It’s a post on everyone’s favorite topic: The Bullpen!
I’ve ranked our relievers by pLI — a player’s average leverage index for all game events — and I’ve included FIP as well. FIP stands for ‘Fielding Independent Pitching’ and it’s a measure that removes fielding — hence the Fielding Independent part of FIP — and only measures what the pitcher is responsible for. It’s useful in seeing how well a pitcher is pitching, regardless of what kind of defense is playing behind him. Just think of FIP as an ERA, because it’s scaled in the same way that ERA is.
If you’re unfamiliar with the concept of leverage, just think about it as what kind of game situation a reliever appears in. The tougher the situation — more men on base — the higher the leverage. BP has a nice definition of leverage which I’ll quote:
Leverage measures how important the situations a reliever has been used in are. A leverage of 1.00 is the same importance as the start of a game. Leverage values below one represent situations that are less important than the start of a game (such as mopup innings in a blowout). Leverage values above one represent situations with more importance (such as a closer protecting a one-run lead with bases loaded in the 9th inning).
So, coming into the bottom of the 9th with the bases loaded and no outs is a high leveraged situation. The idea seems simple: Use your best relievers in the highest leveraged situations and use your lesser relievers in lower leveraged and mop-up situations.
Let’s check out our numbers and see how the bullpen is getting used.
Note: Ignore the Lincecum numbers, they are from the appearance he made out of the bullpen earlier in the year in L.A.
| Name | pLI | FIP |
| Brian Wilson | 2.33 | 3.42 |
| Tim Lincecum | 2.24 | 4.07 |
| Tyler Walker | 1.74 | 4.71 |
| Merkin Valdez | 1.17 | 4.65 |
| Jack Taschner | 1.17 | 4.48 |
| Keiichi Yabu | 0.84 | 4.11 |
| Vinnie Chulk | 0.82 | 5.47 |
| Billy Sadler | 0.78 | 6.04 |
| Alex Hinshaw | 0.72 | 3.9 |
| Sergio Romo | 0.68 | 4.6 |
| Brad Hennessey | 0.67 | 4.51 |
| Osiris Matos | 0.61 | 4.87 |
| Erick Threets | 0.55 | 6.77 |
| Geno Espinelli | 0.19 | 7.45 |
| Pat Misch | 0.04 | 4.44 |
| Kevin Correia | 0.03 | 11.32 |
Some thoughts on the numbers:
~ Brian Wilson has really worked in some hairy situations this year. He’s the Giants highest leveraged reliever by far, he’s the only reliever with a leverage index of 2.0 or greater. He also has the best FIP out of our bullpen members at 3.42. That’s good usage. I still wish Bochy would think “outside of the skull” sometimes and use Wilson in non-save situations when it’s called for, instead of just waiting around for the save. He’s our best reliever, use him accordingly.
~ Tyler Walker, who’s morphed into a human gas can lately, is our 2nd highest leveraged reliever at 1.74. The bulk of that leverage score he’s accumulated by working the 8th inning this year. Recently, he’s been working outside of the 8th inning but he’s still struggled. His FIP of 4.71 just isn’t very good and it’s definitely not the kind of guy you want in high leveraged situations. Walker’s FIP ranks 11th out or pitchers listed, but because we have Lincecum on the list and a couple of guys who’ve just thrown an inning or two out of relief this year — Correia, Misch, Threets, Chulk, and Hennessey — you could bump him up a few positions. Still, it’s been a hard year for Walker and he definitely should not be pitching in high leveraged situations.
~ Despite his control issues this year, Hinshaw ranks 2nd in FIP right behind Wilson. Yet, his leverage score of 0.71 indicates that Bochy has used him more in blow out or low leveraged situations. Maybe it’s time to move him up the bullpen ladder so to speak? His walks are a problem — BB% of 15.7% — but he’s neutralizing them to an extent with his high K% of 30%. I would be in favor of working him up the ladder gradually to see how he does. The control still needs work, but I love his arm.
~ Yabu might be our 3rd best reliever right now. His FIP of 4.11 ranks him behind Wilson and Hinshaw at number three. I’m fine with Yabu’s leverage score of 0.84. He’s been mostly used in long relief or mop-up situations.
~ Whether or not it’s part of Bochy’s bullpen philosophy or not, he’s really working in the young guys slowly. Hinshaw, Salder, Matos, and Espinelli are all working in very low leveraged situations. Hinshaw tops the list at 0.72 and most of the young relievers are are in the 60′s or lower. Espinelli — who’s struggled in a brief 11.2 innings — has a leverage score of 0.19.
~ The bullpen has largely struggled this year. Wilson has emerged as the top arm but with the disintegration of Tyler Walker, Brad Hennessey, Vinnie Chulk and the majority of the younger arms having their expected ups-and-downs, it hasn’t been a pretty sight. FIP isn’t thrilled with Taschner but he’s having a decent year, he might be pitching over his head right now to some extent. The Giants are last in the National League for bullpen ERA at 4.44.
Just some thoughts on the bullpen, but I wonder how Sabean will try to fix things. I’m a little afraid of what Dr. Sabes might try to do, I rarely like the idea of paying the FA market for relievers because they tend to be overpriced and I’m not convinced the value is there. F-Rod will be entering the market this offseason and could land the highest paid contract for a reliever ever. Our bullpen is in tatters. Hugely priced pitcher enters the FA market. Brian Sabean is drooling. Anyone else a little worried?
Comment Starter: Outside of Brain Wilson, who on the Giants do you like to be a successful contributing member to the ’09 bullpen? Should the Giants stand pat, or dip into the free agent pool for bullpen help?
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PANIC UPDATE: Sound the alarms, call the police, is the Posey deal still gelling? Henry Schulman thinks so. On his blog, he posted an update that Posey isn’t a sure thing, yet.
Evans told me negotiations were “ongoing.” I pressed him and another source on whether this was all semantics. In other words, are the Giants using the fact that a potential contract is not signed to say a deal is “not done” even if the two sides have a verbal agreement? No, I was told. Very simply, as of 9:30 this evening, there is no deal. Doesn’t mean there won’t be.
C’mon, Buster, take the money! I’ve cursed us all by already ranking him in the Giants farm system.
I’ll kick this one off:
I’m a Romo fanboy. I just like his stuff and style. I think he could be a good bullpen guy. Hinshaw could be great if he learns to control the strikezone more. Sadler has STUFF but control has prevented him from being good. I actually don’t mind Misch as a reliever, he excelled in that role in the minors. Matos doesn’t do much for me, not sure why. I’m not sure Geno will make it in the majors, he throws slower than Zito — topping out at like 82mph — and his upside is probably a LOOGY. Still, I’ll always love the guy that rocks the stirrups.
Excellent analysis as always, Chris. I wish I had the patience, dedication, and knowledge to be able to break these things down. I really do appreciate your work!
To paraphrase the “great” Don Rumsfeld, you have to go to war with the bullpen you have, not the bullpen you want. Apart from Wilson, the bullpen is pretty craptastic. (We miss you, Merkin! Get well soon!!) I had high hopes for the Romos and Hinshaws of the world, but they’re not getting the job done consistently.
If Bochy were a smart and forward-thinking manager, he’d start bringing in Wilson when leverage dictated it, not when the scoreboard operator turns on the “9.” The whole “defined roles” thing isn’t just ineffective, it’s lazy and willfully ignorant.
Let’s begin the healing by dumping all relievers whose names end in “-er.” That seems fair, don’t you think?
@Delorean
Thanks! I’m glad you enjoy the work, I really do appreciate your comments and input.
Yeah, it’s not just Bochy that thinks that way, but 90% of all baseball managers. What you’ve suggested, while right on the money, is basically baseball heresy. El Lefty Malo made the same grip over at his site, saying that during the Houston series Bochy didn’t call in Wilson at all because he never had a save situation to use him in.
Yeah, I didn’t mean to sound like I was singling Bochy out. All big-league managers do it, and it’s bullshit. You’d think someone like LaRussa would give the leverage thing a try instead of doing stupid shit like hitting his pitcher 8th.
Idiot.
I actually think one of the biggest problems with using your ‘Closer’ in new and different ways is that the save stat is basically how these guys make their earnings. It’s an arbitrary statistic that people attach way too much value to. After all, if K-Rod enters the FA market with 10 saves instead of 55+, people might value him less, which leads to him making less money.
If you told the entire population of ‘Closers’ in MLB that you were going to start using them differently, I’m pretty sure they’d riot.
The save stat is the reason why guys like Joe Borowski and Todd Jones have earned millions of dollars when they aren’t all they great but they “Get the job done when it counts” which is in a manufactured and arbitrary situation that they have no control over, and most times, the hard work has already been done before they got in the game.
The fact is that if you looked at game-states scenarios — the different combination of runs, open bases, and innings that make up the different stages of the game — closing out the 9th inning in save situation — a lead of 1-3 runs — will happen 90%+ of the time. It’s going to take a maverick manager to start making a change to how the bullpens are used, because if the game flops and you lose, the press is going to hammer that manager for not bringing in the closer at whatever time they perceived was the correct time.
You emailed me last week with a question about THE BOOK, and Tango has a great chapter on bullpen usage that answers a lot of these questions.
Agreed all all points! Looks like I’m'a hafta drop some coin on THE BOOK!
It is a definite disappointment that so many of our young and/or bull pen pitchers have had such poor years, ie, Chulk, Misch, Munter, Hennessey. Walker has, at least, out performed these guys. I really don’t know what has happened to Walker. He was doing very well early in the year. He is not alone in the going thru a gas can phase – Yabu, Taschner and others have gone thru stretches where they just can’t get anybody out. I think some of the problem is guys who were counted on have had such awful years that they are in Fresno, meaning that everyone other than Wilso is being asked to perform in more highly leveraged situations than we would like – or than we feel they are really capable of.
I am hoping Walker is just experiencing something akin to dead arm – he is still fairly close to his TJ surgery, so maybe he doesn’t have the stamina needed. It seems to me (and I might be completely wrong on this) he has gotten away from the split finger and has been throwing more sliders. And it seems, he has kind of lost the feel of his slider.
Hey Frank,
That might have something to do with it but Walker came back from TJ really fast, I assumed his recovery time was so short because, well, he recovered quickly. I’m not sure that his TJ is causing him problems so much as what we’re seeing is Walker’s near true talent level.
He’s always been an arm you’d rather use in middle relief than in late inning situations. From 2004-2005 he gave the Giants about 120 innings of 4.20 ERA baseball, that’s probably his ceiling. Not a bad thing to have in your bullpen, but it’s how you use him and what you should expect from him. He’ll be 33-years-old next year and it’s possible that his 4.20 ERA days are past.
I’ve always felt Walker was a little overrated because he’s a super duper nice local kid but he is what he is, and he’s not a huge part of our bullpen. I wouldn’t be sad to see him go, or if he stays, to take on a middle relief role outside of late game duties.