, fans, and most importantly, his wife. The remainder of his career, which stretched from 1950 to 1967, and included stints with the Cleveland Indians, Washington Senators, New York Mets and Los Angeles/California Angels, was not without incident, but his autobiography provides an in-depth account of his experiences that raised public awareness of the realities of mental illness.

Behind the Mask: My Double Life in Baseball, by Dave Pallone with Alan Steinberg
To my knowledge, Dave Pallone is the only confirmed homosexual in major league baseball history. The twist to his story is that he was an umpire. Not just any umpire, though, but an umpire who landed his job in the majors when the union was on strike. He was also at the center of one of the most famous on-field conflicts in modern history, the incident that resulted in Pete Rose's 50-game suspension for shoving him. Coincidentally, Rose and Pallone were both dismissed from the game by A. Bartlett Giamatti. Pallone claims that his firing was the result of his being "outed". His autobiography is a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at his closeted life in the homophobic sports world. One caveat to potential readers is that some of his accounts may be a bit more up close and personal than necessary, but they can easily be skipped over, and otherwise, this is well worth the read.

The Business of Baseball

Fair Ball: A Fan's Case for Baseball, by Bob Costas
Following the 1999 season, Bob Costas wrote this well-organized, easy to read, but very thorough "plan" for major league baseball as it moved into the 21st century. Subjects covered include logical arguments for a revenue sharing plan, a payroll ceiling and a payroll floor, simple realignment, a revised playoff structure, the elimination of the DH and the use of instant replay. It's almost ten years since it was written, and much has changed in the game since, particularly the fact that eight teams have won the subsequent nine World Series, but concerns about competitive balance are still a sleeping giant. Much of what Costas advocated for still makes sense, although may be in need of a slight revision to be practical. More importantly, though, at less than 200 pages, with typeset that resembles a children's book, it doesn't require much of a time investment, and it remains a very interesting read.

Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis
Billy Beane certainly wasn't the first baseball executive to incorporate statistical analysis into personnel decisions, but his philosophies regarding under-valued skills are still considered somewhat revolutionary. This is easily the most mainstream of my recommendations here, but all I have to say is if you haven't read it yet, what are you waiting for?

Parting Ways

Three somewhat surprising baseball breakups occurred over the past two days. One has a slight chance for reconciliation, so we'll call that a separation. The other two, however, are clearly divorces, although one is clearly more amicable than the other.

Randy Johnson and the Arizona Diamondbacks failed to reach a contract agreement, so Johnson filed for free agency on Thursday. While it's possible the two sides could work things out, it doesn't look likely. Diamondbacks General Manager Josh Byrnes said he would not rule out signing Johnson, but added "something would fundamentally have to change in our position or their position or both."

The Chicago Cubs traded minor league pitcher Jose Ceda, to the Florida Marlins, for Kevin Gregg, effectively ending Kerry Wood's tenure with the club. With the emergence of Carlos Marmol, and the acquisition of Gregg, the Cubs decided that they'll spend their resources elsewhere, rather than to try to retain Wood's services. Wood indicated that he was disappointed, and that his departure from his former club is "bittersweet", but seems to harbor no ill-will towards the team for its decision.

Trevor Hoffman, on the other hand, was shown the door in rather unceremonious fashion by the San Diego Padres, with whom he has spent almost the entirety of his record-setting 16-year career. San Diego rescinded their rather modest one-year, $4 million contract offer on Thursday, and Hoffman's agent said the impression the Padres' front office gave them was that it was a take-it-or-leave-it proposal. Then, to add insult to injury, they ignored his efforts to try to negotiate and informed him by fax that they were withdrawing their offer.

Hoffman will play elsewhere this year, hopefully for a contender who will give him one more legitimate shot at some post-season glory. The Padres will have a difficult time not finishing in last place for the second straight year. For more on the MLB hot stove, check out my latest post over on Casey's Clipboard.

Casey's Clipboard & Wally's World

Yesterday, the first installment of a new series I'm writing appeared on Casey's Clipboard & Wally's World. It's called Cooking with Chas: A Weekly Look at What's on the MLB Hot Stove, and it will be a regular Friday morning feature for the next few months. As the title suggests, I'll be discussing the major topics of the Major League Baseball off-season, what is commonly referred to as the Hot Stove League.

A little explanation as to where the Chas moniker came from is in order. My friend Smitty moved back to his native Rochester a little over a year ago, abandoning our undefeated fall co-ed softball team in the process. We lost in the finals, and continue to come up short in the quest to duplicate our Summer 2005 championship, despite several regular season first-place finishes. But, that has little to do with this story.

Shortly after Smitty returned home, he sent me a link to a blog that his uncle (Casey) had started recently, and encouraged me to check it out. I did, but I laid low for a little while, then decided to start commenting somewhat mysteriously. As you know, Charles Simone is my writing pseudonym. Charles is my middle name, and it's also my father's name. As a child, I recall my dad sometimes abbreviating his name as Chas in cards and notes he had written, so I decided to start leaving comments on the site as Chas.

I succeeded in my quest to be somewhat mysterious, as I learned later that there was some discussion between Smitty and Casey about who I was. Casey, as the site's administrator, was able to determine from his usage statistics that the comments were coming from the Boston area, so they surmised that I was a friend of Smitty's. But, since he had promoted the site to several people, he didn't know specifically who I was. Slowly, I revealed my identity through a series of hints, and have continued to be a regular commenter on the site since.

Casey and I developed a rapport through his blog, and eventually he started reading my blog as well. I now have Casey to thank for diverting some attention to Left Field, as both he and Rey--who writes an excellent weekly column about English football on the Clipboard called On the Pitch with an American Novice--have become fairly regular commenters here.

So, when Casey asked me to write a weekly column on the baseball hot stove league, it only made sense for me to continue to embrace the nickname that I don't particularly like, but for which I have no one but myself to blame. However, when I came up with the cleverly cheesy title Cooking with Chas, I started to appreciate the name a little more.

If you're interested, head on over to Casey's Clipboard and check out my first column. I'm hoping to generate some discussion there by incorporating the interests of the commenters into my future columns, so please feel free to become a part of that.

I just don't get it...

$51 million just for the rights to negotiate with a player who probably won't be willing to sign for more than three years because he'll want to hit the free agent market while he's still young? I just can't seem to figure out how this could be a good deal.

I understand the value of keeping him away from the Yankees (and don't confuse my confusion with sour grapes), but let's do the math. If the Red Sox sign Daisuke Matsuzaka, the Japanese phenom, to a three-year deal, they'll already be paying $17 million per year to his former team. He gets none of this, so even if they pay him "only" $8 million per year, that's a total of $25 million.

Johan Santana, inarguably the best pitcher in baseball, makes $10 million per year. How can this guy be worth 2 1/2 times what Santana is worth? I realize Santana signed his extension two years ago, after his first Cy Young (he wins his second tomorrow), and, of course, the market has changed since then, but I still don't understand this move. If they can get him to sign for four years, then maybe they can offer him as much as $10 million per, but if the guy truly is worth this much then this reinforces the fact that he won't sign for more than three years.

Of course, the Red Sox don't have to pay the money if they don't sign him, but I've read that they have to negotiate in good faith or else they'll do major damage to MLB's relationship with the Japanese leagues. My theory is that they're going to offer him more money per year the longer the contract he signs...something like $6 million per for three years, $10 million for four, $12 million for five. In each of these scenarios they're still paying him in the $22-$23 million per year range.

Or, maybe they're counting on the fact that Scott Boras is such a difficult agent to deal with, and they plan on playing hardball and hoping that whatever their final offer is, it doesn't get accepted. Then, they don't have to be on the hook for an "out of this world" salary, and they can rest easy knowing that the Yankees didn't get him either.