Wednesday’s disclosure that the Yankees have decided to shift Joba Chamberlain to the bullpen to start the year didn’t exactly qualify as news. Despite off-season denials of such a scenario, several pieces of data pointed to the inevitability of the decision, ranging from Chamberlain’s success during last year’s stretch run (pre-bug spray, at least), his age (22), his workload capacity based on the Rule of 30 (about 145 innings, based on the time he spent at four stops plus the postseason, though Will Carroll will tell you that only the major league innings count when it comes to parsing injury risk), and the current health status of Chien-Ming Wang, Andy Pettitte, Mike Mussina, Philip Hughes, and Ian Kennedy.
If you’re a Yankee fan, you should knock on wood, since Opening Day is still ten days away, but if those five aforementioned pitchers are healthy enough to start the year in pinstripes instead of on the shelf, that rates as a much bigger surprise than the latest Joba Rule. As somebody who’s spent the past decade watching the Yankees very closely, I’ve been fond of reminding anyone within earshot that for all of their perceived surpluses of capable starting pitchers, the Yankees are rarely forced to exile one to the bullpen. Injuries and ineffectiveness inevitably arise to make such decisions a moot point; to borrow a phrase from Chris Rock, that train is never late. (Particularly when you’ve got Carl Pavano and Jaret Wright on the payroll.) Even with Wright a distant, nightmarish memory and Pavano a rehabbing non-entity, the Yankees’ Team Health Report has them as the only AL East team without a single green-light pitcher.
If recent history is any guide, the chances of the Yankees’ five-man rotation making it through the season intact are pretty slim, whether due to injury or ineffectiveness. In fact, while their rotation as a whole has been serviceable over the last three years–ranking 19th, 15th, and 13th in team SNLVAR–it’s been one of the least stable in the majors in terms of games started by the five busiest bodies:
Team Year GS5 Rank NYA 2005 111 28 NYA 2006 136 10 NYA 2007 121 27 NYA TOT 368 24
For the sake of comparison, the runaway leader over the three-year span is the White Sox with 461, with the Indians ranked second at 434. Dead last are the Rangers at 342, just ahead of the Royals, Nationals, Devil Rays, Cubs, Dodgers, and then Yankees. That’s not exactly auspicious company; the six teams below the Yankees mustered just two post-season appearances (the 2006 Dodgers and last year’s Cubs) in the three years in question. Suffice to say that if you’re going to have an unstable rotation, it helps to put 900 runs on the board.
So, the recent Yanks have averaged about 123 starts per year from their top five, leaving 39 starts to be absorbed by the rest of the staff. Even if they were to play towards the high side of that time span, 136 starts, those extra 26 are more than one extra pitcher can be expected to absorb. Of that surplus, how many can we expect Chamberlain to make?
An aggressive estimate might put him at about 15 starts, leaving the Yanks to come up with another dozen or two from among the Jeff Karstens/Darrell Rasner/Kei Igawa/TBNL herd. Suppose Chamberlain pitches on a 180-inning pace as a starter for three months of the year, and takes the guise of a heavy-use 90-inning reliever for the other three months. In his starter phase, he could total 15 starts averaging six innings per start (90 innings) and as a reliever, he’d average an inning every other day (45 innings). That would put Joba at 135 innings, not far off from his Rule of 30 target. Of course, that wouldn’t leave a ton of headroom for October, if the Yankees get there. One can’t determine whether the team might want him to be part of their front four, or to return to the set-up role without knowing the rest of the staff’s strengths and weaknesses at that point in time. Either way has its merits so long as he can usurp a greater percentage of innings than the regular season, but both have their drawbacks as well.
As for Chamberlain in the bullpen, on paper, the Yankees clearly have the need for a setup man of his caliber, given that the supporting cast of the bullpen in front of Mariano Rivera consists of LaTroy Hawkins, Kyle Farnsworth, and a few somebodies picked from a group of unprovens containing Brian Bruney, Chris Britton, Jonathan Albaladejo, Edwar Ramirez, Ross Ohlendorf, Scott Patterson, Jose Veras, Billy Traber, Kei Igawa, and Sean Henn. Of that latter bunch, nobody besides Britton has completed even a 50-inning season in the bigs with an ERA better than league average. This is a problem, one compounded by the fact that the projected starting five still includes two youngsters whose innings will be closely monitored and a 39-year-old coming off a year in which he put up a career-worst ERA in a career-low number of innings. Somewhere, the Yankees need to absorb far more than Joba alone can handle.
Switching gears, how good was Chamberlain coming out of the bullpen last year? Good enough to finish 30th in the American League in Reliever Expected Wins Added despite throwing just 24 innings. Among the 100 pitchers who accumulated at least 1.0 WXRL, Chamberlain ranked fifth in expected wins added per nine innings (WXRL/9). Here are the top 30 pitchers in that category (only relief innings are considered):
Pitcher Team IP WXRL WXRL/9 J.J. Putz SEA 71.2 7.419 0.931 Takashi Saito LAN 64.1 5.765 0.807 Jonathan Papelbon BOS 58.1 5.143 0.794 Rafael Betancourt CLE 79.1 6.845 0.777 Joba Chamberlain NYA 24.0 1.848 0.693 Brian Wilson SFN 23.2 1.708 0.649 Joe Nathan MIN 71.2 5.077 0.637 Joakim Soria KCA 69.0 4.774 0.623 Jose Valverde ARI 64.1 4.269 0.598 Jason Isringhausen SLN 65.1 4.202 0.579 Hideki Okajima BOS 69.0 4.429 0.578 Mike Gonzalez ATL 17.0 1.079 0.571 Francisco Rodriguez ANA 67.1 4.259 0.570 Heath Bell SDN 93.2 5.656 0.543 Brandon Lyon ARI 74.0 4.357 0.530 Zack Greinke KCA 53.1 3.114 0.525 Billy Wagner NYN 68.1 3.751 0.494 Manuel Corpas COL 78.0 4.158 0.480 Carlos Marmol CHN 69.1 3.694 0.480 Mariano Rivera NYA 71.1 3.699 0.467 Matt Capps PIT 79.0 4.098 0.467 Rafael Perez CLE 60.2 3.142 0.466 Rafael Soriano ATL 72.0 3.713 0.464 Francisco Cordero MIL 63.1 3.220 0.458 Pat Neshek MIN 70.1 3.572 0.457 Trevor Hoffman SDN 57.1 2.894 0.455 J.C. Romero 2TM 56.1 2.822 0.451 Todd Jones DET 61.1 3.050 0.448 Bobby Seay DET 46.1 2.303 0.448 Alan Embree OAK 68.0 3.335 0.441
If we exclude the pitchers who saw significant time as closers last year by arbitrary ruling out anyone who had more than five saves, we get this list:
Pitcher Team IP WXRL WX/9 Rafael Betancourt CLE 79.1 6.845 0.777 Joba Chamberlain NYA 24.0 1.848 0.693 Hideki Okajima BOS 69.0 4.429 0.578 Mike Gonzalez ATL 17.0 1.079 0.571 Heath Bell SDN 93.2 5.656 0.543 Brandon Lyon ARI 74.0 4.357 0.530 Zack Greinke KCA 53.1 3.114 0.525 Carlos Marmol CHN 69.1 3.694 0.480 Rafael Perez CLE 60.2 3.142 0.466 Pat Neshek MIN 70.1 3.572 0.457 J.C. Romero 2TM 56.1 2.822 0.451 Bobby Seay DET 46.1 2.303 0.448 Akinori Otsuka TEX 32.1 1.566 0.436 Tony Pena ARI 85.1 4.103 0.433 Ehren Wassermann CHA 23.0 1.075 0.421 Henry Owens FLO 23.0 1.051 0.411 Chad Qualls HOU 82.2 3.608 0.393 Derrick Turnbow MIL 68.0 2.752 0.364 Matt Herges COL 48.2 1.927 0.356 Justin Speier ANA 50.0 1.950 0.351 Scott Downs TOR 58.0 2.260 0.351
In other words, ignoring the small-sample caveats, Chamberlain had more of a per-inning impact on winning than any setup reliever in the majors besides Betancourt. In an effort to create a memorable acronym for something that seems worth exploring a bit more deeply, I’m going to christen these guys the MISERs (Maximum Impact SEtup Relievers). Here’s a quick look at the leaderboards of recent years, using a somewhat more robust 40-inning cutoff that might let the occasional LOOGY, DL dweller, or mid-season call-up through:
Pitcher Team Year IP WXRL WX/9 Cla Meredith SDN 2006 50.2 3.762 0.668 Joel Zumaya DET 2006 83.1 5.010 0.541 Rafael Soriano SEA 2006 60.0 3.189 0.478 Scott Linebrink SDN 2006 75.2 3.995 0.475 Taylor Tankersley FLO 2006 41.0 2.133 0.468 Duaner Sanchez NYN 2006 55.1 2.796 0.455 Juan Rincon MIN 2006 74.1 3.202 0.388 Scot Shields ANA 2006 87.2 3.728 0.383 Dennys Reyes MIN 2006 50.2 2.145 0.381 Kiko Calero OAK 2006 58.0 2.403 0.373 Pitcher Team Year IP WXRL WX/9 Cliff Politte CHA 2005 67.1 3.861 0.516 Scott Eyre SFN 2005 68.1 3.709 0.489 Scott Linebrink SDN 2005 73.2 3.707 0.453 Jesse Crain MIN 2005 79.2 3.839 0.434 Mike Gonzalez PIT 2005 50.0 2.391 0.430 Clay Hensley SDN 2005 42.2 1.961 0.414 Dan Wheeler HOU 2005 73.1 3.339 0.410 Juan Rincon MIN 2005 77.0 3.367 0.394 Al Reyes SLN 2005 62.2 2.717 0.390 Bob Howry CLE 2005 73.0 3.112 0.384 Pitcher Team Year IP WXRL WX/9 Tom Gordon NYA 2004 89.2 6.438 0.646 Akinori Otsuka SDN 2004 77.1 5.049 0.588 B.J. Ryan BAL 2004 87.0 4.965 0.514 Todd Jones CIN 2004 57.0 3.124 0.493 Ray King SLN 2004 62.0 3.126 0.454 Kiko Calero SLN 2004 45.1 2.271 0.451 Guillermo Mota LAN 2004 63.0 2.920 0.417 Scot Shields ANA 2004 105.1 4.728 0.404 Jesus Colome TBA 2004 41.1 1.846 0.402 Scott Linebrink SDN 2004 84.0 3.559 0.381 Pitcher Team Year IP WXRL WX/9 Brendan Donnelly ANA 2003 74.0 5.602 0.681 LaTroy Hawkins MIN 2003 77.1 5.306 0.618 Rheal Cormier PHI 2003 84.2 5.019 0.534 Octavio Dotel HOU 2003 87.0 4.227 0.437 Scott Sullivan CIN 2003 49.2 2.309 0.418 Luis Ayala MON 2003 71.0 3.210 0.407 Tom Martin LAN 2003 51.0 2.212 0.390 Brad Lidge HOU 2003 85.0 3.661 0.388 Rafael Soriano SEA 2003 53.0 2.160 0.367 Guillermo Mota LAN 2003 105.0 4.107 0.352 Pitcher Team Year IP WXRL WX/9 Buddy Groom BAL 2002 62.0 4.384 0.636 J.C. Romero MIN 2002 81.0 5.531 0.615 Mike Remlinger ATL 2002 68.0 4.215 0.558 Cliff Politte TOR 2002 57.1 3.424 0.537 Arthur Rhodes SEA 2002 69.2 4.022 0.520 Gabe White CIN 2002 54.1 2.765 0.458 Chris Hammond ATL 2002 76.0 3.812 0.451 Scott Sauerbeck PIT 2002 62.2 3.061 0.440 Steve Reed SDN 2002 41.0 1.898 0.417 Luis Vizcaino MIL 2002 81.1 3.737 0.414 Pitcher Team Year IP WXRL WX/9 Felix Rodriguez SFN 2001 80.1 5.445 0.610 Arthur Rhodes SEA 2001 68.0 4.122 0.546 David Weathers MIL 2001 57.2 3.098 0.484 Steve Karsay CLE 2001 43.1 2.321 0.482 Jeff Nelson SEA 2001 65.1 3.438 0.474 Chad Fox MIL 2001 66.2 3.409 0.460 Mike Jackson HOU 2001 69.0 3.109 0.406 Jeff Tam OAK 2001 74.2 3.273 0.395 Kyle Farnsworth CHN 2001 82.0 3.429 0.376 Mike Stanton NYA 2001 80.1 3.333 0.373
It’s interesting to see the names that pop up repeatedly. The only three-timer here is Scott Linebrink, whose pre-trade stint with San Diego would have placed on the 2007 leaderboard as well at 0.414. Clearly, Kenny Williams beat me to the punch in discovering this stat, but it’s really Kevin Towers who deserves the applause; Linebrink, Cla Meredith, Akinori Otsuka, Heath Bell, Clay Hensley, and Steve Reed give the Padres impressively consistent representation here. Other repeaters in this millennium–using the more stringent criteria for 2007 as well which eliminate Chamberlain and Gonzalez above–include Kiko Calero (2004, 2006), Guillermo Mota (2003, 2004), Cliff Pollitte (2002, 2005), Arthur Rhodes (2001, 2002), Juan Rincon (2005, 2006), J. C. Romero (2002, 2007), Scot Shields (2004, 2006), and Rafael Soriano (2003, 2006).
Meanwhile, it’s also worth noting that Rafael Betancourt’s 0.777 in 2007 is the highest of any qualifying MISER in our database. We’ll close things out with an “all-time” top 20 that really only goes back to 1988. The combination of the five-save qualification and the changing usage patterns keep pre-Eckersley relievers from making much of a dent here; only two pitchers, both in the 40-50 inning range, would have placed:
Pitcher Team Year IP WXRL WX/9 Rafael Betancourt CLE 2007 79.1 6.845 0.777 Brendan Donnelly ANA 2003 74.0 5.602 0.681 Cla Meredith SDN 2006 50.2 3.762 0.668 Tom Gordon NYA 2004 89.2 6.438 0.646 Buddy Groom BAL 2002 62.0 4.384 0.636 Mike Jackson SFN 1994 42.1 2.966 0.631 LaTroy Hawkins MIN 2003 77.1 5.306 0.618 J.C. Romero MIN 2002 81.0 5.531 0.615 Felix Rodriguez SFN 2001 80.1 5.445 0.610 Troy Percival CAL 1995 74.0 4.974 0.605 Akinori Otsuka SDN 2004 77.1 5.049 0.588 Dan Plesac TOR 1998 50.0 3.240 0.583 Hideki Okajima BOS 2007 69.0 4.429 0.578 Mariano Rivera NYA 1996 107.2 6.876 0.575 Jeff Zimmerman TEX 1999 87.2 5.576 0.572 Mike Remlinger ATL 2002 68.0 4.215 0.558 Bob Patterson CAL 1994 42.0 2.564 0.549 Arthur Rhodes SEA 2001 68.0 4.122 0.546 Heath Bell SDN 2007 93.2 5.656 0.543 Joel Zumaya DET 2006 83.1 5.010 0.541
Rest assured, I’ll be keeping an eye on the MISERs this year.
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