Chad Moriyama Dodgers, Sabermetrics, Scouting
Kenley Jansen is the epitome of an under-appreciated fireman in the pen, putting out any fire, no matter the size, intensity, or probability for continuation.
Pitching full-time for just about three years, the 24-year-old fireballer fanned an out-of-this-world 16.10 batters per nine innings last season. Yes, he walked a few too many (4.36), but he has plenty of time to improve his control, especially since he’s still learning to be a pitcher.
A 1.74 FIP, 2.06 tERA, 1.59 SIERA, and 1.04 WHIP are just nails, and Kenley handled both righties and lefties with ease (.156/.264/.200/.464 and .163/.269/.194/.463, respectively). His year was even more impressive when you consider two things: he had three atrocious outings that skewed already amazing numbers, and he battled injury and a heart murmur (which reoccurred this Spring but doesn’t appear to be serious).
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Kenley should always be used in the most pressing situation, not in your conventional ninth inning, three-run-lead save situation. Bring him in to face the heart of the opponent’s lineup with the game close regardless of whether it’s the seventh or eighth or ninth. That’s what firemen do: they put out the most dangerous fires.
Oh, and just for kicks, let’s quickly look at his July and September from last year:
July – 10 IP, 6 Baserunners, 17 K/4 BB, 0 HR
September – 13.2 IP, 11 Baserunners, 32 K/3 BB, 0 HR
Just sick.
Javy Guerra entered 2011 as just another arm in the Dodgers pool of pitchers. He closed out the campaign as the closer, and with many fans perceiving him to be a better pitcher than he actually is. Guerra is good, but not great, and he’s the closer by virtue of everybody else before him in 2011 being hurt and/or terrible.
Guerra’s minor league career was solid, with a lot of strikeouts and a lot of walks. He debuted in May, and proceeded to put up a two-month period featuring a shiny ERA and weak peripherals (2.35 in 15.1 innings, with 9 K, 5 BB, and 22 baserunners allowed). Oddly enough, he posted a .327 BABIP against during this time.
The next three months don’t do much to tell us how dominant Guerra could ever be, as he allowed 36 baserunners in 31.1 innings. He walked 13, allowed two homers, and fanned 29 in this time frame. Again, not atrocious numbers, but nothing to get overly excited about, especially considering his BABIP in this period was .232 against.
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Guerra, at just 26 years old, is definitely a guy I’d like to have in the pen. He has upside, is cheap, and has shown the ability in the minors, and for stretches of time in the bigs, to miss bats. In fact, I want a guy like him to be the closer while the better pitcher – Jansen – is placed in higher leverage situations and asked to get the opponent’s better offensive players out
I just don’t want Guerra, based off of the outdated Saves statistic, to get more credit than Kenley. I’m a simple man with simple desires.
Heading into 2011 with the reputation as an injury-prone, command lacking, questionable makeup having potential bust, Scott Elbert ended the year by cementing himself as a fixture in the Dodgers remade pen. Taking over the left-handed reliever role from the also injury-riddled Hong Chih Kuo, Elbert fanned 9.18 per nine innings while issuing 3.78 BB/9 IP, an improvement on his small sample size MLB career and lengthier minor league tenure.
Elbert has always had great stuff and posted big strikeout numbers in the minors, but could never get a footing in The Show. He was only given 26.1 innings in his previous three stints with the big league club to impress in, and certainly didn’t, but the potential was always there if he could harness his stuff and stay healthy.
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With that great promise coming to fruition in ’11, and room to still grow and improve, Scott will be expected to shut down lefties, who only hit a putrid .191/.267/.227/.494 against him last year. Elbert can certainly hold his own against righties (.255/.344/.328/.672 in 2011), but like most southpaws, he’s much, much better against his hitting brethren. Elbert will probably be the only lefty in the pen to start 2012, and with upside and talent, his future in Los Angeles is finally clear.
Ned Colletti’s Motley Crew Of Veteran Goodness
Mike MacDougal is back on a guaranteed (!) one-year deal following a shiny ERA, terrible everything else season. In 57 innings that had other teams frothing at the mouth, Mike whiffed just 6.47 per nine while issuing 4.58 free passes each nine he took the mound.
But hey, he had a 2.02 ERA and was an experienced vet. That totally makes up for the 4.33 tERA, inability to miss bats, and the taking up of a roster spot that would be better served on Josh Lindblom.
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Matt Guerrier … exists. 6.78 K/9, 3.39 BB/9, 3.43 FIP, and all.
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Todd Coffey received a guaranteed one-year deal, and coming off of a 3.41 FIP season, he could actually be useful if used against righties only. Coffey was death to right-handers in 2011, allowing just a .193/.250/.255/.505 slash line against while whiffing three times as many as he walked. Of course, conversely, lefties murdered him, mashing to the tune of a .338/.404/.416/.820 line, and they drew nine walks while only going down swinging 11 times.
So yeah. Use him against righties, and never let him try to sprint his guts out to face Carlos Gonzalez or Lance Berkman or even Juan Pierre‘s limp bat, for that matter.
All of that said, would I have signed Coffey? No. But I’m not Ned Colletti.
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Ronald Belisario is back! After he serves a suspension for a drug-related incident, that is. He’ll almost never be able to replicate his BABIP-fueled 2009 where he fanned over 8.0/9 IP, but hey, another bullpen arm could never hurt.
Granted, he’s out of options, so when he does return, someone has to go, and anyone not named MacDougal should not be replaced by Belisario. Heck, not even Coffey, who’s been pretty decent against righties for a long time.
But seriously. Get rid of MacDougal.
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Blake Hawksworth, once he returns from injury, must be on the 25-man roster.
Why? Because his sister is Erin Hawksworth.
Enough said.
In many ways, because of how backwards baseball is, that Jansen, the better pitcher is not the closer? Because as you said, right now, he’s being put in pressure situations regardless of the inning.
Basically.
MacDougal had a 3.80 SIERA. I mean, you can quote the stat that proves your point the most, but he’s just league average. Complaining about front-end relief pitchers being average is….interesting.
Complaining about more expensive but less talented veterans blocking cheaper, more talented youngsters (who have already had success in the bigs) is something that happens because it should happen. Agent Ned does this for enough roster positions that it prevents the team from keeping #2 starters (Kuroda) and signing actual stars (Fielder, Reyes). Was there any logic in signing Navarro last season to block AJ Ellis or signing Guerrier while cutting Cory Wade? Pile this up over multiple positions and you get a mediocre roster like the 2012 Dodgers.
Yeah, but you’re missing the point. These guys are relievers, AND they’re putting up stats around league average. If Navarro was league average we’d be a lot better off and frankly quite happy with his production.
Whining about Jamey Wright and Mike MacDougal as more expensive but less talented is ridiculous considering their salaries. Both make around, what, $1 mil? Oh darn, how are we gonna sign big-time free agents with THEM clogging up our payroll.
And that’s even ignoring the fact that last year our bullpen completely imploded and Guerrier and MacDougal were all that was left. Broxton, Kuo, Jansen, Padilla all went down and then the only people holding the fort were the depth guys.
Good thing we have depth guys, right? Because now, if someone gets injured, Lindblom/Tolleson replaces them. Without the depth, if someone got hurt, we’d be turning to someone horrible or screwing up a starting pitcher prospect’s development, since Lindblom, Tolleson, and probably someone like Eovaldi or St Clair would already be in the majors instead of Coffey, Guerrier, MacDougal, and Wright. You can call them all crappy if you want but they’re all that stands between Eovaldi/Withrow and becoming career relief pitchers.
There are plenty of valid complaints to be made about Ned Colletti not trusting the youth but this is not one of those situations. This is just bashing him for the sake of bashing him.
Going to have to disagree 100%. A 2012 bullpen of Jansen, Guerra, Elbert, Lindblom, Tolleson, Wade, and St. Clair would collectively cost the team about $3.35 million.
Instead, we have:
Jansen at <500K
Guerra at <500K
Elbert at <500K
Guerrier at 4.75M
Coffey at 1.0M plus 300K buyout
MacDougal at 650K plus 350K buyout
Wright at 900K plus 500K incentives
This all adds up. If you focus on the mediocre/crappy relievers alone, then yes, your point makes sense. But if you add the bullpen overpayment to the starting rotation overpayment, the middle infield/utility overpayment, and the Rivera overpayment, then you're talking about real money (and less talent, because it prevents the team from signing great players). Obviously, this won't matter in a couple years, once Agent Ned is gone and we have a competent GM.
Okay, sure, Guerrier was an overpayment. But this was about MacDougal and to a lesser extent, Wright. Both of them are dirt cheap so there’s not a point in bashing their signings.
Thinking that the extra $1.5m spread over three different relievers isn’t worth not being vulnerable to 2-3 injuries putting a wrecking ball through your entire bullpen is laughable, at best. If our backup guys in the minors as of now were our main guys in the majors we’d be fucked when, say, Jansen gets hospitalized again, or Elbert’s elbow gets a little balky. We have insurance on our bullpen, and our bullpen is probably one of our better strengths this year, so save the Ned bashing for the things he did wrong this offseason. Because if you cry wolf about the bullpen it weakens valid points about guys like Rivera, Ellis, Hairston, Harang etc.
Still plenty of pitching depth at AA and AAA if my hypothetical six kid plus Wade bullpen lost a couple guys due to injury, though. Plenty of NRIs who can be stuck in AAA, plus Ely, Antonini, Troncoso, Ames, and Wall. Possibly even Belisario and Hawksworth, too. It’s not even remotely laughable or crying wolf to disagree with Ned on this, or you Taylor.
“Plenty of NRIs”
Exactly. Sure, we’re putting one on the roster immediately, but only because he’s good enough to latch on somewhere else and there’s value to being able to cut him loose.
Ely, Antonini, and Troncoso are almost definitely worse out of the pen than Wright and MacDougal.
No one knows what we’ll get from Ames, and his upside is probably Todd Coffey-esque, and that’s if we’re really lucky with him.
Wall’s someone i forgot about. He should be pretty good.
So, Wall, plus Tolleson, Lindblom, and St Clair to replace Wright, MacDougal, Guerrier, and Coffey. Eovaldi if you want to mess with his development.
If you’re completely comfortable with throwing out 3 pitchers who’ve never pitched a single inning in the majors as plan freaking A for our bullpen, then more power to you. I’m not and neither are the people in charge.
And yes, it’s laughable to have Ely, Antonini, and Troncoso as your cavalry for when you’ve got several injuries to the bullpen.
Not really.
Billingsley started out in the pen and they were well aware of when to move him into the rotation. The Eovaldi point is moot considering he might be a reliever down the road anyway given his stuff.
Bottom line i that there are a ton of arms waiting, that’s the strength of this team, but he has chosen to fill the roster with veteran relievers, some of whom are on multi-year contracts. It’s just pointless.
Why the fuck anybody would defend the Guerrier signing is beyond me.
I’m not sure what you’re trying to say.
That bullpen depth should be a priority?
Okay, yeah, if three or four guys go down with injury in 2012, and Colletti didn’t sign all those veteran guys, they would be fucked.
Great?
That’s how every other team operates, because they take that risk and allocate those funds to improving the STARTERS instead of the DEPTH.
Not defending the Guerrier signing. Happened last offseason, so now we’re just stuck with him. I didn’t even really want to bring him up. Defending Wright, MacDougal, and Coffey, because those are all decent pickups, in ascending order of decent-ness. Except, for some reason they’re worthy of ridicule from you and MSTI. But, you two just say “look, peripherals! only league average!”, well, great, only $1 mil, guys. Wright’s just placeholding for Belisario.
Okay, maybe too much snark, but I didn’t raise a lot of shit about the signings at the time.
All I said during my own personal analysis was that if he’s paying market value or a little over for relievers, which is a team strength, then I’m hoping he can pay for upgrades where we got fucked last year … and he didn’t.
Look, if the Dodgers were the Rays or something, and everybody is basically set, then yeah, I get the depth thing, but this team had so many holes and they filled it with shit and they only have depth at reliever and starter (sorta).
Like we’re about to carry three utility infielders who can’t hit, where’s the depth there? It’s just confusing, honestly.
Yeah, honestly, with the position players (and to an extent, Harang over some of the other options Ned had), I have no clue what the fuck went on. I just don’t want to see actual probable strengths of the roster get mixed in with the weaknesses because if gives his very few supporters ammo against you.
If you remember me from the FireNedCollettiNow days, I’ve never been a fan of his, but he had done a select few things right.
I’ve said this multiple times before, but Colletti has been a better GM since he had his payroll taken away, at least in a value sense. However, he has still struggled to construct a roster using what he has had.
He just allocates the funds in an increasingly odd way.
See, Ned Colletti is that guy who you should have as an assistant GM to find you guys like MacDougal or Wolf who can give you those kinds of lucky seasons for cheap, but that you should keep away from any major signings or MLB guaranteed deals.
Don’t have a problem with it.
He’s proven to be mediocre over recent years.
I doubt he’s that much out of the red in 2012, value wise.