Collette Calls: The Bullpen War of Attrition

Last week I wrote about how offense was way down and wondered where we were headed. The bats woke up in a hurry this week, and we're now seeing the offense we've sorely missed this season.

The difference between last week and the games proceeding it is rather stark, almost as if baseball found a bunch of the old baseballs and threw them back out into play:

I am only speculating that the 2019 baseball is back, but baseball has shrunk the size of the rosters, and the play of the game is normalizing, yet offense surges way up? RotoWire colleague Todd Zola hinted at this week being a good one for hitting in his weekly hitting article, but I don't think even Lord Zola saw this coming.  The league-wide average exit velocity and launch angles have held true, so it is not like hitters made some type of adjustment in that area. 

I think it is the attrition in the bullpens across most of the league. These are the week-by-week numbers of relievers:

The surge in output against relievers is in line with the overall surge of offense last week, but their numbers are going up as their talent/depth is going down. Pitching has been ravaged by injury this year worse than any year before it. Both Ben Lindbergh and Eno Sarris wrote articles about it earlier this month, and it has only gotten worse.  The data from our own Injury Report paints the grim picture:

Folks, this is a game of attrition. There is only so much pitching depth an organization can build up, so while most teams can and do lose a couple of arms early, nobody is built to withstand a hit like this even over the course of a mini-season. 

It starts at the top, where 13 of 30 opening day closers are already out of their job.

• Mychal Givens - lost the role to Cole Sulser
• Wade Davis - on the IL; Jairo Diaz closing
• Roberto Osuna - out for the season
• Ian Kennedy - Mike Mathey'd by Trevor Rosenthal
• Hansel Robles - pitched way out of the role early
• Edwin Diaz - two bad outings pushed him down the depth chart
• Aroldis Chapman - COVID'd
• Kirby Yates - on the IL with bone spurs
• Matt Magill - job wasn't his after all
• Ryan Helsley - COVID
• Jose Leclerc - out for the season
• Ken Giles - on the IL with elbow issues
• Sean Doolittle - on the IL with knee inflammation

Some of those preseason closers had red flags, but there are also top-shelf closers on that list on the IL or already done for the season as well. This has been the story across most of baseball as organizations have their depth tested. The 2020 season has already seen the league use 383 relievers,  which puts it at the mid-point of the chart during the wild-card ERA (1995-2020):

By season's end, 2020 could finish in the top 10 for relievers used while playing 63 percent fewer games than the seasons currently in front of them on the chart above. One could say the surge in offense this week is due to the overall talent pool of pitchers on the decline as injuries continue to take its toll on rosters across the league. 

This is not an article to continue the chat about offense as much as it is an attempt to focus on some guys pitching well in their current roles who may take bigger steps forward as the injuries around them continue — assuming they too can avoid the injury pandemic in baseball.

Ryan Borucki missed most of 2019 with arm trouble, coming into camp throwing 94-95 on the heels of a season in whch he finished with an average fastball velocity of 91.5. We never got to see what was with the new velocity, but we are seeing it this season. Borucki has worked 6.1 innings since his recall from the injured list with 14 strikeouts. He has spiked the average velocity on his sinker from 91.9 last year to 94.7 this season, and I saw him touch 97 a couple of times this weekend against Tampa Bay. Borucki has also ramped up the usage of his slider, which has more bite 87 than it did last year at 84 mph. Toronto's bullpen is trying to pick up the pieces with Ken Giles out, and Borucki is one of the guys looking good in a swing role.

Jordan Romano is another pitcher out of that pen who has impressed. He looks different from the mound this year as he has added this pre-pitch squat movement to his delivery to allow him to control his tempo home. Last season, Romano's four-seamer averages 94.6 home while the slider came in at 84.7. This season, the fastball has averaged 96.6 and the slider 88.7. He has almost doubled the whiff rate on his fastball while adding a touch more whiffiness to his slider, which serves as his primary pitch. He has pitched 10 innings and has struck out 13 himself. His repertoire is very much likes Giles, and bears watching now or if you are in a league where you can grab keepers now for next year. 

Josh Staumont has grown a man bun this year, and is now cooking with his own gas. Last season, he sat 95.9 with his heater, and this year it is at 98.3, dotting 100 a few times already. He also throws a hammer curve, giving him both velo separation and eye-level changing abilities at hitters. He has struck out 19 batters in 9.2 innings with his only earned run coming off a solo shot. There are only one-year contract veterans in front of him, which could mean Staumont would be the guy with the early lead on the 2021 closer role. If you have not yet tuned in to watch him work in relief this year, make it a point to do so soon. 

Freddy Peralta already has 22 strikeouts in 12 innings this season. He had a rough first outing against Chicago, but has since come in and struck out six, eight and five batters in his last three relief efforts against the tough lineups of both Chicago squads and Minnesota. Peralta worked on a slider in winter ball and has thrown 19 this season and the league has yet to put the pitch safely into play. The fastball is still the money maker, and he throws it 70 percent of the time with more swing and miss than he had last year thanks to the slider to keep hitters honest. Last season, the league hit .267 and slugged .473 off his fastball; this season those numbers are .167 and .250 to date. Peralta is not going to be a starter to get wins, but coming in for multi-inning relief roles with heavy strikeouts and improving ratios still gives him value.

Jake McGee has changed since being cut from Colorado earlier this year. He went to the Dodgers, who have essentially told him to live off his fastball, and he has obliged. He has thrown his fastball 95 percent of the time, and he is throwing it near two miles an hour harder than he did in Denver, and has already garnered two wins in relief for the club scattering four baserunners and striking out 12 of the 30 hitters he has faced. 

Matt Foster is one of the intriguing arms in the White Sox bullpen working behind Alex Colome this year. Aaron Bummer has already hit the IL, but this rookie has made a solid first impression. He has struck out 15 of the 36 batters he has faced since his Aug. 1 recall, winning two games and has multiple strikeouts in five of his seven appearances. His changeup has a 54.0 whiff percentage to it, and his fastball gets quite a bit of rise and some run allowing him to change eye levels effectively with hitters between the two primary offerings.

Devin Williams can best be summed up with with this tweet by PitchingNinja showing Williams absolutely carve up Byron Buxton:

Williams has a nasty changeup with a 63.0 whiff percentage and can follow that up with 95-98 heat as well. His changeup has elite movement to it, as if Milwaukee needed more nastiness in its bullpen. He has struck out 17 of the 37 hitters he has faced and is getting high-leverage work to get the ball to Josh Hader.

Gregory Soto is not new to Detroit, but this version of him is. Last season, he went 0-5 with a 4.0 K-BB% and opponents hit .305 against him. He was simply a low leverage hot mess of a reliever. This year, So has a 32 percent K-BB, the league is hitting .086 against him, and he looks like this:

He has added two miles an hour to his average fastball velocity, and three miles an hour to the journey of his slider to home plate. Joe Jimenez gets saves, but is not the rock solid closer type, making Soto an excellent speculation for saves should Detroit trade Jimenez before the deadline.