Wrong Met

Yes K-Rod will help our bullpen, which really needed help. Although I was under the impression that K-Rod wouldn't be happy with anything but the closer role based on the clauses in his contract. Does that mean Axford is moving to setup man? All reports seem to indicate otherwise.

The point is that obviously the Brewers could have upgraded a lot more if they had gotten Reyes. Reyes has been worth 4 wins already this year while Betancourt has been worth -0.8. That's almost a five game swing at the halfway mark. That is massive for a single position.

It's probably pie in the sky to hope for Reyes anyway though. Still I'd like to see the Brewers do something to improve at SS if they really are going for it this year. I'm really worried about the Reds. They are below .500 but their Pythagorean puts them at tied with the Brewers and Cards. They are going to start winning some more ballgames.

Cincy needs help at short too and I'm really hoping they don't land Reyes. Paul Janish is at least in the positive for WAR at 0.2 but that's all defense. Holy crap at that .227/.259/.251 line. They probably need pitching help too but somewhat fortunately for them their bullpen looks pretty solid. I hope they don't get the help they need and Johnny Cueto gets kicked in the head.

The Cards have such a surprisingly potent lineup. I have no idea if Berkman can sustain what he's done so far but he doesn't have a crazy high BABIP or anything so who knows. Really though the Cards need pitching in a bad way. They have a couple decent starters and two to three above average arms in the bullpen but it just drops off the shelf after that. Lohse, Garcia, Salas, Motte and Boggs are the only pitchers with significant innings and an ERA+ over 100. I have no idea who's available. Johnson? Zimmermann?

An Open Letter to Everyone Who Still Thinks Francisco Rodriguez Was MLB's Premier Closer in 2008

Dear Everyone Who Still Thinks Francisco Rodriguez Was MLB's Premier Closer in 2008,

I really hate to tell you this. I know you're enamored with that saves record. "62," you find yourself mumbling for no apparent reason, your suddenly awestruck eyes trained on the horizon. "62!" Yes, Francisco Rodriguez set the single-season record for saves last year. And yes, he pitched well while doing so. But he wasn't the best closer in baseball last year. He wasn't even the best closer in the American League, and he may not have been in the top five in the junior circuit, for that matter!

I know you're upset right now. I know you think I'm crazy. But bear with me here: let's break K-Rod's year down together, starting with that "62" in the saves column. The fact of the matter is that the saves record was largely due to good fortune (from a closer's perspective). The Angels didn't score an awful lot of runs last year (765 RS, good for 10th among 14 AL teams), but had solid pitching (697 RA, 5th in the AL), which resulted in a lot of close games, which in turn resulted in a lot of save opportunities for Rodriguez: 69, to be exact (itself a big league a record). K-Rod converted 62 of those save opportunities and blew 7 saves for an 89.8% conversion rate. Not bad, but not automatic.

"But wait," you may say, "nobody except Brad Lidge was automatic in 2008!" Fair enough. So what about the rest of the stats? And what about these so-called "superior" closers (at least in 2008) I've made veiled reference to already?

I'm so glad you [may or may not have] asked! As I hope this list will indicate, K-Rod did have a good year, but if you ignore the number "62" for a moment, he's nowhere close to the guys at the top of the 2008 heap (particularly Mo, who had an obscenely good 2008 to almost no fanfare).

K-Rod:
76 G, 69 GF, 62/69 S/Opp, 68.3 IP, 2.24 ERA, 198 ERA+, 77 K, 34 BB, 1.288 WHIP

Mariano Rivera:
64 G, 60 GF, 39/40 S/Opp, 70.7 IP, 1.40 ERA, 317 ERA+ (!), 77K, 6 BB (!!), 0.665 WHIP (!!!)

Joakim Soria:
63 G, 57 GF, 42/45 S/Opp, 67.3 IP, 1.60 ERA, 266 ERA+, 66 K, 19 BB, 0.861 WHIP

Joe Nathan:
68 G, 57 GF, 39/45 S/Opp, 67.7 IP, 1.33 ERA, 305 ERA+, 74 K, 18 BB, 0.901 WHIP

Brad Lidge:
72 G, 61 GF, 41/41 S/Opp, 69.3 IP, 1.95 ERA, 225 ERA+, 92 K, 35 BB, 1.226 WHIP

Jonathan Papelbon:
67 G, 62 GF, 41/46 S/Opp, 69.3 IP, 2.34 ERA, 198 ERA+, 77K, 8 BB (!), 0.952 WHIP

So we have six closers, all of whom pitched a very similar number of innings across a similar number of games, of which they finished a similar number and with roughly the same success rate in save situations (ignoring Lidge and Rivera, who combined to blow one save all year). But K-Rod finished with 23 more save opportunities than any other man on this list. TWENTY-THREE! I should hope he'd save more games than the others!

What's more impressive than K-Rod's individual "62," I should think, is that the Angels even gave him 62 chances, let alone 69! 69: that's roughly 43% of all Angels games in 2008. Not 43% of all Angels wins; 43% of all the games that the Los Angeheim Angels of Anangeles stepped onto the field for during the regular season. 43% of those games ended with K-Rod stepping onto the rubber in a situation that has been arbitrarily determined to be worthy of an "S" in the box score.

Now, as we shift away from the saves column, K-Rod looks a lot less impressive. Even Lidge, "Mr. Automatic" in 2008, pales a bit in comparison to Rivera, Soria, Nathan, and Papelbon. Rodriguez's K/BB ratio is worse (often much worse) than everyone else on the list, as is his WHIP. His ERA+ is at the bottom of the heap, as well. And unlike Lidge, he didn't make up for high walk totals with absolutely ridiculous K-rates (though he did strike out a lot of hitters--let's be fair, here), or for his high WHIP with ridiculously "clutch" save rates (he saved games at just under a 90% rate, which is good but not Lidgean or Riveran--and Rivera combined his 97.5% success rate with an absurd 0.665 WHIP!).

K-Rod was good in 2008. But he wasn't anywhere near as dominant as Rivera, Soria, Nathan, Papelbon, or Lidge. And I only chose the easy cases; a case could be made that Bobby Jenks (57 G, 52 GF, 30/34 S/Opp, 61.7 IP, 2.63 ERA, 174 ERA+, 38 K, 17 BB, 1.103 WHIP) was at or above Rodriguez-level last year as well, for example.

Listen: I know you like the saves record. And I'll admit that it's pretty cool. It's a Major League record, after all, and who among us didn't dream of breaking records on our way to first-ballot HOF induction while slapping pine cones with sticks in our backyards? Hell, I'd be buying rounds if I broke the single-inning record for balks. But dominance in a closer is about more than the saves column. Joakim Soria in '08? Dominant. Mariano Rivera basically every year ever? Dominant. But I'm afraid that, good though he is, Francisco Rodriguez is not now, was not in 2008, and probably will not ever be at Mariano Rivera's level.

I hope we can still be friends.

Love,
Dave

P.S. - My sister thinks you're cute.