Mets Bullpen Analysis - April

Yesterday I posted an analysis of my favorite team, the New York Mets, Starting Rotation for the month of April. Today I'm doing the Bullpen. You can also check this out over at Mets Fever.

The Bullpen

Billy Wagner – His K rate is down a little bit, but it’s still great and his K/BB is fantastic. His GB rate is way down from its normal 45% to 37%. That should increase. He’s getting lucky, but it doesn’t make much of a difference as he is a fantastic pitcher anyway.

Aaron Heilman – Heilman’s K rate is down all the way to 5.74. Probably related to his elbow troubles. His BB rate is improved, and could increase a little bit, but as long as he gets his Ks back on track he will be fine. His GB rate has also dropped from about 45% to 31.3%. That should increase as time goes on. Giving up a few too many HRs and not giving up as many hits as he should be, but once he gets his health in order he should be the Heilman of old.

Joe Smith – Love him. I was upset losing Bradford, but Smith shares similar qualities. I can only imagine if we had them both. Bradford is much better than Schoeneweis, who got similar money. High K rate (10.69) and High GB rate (68.4%) are fantastic, although both will probably drop a little. His BB rate isn’t as low as you’d like it (3.94), but his other two important stats make up for it. Once he lowers the BB rate he will prove to be on of the best relievers in all of baseball.

Scott Schoeneweis – Not pitching well… even worse than I expected when we signed him. He’s walking more than the measly amount he is striking out, and he’s being aided by a .216 BABIP. Unfortunately, that will catch up to him and hurt the team’s bullpen. Omar, why’d you let Chad Bradford go?!

Pedro Feliciano – K rate is good – although I’m still not convinced it will hold – but he is walking a ton of batters (6.14 per 9 IP). 59.5% GB rate is fantastic, but unlikely to last. .233 BABIP is keeping his ERA low, but once that gets to a normal level he’d better stop walking batters or he will be in trouble.

Aaron Sele – A slightly higher K/9, as you would expect with the shift to the bullpen, but also a higher BB/9, which is not good. It’s at 4.70, and he has to get that under 3.0 if he wants to be effective. 44.9% GB rate is pretty good, and should remain stable throughout the year. Hasn’t given up a single HR, which he should have by now, but his .364 BABIP means he’s giving up far more hits than he should be. Not great surface numbers, but I wouldn’t expect much of an improvement.

Lino Urdaneta – Didn’t expect to see this guy in a Mets uniform this year, and with only 1 IP the sample size is just too small to make any sort of assessment.

There you have it... the Mets Bullpen. Seems like we have three very good relievers (once Heilman gets his act together) and one potential one in Feliciano (once he stops walking people), and Duaner Sanchez should be added to this group once he gets back. Guillermo Mota will be an improvement over Urdaneta, Sele, and Schoeneweis once he returns (assuming his stats weren't overly inflated by steroids).

Mailbag: Atkins/Hall/Jacobs for Thome/Wagner?

Here's another question from our Fantasy Baseball Mailbag from an anonymous reader.

Our reader writes:

"Hey Derek, great blog.

If you have a moment, I wanted to know what you thought about this trade.

12 team, 5x5 head to head league (default settings).

My team:

C: Lo Duca, Barrett
1B: A. Gonazalez, M. Jacobs
2B: I. Kinsler
3B: D. Wright, G. Atkins, B. Hall
SS: B. Hall
OF: C. Crawford, B. Abreu, R. Ibanez
SP: G. Maddux, J. Smoltz, C. Schilling, A. Wainright, D. Bush, K. Escobar, F. Garcia, C.C. Sabathia
RP: T. Saito, J. Soria

Here's the offer:

I give: B. Hall, G. Atkins and M. Jacobs

I Receive: J. Thome, B. Wagner

Pros:
1) I need closer help desperately, and there is no one, aside from Julio available, and Wagner is among the best.
2) With D. Wright at 3B, G. Atkins is expendable.
3) I just picked up Jacobs, and who knows if he'll keep up his current pace.
4) If Thome remains healthy, he should be a nice HR / RBI boost from the Util. slot.

Cons:
1) Thome is injury prone.
2) I'll be leaving my non-pitching roster a bit thin - picking up the likes of Khalil Greene (or R. Aurilia) at SS, and relying on A. Gonzalez at 1B.
3) I feel like this trade will force me into needing to trade away some pitching to balance out my roster.

What do you think?

Thanks."

I responded:

"Z,
I would most likely not pursue this trade. I believe Garrett Atkins will be a first round pick next year and quite possibly the first third baseman taken. I actually believe he could be a better hitter than A-Rod. I like him much more than David Wright, despite being a Mets fan and a huge David Wright fan. If you are going to trade a third Baseman, I would trade Wright. I think he is the inferior player and has more value. Try trading Wright for a guy like David Ortiz or Lance Berkman if you don't trust your 1B, or a guy like Manny Ramirez if you need an OF (Ibanez is only so-so).

I like Mike Jacobs. He is a good bet to approach 30 HRs this year and is a pretty good contact hitter with pretty good discipline. You could do a lot worse than him.

I also would not suggest trading for a closer. I've written a lot about closers over the past month, and if you read this post about my strategy concerning closers, I think you'll see that they are highly overvalued. While Wagner is a better pitcher than Soria or Saito, how many more saves do you expect him to get you? The Dodgers created 61 save opportunites last year while the Mets created 61. Wagner will probably get a few more saves than Saito, but this is not worth the price he would cost you. Working the waiver wire for cheaps saves is a much better alternative. Henry Owens should pick up a few for the Marlins over the next few weeks. Try picking him up.

Last, if you're looking for a high HR/RBI utility man, Frank Thomas is your guy. I wrote about him a few weeks ago. He's a great player who is severely undervalued.

One last bit of advice: trade Freddy Garcia for a better pitcher. Check out my rankings for some good targets.

I hope this helps! Good luck this season!"

Let your thoughts on this trade be known!

Fantasy Baseball Rankings - Closers

These rankings are more for informational purposes than anything else, as we don't advocate taking closers early. For more Closer information, read these two articles we've recently written on the subject. In short, wait until the late rounds of the draft to take closers.

Draft Day Strategy - Closers
Sleeper Alert - Late Round Closers

Like our Starting Pitcher Rankings, these don't take injury risk into account. While Gagne is #1, I wouldn't recommend drafting him - even if I recommended drafting top closers in general - because he is a huge risk and has Akinori Otsuka (a great option if Gagne does go down) breathing down his neck. Our Closer Rankings include player's involved in Closer Battles, not just the front runners.

Lastly, these Closer Rankings only represent the player's skill, not his likely hood to receive save opportunities. As this is a delicate thing to predict, we aren't even going to attempt it. We don't have a scientific way of doing it at the moment, but it is something we will be looking into for 2008. This is explained more in our Draft Day Strategy article on Closers.

Without further ado, our Fantasy Baseball Closer Rankings.

Rank	Pitcher	Score
1	Eric Gagne	13.59
2	Joe Nathan	12.86
3	Brad Lidge	12.86
4	Francisco Rodriguez	12.36
5	Billy Wagner	12.32
6	B.J. Ryan	12.22
7	J.J. Putz	11.10
8	Jonathan Papelbon	10.78
9	Jose Valverde	10.68
10	Bobby Jenks	10.65
11	Tom Gordon	10.36
12	Mariano Rivera	10.26
13	Takashi Saito	9.91
14	Octavio Dotel	9.90
15	Huston Street	9.76
16	Francisco Cordero	9.63
17	Trevor Hoffman	9.34
18	Brian Fuentes	9.34
19	Chad Cordero	8.91
20	Jorge Julio	8.71
21	Jason Isringhausen	8.66
22	Danny Miceli	8.45
23	Bob Wickman	8.39
24	Chris Ray	8.28
25	Ryan Dempster	8.12
26	Armando Benitez	8.07
27	Arthur Rhodes	7.87
28	Salomon Torres	7.80
29	Chris Reitsma	7.79
30	Dustin Hermanson	7.70
31	Bill Bray	7.49
32	Joe Borowski	7.34
33	Mike Stanton	7.18
34	David Weathers	7.13
35	Todd Coffey	7.10
36	Todd Jones	7.05
37	Seth McClung	5.26

Teams that have closer jobs up for grabs include:

Reds

Red Sox

Devil Rays

Marlins (Tankersley's DLed to start the year and Owens and Lindstrom aren't included, but Owens is a good sleeper if he gets the job)

Teams whose closer has an above average chance of getting injured or losing his job by year's end:

Tigers

Rangers

Braves

Cubs

Pirates

Cards

Giants

Phillies

Indians

The two lists above illustrate one of my biggest arguments for waiting on closers. Guys will be available on the waiver wire, and this year, lots of great options will be.

UPDATE 3/9: Brendan Donnelly, Joel Pineiro, Craig Hansen, and Jonathan Papelbon added with the news of Mike Timlin's injury (Thanks to Jason McAdams of My Baseball Bias for the tip). I wouldn't touch any of these guys until something is resolved. Unless Papelbon takes the job, which doctors continue to say he shouldn't do for health reasons, I don't see the Red Sox trusting any of these guys in their run for the playoffs. I see a mid-season trade as the most likely scenario.

UPDATE: 3/16: Julian Tavarez, Chris Reitsma, and Arthur Rhodes added.

UPDATE: 3/26: All Red Sox (except Jonathan Papelbon) removed with news that Papelbon will close. Dustin Hermanson added.

UPDATE: 3/26: Jorge Julio added with the news that he has been traded to the Marlins.

New York Mets Bullpen Analysis

We continue our New York Mets day of analysis with the bullpen. Billy Wagner is the only real fantasy option for 5x5 leagues

Billy Wagner
What’s not to like? A K/9 between 10 and 11 and a BB/9 in the mid 2s makes for a beast of a pitcher. Throw in a 52.8% GB Percentage in 2006, although it was closer to 45% in 2005 and 2004. Either way, Wagner is one of the top relief pitchers in all of baseball. Needless to say, he is also a very good fantasy option.

Aaron Heilman
Heilman is one of the premier setup men in Major League Baseball. His K/9 was 8.83 in 2005 and 7.55 in 2006, so I think a K/9 in the high 7s or low 8s is reasonable for Heilman this year. A BB/9 around 3 is also probable. Add in a GB Percentage around 45% and Heilman should be one of the top relievers in a very good Mets bullpen this year.

Duaner Sanchez
May not be ready for opening day, but Sanchez is a very good reliever that the Mets will need to get them through the year. A K/9 in the mid-7s is a good start, but in order for Sanchez to become elite he needs to improve his control. His BB/9 was 3.90 and 3.95 in 2006 and 2005. That leaves his K/BB a tick below 2. A GB Percentage in the high 40s helps make up for this, but his BBs will really need to come down for Sanchez to become great.

Scott Schoeneweis
As is more common with relievers than starters, Schoeneweis’s K rate is somewhat inconsistent. Floating between 5.05 and 6.79 the past three years, a K/9 closer to 5.5 should be expect in addition to a BB/9 rate around 4. This is not ideal for a reliever, its not even really good. Schoeneweis makes up for it somewhat with a 58% GB Percentage over the past two years. While Schoeneweis is ok, the Mets will miss Chad Bradford a lot this year.

Pedro Feliciano
After playing a year in Japan in 2005, the Mets brought him back in 2006. He posted an 8.06 K/9, a little above his 7.78 career average, although he’d only pitched 72.2 major league innings before that. I think a regression to the mid-to-high 7s seems reasonable. Feliciano seems to have good control. He posted a 2.70 BB/9 last year. As this was a career worst (excluding 2002 when he only pitched 6 innings), I see this coming down a little bit to the low-to-mid 2s range. His GB Percentage was 49.4% last year, and he has a career 46.1% GB Percentage. This makes Feliciano a very good lefty relief option… certainly better than Schoeneweis.

Ambiorix Burgos
Burgos is known for his high K rates. He should probably strikeout a batter per inning in the majors, but for him to become a top reliever he needs to dramatically decrease his walks totals. His BB/9 has been around 4.5 the past two years, and a 2.0 K/BB isn’t as good for a reliever as it is for a starter. He still could be a good option for the backend of the Mets bullpen though, especially if his BB/9 can get down even to the low 3s. A GB Percentage of 43.3% in 2006 and 48.9% in 2005 makes for an average around 45%, which is above average and a good number. The bottom-line is that Burgos could one day become a great reliever if he can lower his walks.

Jon Adkins
A K/9 between 5 and 6 and a BB/9 between 1.5 and 2.2 in 2004 and 2006 (he didn’t pitch much in the majors in 2005) makes for a decent reliever. His minor league K numbers were never that impressive though, so a K/9 below 5 is a possibility. He had a 46% GB rate in 2004 and a 40% GB rate in 2006, so his skill at this could certainly be worse. Adkins wouldn’t be a terrible choice to round out the bullpen, but there are better relievers out there.

Joe Smith
Smith, a 2006 3^rd round pick of the Mets, only pitched 20 innings for Brooklyn (low A ball) and 12.2 inning for Binghampton (AA) in 2006, but they were impressive innings. Talk out of Spring Training indicates he could make the jump to Flushing this year. He had a 60.2% GB Percentage, 12.60 K/9, and 1.35 BB/9 for Brooklyn. While we are dealing with an extremely small sample size, it is very impressive. I am excited to see what he can do over a full season, be it in the minors or the majors.

That wraps up the Mets Bullpen analysis. It looks like we will see a very good year out of the Bullpen, but Chad Bradford's 3.46 K/BB ratio and 64% GB Percentage will certainly be missed. Lefty or not, Scott Schoeneweis was a much worse investment than Chad Bradford. I'm very disappointed Omar didn't realize this.

Sources:
Most stats and batted ball figures can be found at The Hardball Times.
Minor league stats and batted ball figures for 2006 can be found at Minor League Splits
Career minor league stats can be found at The Baseball Cube.