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blog-0372301001537551756.jpgWhat do we make of the Twins bullpen in this era where bullpens have supplanted starters? Closers, Openers, Lefty and righty specialists, relievers for innings 5,6,7,8,9. Lots of warm ups, lots of wasted time. In my world we would not have openers and we would limit the teams to 4 pitchers per nine innings which would really make the manager think about who to bring in and when - if they are on their third pitcher in the sixth inning. We might have to teach starters to learn what starters in the past learned – how to conserve themselves, who to put max effort into, and to think about quick outs instead of 6 – 9 pitch outs. But my dream does not count so what should the Twins do about their 2019 – 2020 Bullpens?

 

We have the following players in our current Bullpen:

Belisle – overused – even if it is once a week or once a month

Hildenberger – overused and should not be in the ninth

Reed – Can he be what he once was?

May – just to make everyone angry, I will tell you I think he is overrated.

Drake – Not on a good team, but are we a good team?

Magill – Nice surprise can he keep it up?

Busenitz – running out of chances

Rogers – finishing the best of all

Mejia – Not sure what to think of him in BP

Goya- Our opener specialist

Duffey – Hope your next team can get you effective again

Curtiss – okay, but

Vasquez – Nice to see the advance, but do they really expect him in MLB next year?

Gimenez – I know he is a ringer

Which ones do you want to keep? They are all on the 40 man roster. Who would you DFA – I would choose Gimenez, Belisle, Busenitz, Duffey as my for sure DFA group, but would not mind if we could move up from Curtiss, Magill, and Drake.

 

Then in the minor leagues we have:

A different Reed

Anderson

Moran

Stashak

Molina

Harper

 

All were included in Seth Stoths minor league reliever of the year. Only Vasquez, Moya, Curtiss, and Busenitz were called up from the entire list. Why not all of them in September? I know service time, etc. Anyone you want to predict will be on the roster in the next two seasons? Go ahead and move starters in if you want, I have not seen enough of the young pitchers to want Gonsalves, Stewart, Little, DeJong in my pen.

 

Here is the Relief pitcher Free Agent Class for your shopping pleasure – but remember that very few relief pitchers can sustain their effectiveness and seldom to they come in and shine for their new club:

Adam Ottavino (33 years old, 2.2 WAR)

Jeurys Familia (29, 1.8)

David Robertson (34, 1.3)

Craig Kimbrel (31, 1.2)

Sergio Romo (36, 1.0)

Jesse Chavez (35, 1.0)

Oliver Perez (37, 0.8)

Jake Diekman (32, 0.7)

Tony Sipp (35, 0.7)

Brad Brach (33, 0.7)

Zach Duke (36, 0.7)

Joe Kelly (31, 0.6)

Justin Wilson (31, 0.6)

Mark Melancon (34, 0.5) -- Can opt out of the two years and $28 million remaining on his contract.

Tyler Clippard (34, 0.4)

Andrew Miller (34, 0.4)

Kelvin Herrera (29,0.4)

Tony Barnette (35, 0.3)

Aaron Loup (31, 0.3)

Bud Norris (34, 0.3)

Jonny Venters (34, 0.3)

Adam Warren (31, 0.3)

John Axford (36, 0.2)

Greg Holland (33, 0.2)

Shawn Kelley (35, 0.2)

Jerry Blevins (35, 0.1)

Santiago Casilla (38, 0.1)

Fernando Salas (34, 0.0)

Ryan Madson (38, 0.0)

Zach McAllister (31, 0.0)

Blake Wood (33, 0.0)

Daniel Hudson (32, -0.1)

Zach Britton (31, -0.1)

Jorge De La Rosa (38, -0.1)

Jeanmar Gomez (31, -0.1)

AJ Ramos (32, -0.2)

Jim Johnson (36, -0.2)

Matt Belisle (39, -0.2)

Randall Delgado (29, -0.2)

Boone Logan (34, -0.3)

Brad Ziegler (39, -0.3)

Cody Allen (30, -0.3)

Hector Santiago (31, -0.4)

Peter Moylan (40, -0.4)

Junichi Tazawa (33, -0.6)

Blaine Boyer (37, -0.9)

Josh Tomlin (34, -1.3)

David Phelps (32, N/A) -- Hasn't appeared in the Majors in 2018.

Joaquin Benoit (41, N/A) -- Hasn't appeared in the Majors in 2018.

https://www.mlb.com/news/2019-mlb-free-agents/c-293292274

 

 

Not easy because we are not blessed with great arms like some teams and we have not shown an ability to develop them. With the average now close to 4 pitchers per game per team and going up can we get by with 8 relief pitchers – five starters and that makes 13. Can relief pitchers come in every other game? https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-bullpens-took-over-modern-baseball/

 

Don Mattingly got steamed https://www.miamiherald.com/sports/mlb/miami-marlins/article218196470.html on September 15 when the two teams – Phillies and Marlins used a total of 15 relievers in one game! No pitcher recorded 6 outs in the game.

 

So what happens next – that was a September open roster game, but will we start to see rosters with a second catcher, a utility man and the rest pitchers? Stay tuned.

 

Give it a try – who will you depend upon?

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Just wanted to throw in a few thoughts...

Oliver Drake has done what he's needed to (2.70 ERA, 8.1 K/9), so he'll probably be on the team next year despite what we may want. I dunno about Matt Magill (4.00 ERA, 1.45 WHIP, 1.8 HR/9), his numbers have been trending the wrong way and I'm not sure if he's going to hold up (5.21 FIP). 

 

Why has Andrew Vasquez only pitched 2 innings? Why did we start his clock early if we're not going to use him?

 

I think if the Twins actually wanted Jake Reed, he'd be on the team now. He was eligible to be taken in the Rule 5 draft and the Twins didn't protect him, they didn't call him up after a great year at AAA... it's obvious they don't care about him. He should be on another team next season.

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Just wanted to throw in a few thoughts...

Oliver Drake has done what he's needed to (2.70 ERA, 8.1 K/9), so he'll probably be on the team next year despite what we may want. I dunno about Matt Magill (4.00 ERA, 1.45 WHIP, 1.8 HR/9), his numbers have been trending the wrong way and I'm not sure if he's going to hold up (5.21 FIP). 

 

Why has Andrew Vasquez only pitched 2 innings? Why did we start his clock early if we're not going to use him?

 

I think if the Twins actually wanted Jake Reed, he'd be on the team now. He was eligible to be taken in the Rule 5 draft and the Twins didn't protect him, they didn't call him up after a great year at AAA... it's obvious they don't care about him. He should be on another team next season.

 

Drake has put himself in good position to at least stay on the 40-man roster through the November additions. 

 

Vasquez ... I mean, the service clock thing doesn't really matter. With Rogers and Moya ahead of him, he would likely start 2019 in Rochester (pending injury, etc.) The service time thing has nothing to do with Vasquez. But, he hasn't been used for more than a batter or two in any outing as he's getting adjusted to MLB. He's obviously staying on the 40 man roster, so they're just getting his feet wet while they are likely looking to make decisions on guys like Duffey, Busenitz, Drake, Magill, maybe Curtiss and others. 

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Then in the minor leagues we have:

A different Reed

Anderson

Moran

Stashak

Molina

Harper

All were included in Seth Stoths minor league reliever of the year. Only Vasquez, Moya, Curtiss, and Busenitz were called up from the entire list. Why not all of them in September? I know service time, etc. Anyone you want to predict will be on the roster in the next two seasons? Go ahead and move starters in if you want, I have not seen enough of the young pitchers to want Gonsalves, Stewart, Little, DeJong in my pen.

 

I mean, they can only have 40 players on the roster... no sense in calling up guys like Molina (split the season between EST, ET and CR). Moran split the season between Low A and High A. Harper is a minor league journeyman. 

 

I'd love to see Reed and Anderson, for sure, but again, service time has nothing to do with this at all. 

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I'm not sure the reasoning behind Reed, and why didn't they treat Vasquez the same way. Neither needs to be a part of the 40-man until the offseason. Vasquez not being used, so why?

 

Sure, the Twins need to make some decisions on Duffey, Busenitz and more. They really don't need to drop many players to add guys to protect from the Rule 5, so spring training battles will happen, as well as decisions on folks like Magill and Drake as we enter next season. 

 

But back to the original point...every game, with an opener, a starter and a closer will use three pitchers. It seems the concept of having multiple relief pitchers appearing in nearly every-other-game is a concept being explored. Starters eeking thru five innings is the norm. Man, the days with four man rotations and starters pitching 250+ innings and also throwing in relief, at times. A relief pitcher capable of going thru an order once, not getting pulled when they have to face a batter from the "other" side.

 

Plus teams having 12 or 13 pitchers in their team, and another being on standby for immediate call and a send-back. Whew.

 

And yet, hitters still hit.

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Look at Watson’s splits, he’s no closer, but he ain’t no LOOGY. And given that San Francisco might be looking to into shedding payroll this offseason, I think the Twins might have a shot at Watson. Although it’d probably take both Vasquez and Cave to aquire 2yrs of control over Watson for $7M.

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I didn't look closely because he isn't averaging 1 IP per game. He's had success this year. Not so much in 2017 and his splits held down his trade value in 2016.

 

Not sure if this season was due to the spacious AT&T Park, or him just making adjustments. Either way, a lefty duo of Watson/Rogers (maybe Moya??) in the pen would be very strong on paper. Which is why I wouldn’t lose sleep over giving some like Jake Cave for him.

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Not sure if this season was due to the spacious AT&T Park, or him just making adjustments. Either way, a lefty duo of Watson/Rogers (maybe Moya??) in the pen would be very strong on paper. Which is why I wouldn’t lose sleep over giving some like Jake Cave for him.

A relief pitcher for a starting OF, no thanks.

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Just wanted to throw in a few thoughts...

Oliver Drake has done what he's needed to (2.70 ERA, 8.1 K/9), so he'll probably be on the team next year despite what we may want. I dunno about Matt Magill (4.00 ERA, 1.45 WHIP, 1.8 HR/9), his numbers have been trending the wrong way and I'm not sure if he's going to hold up (5.21 FIP). 

 

Why has Andrew Vasquez only pitched 2 innings? Why did we start his clock early if we're not going to use him?

 

I think if the Twins actually wanted Jake Reed, he'd be on the team now. He was eligible to be taken in the Rule 5 draft and the Twins didn't protect him, they didn't call him up after a great year at AAA... it's obvious they don't care about him. He should be on another team next season.

I just don't understand the disrespect for Jake. He just gets better. Guys they promoted don't look nearly as good 

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Some of the guys on the list may be looking for a 1 - 3 year contract with an op-out if they do really well.  

Three names stand out on the list Herrera, Britton, Familia.  Twins need at least one of the three and maybe two to compete with the better pens.  Familia will probably be too expensive and a better club looking for a closer may well overpay for him.  The other two are possible, maybe Britton will have less money(but also higher risk) than the others.  Rest are throw darts at, but the Twins need at least two relievers off that list and hope they pick the correct ones.

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