Remember 1969: Remembers Ramblings

 

Remember 1969: Remember's Ramblings

 

Remember's Ramblings – Volume 1, Article 8

December 03, 2024

 The Volatility of the Relief Pitcher

 

 

What makes a great relief pitcher?    The short answer is a guy that can come into a game at any point and not give up any runs.   Doing that 40 or 50 or 60 times every year is pretty much impossible.    Everybody has a bad day once in a while.   There are not a lot of starting pitchers in baseball history that have gone undefeated for a year.   Likewise, there are not a lot of relief pitchers that have been unscored upon for 6 months. 

So with that in mind, a look at four current Mets pitchers and one 2024 Met who is now a free agent.   For each of the five bullpen arms, this analysis looks at their 2024 full year stats and then takes their best 95% (or more accurately, removes their worst 5%) to see what effect it has on their stat line for the fans to read. 

Edwin Diaz:     This guy had a pretty good year

100%:  55 games.    ERA of 3.52, WHIP of 1.043, 7 HR allowed,  53.2 Innings 84 Ks with 20 walks

 5% of 55 = 2.75, so I rounded up and took out his worst three games to see what his best 95% looked like.

95%:   52 games.   ERA of 2.08, WHIP of .904, 4 HR allowed, 52.0 innings 81Ks with 18 walks.

In his worst three outings (one in April, one in May, and the other in August), he gave up  2, 4, and 3 earned runs, or 9 of the 21 total earned runs he gave up all year.    He gave up a homerun in each of his bad starts, bringing his homerun rate to 1 every 13 games compared to 1 every 7.5 games average.     7 hits, 9 earned runs, and 3 homers in 1 and 2/3 innings will kill the stat sheet.  

 Reed Garrett:   Another really good majority of the year

100%:  53 games.   ERA of 3.77, WHIP of 1.395, 6 HR allowed, 57.1 innings, 83 Ks with 30 walks

 Again I rounded up to 3 games.  When his worst three games are removed, it only took out 2.9% of his innings. 

95%:   50 games.  ERA of 1.94, WHIP of 1.203, 4 HR allowed, 55.2 innings 80 Ks with 26 walks.

Garrett’s three clunkers were in May, July, and unfortunately the final series in Milwaukee before going back to Atlanta in late September.    He gave up half of his 2024 earned runs in those 1 and 2/3 innings.    I will take a pitcher on the roster with a 1.94 ERA over 50 outings covering 55+ innings while limiting the bad stuff to three games.

Danny Young:   

Not quite as extreme, but the stat sheet still looks better

100%:    42 games.   ERA of 4.54, WHIP of 1.248, 3 HR allowed, 37.2 innings,  48 Ks with 18 walks

5% of 42 is a hair over 2, so I rounded down and found his two worst games  - a game in early June with 2 ER in 0.1 inning, and a game in early July with 3 ER in 0.1 inning.  

 95%:   40 games.  ERA of 3.41,  WHIP of 1.135, 2 HR allowed,  37 innings, 47 Ks with 17 walks

 Geez, that 3.41 ERA sure looks better than 4.54.  It’s too bad that he had those two poor outings.   Most fans would take 95% of Danny Young.  

 Huascar Brazoban:   You can see why the Mets traded for him

He had a 2.93 ERA going when he had his worst appearance of the year on June 26 to blow it up immediately to 5.63.    He was able to work it back down to 2.93 by not giving up an earned run in his last 10 outings as a Marlin before his trade to the Mets in late July.   Unfortunately, he did not pitch as well once he got to New York.   He gave up 3 earned runs in his second Mets appearance and kept the ERA in the high 3’s the rest of the year.   

100%:  39 games.  ERA of 3.83, WHIP of 1.219.  2 HR allowed,  52.2 innings, 51 Ks with 25 walks

95%:  37 games.  ERA of 3.16, WHIP of 1.052, 1 HR allowed 51.1 innings, 48 Ks with 24 walks

This is not a bad body of work for a full year.   He limits the homers but his K-BB ratio is not great.  He limits the hits to maintain a very good WHIP.   He had a couple not-so good outings at the end of the year, including in the final game loss to Atlanta that didn’t mean anything (let’s just get the heck back to Milwaukee) where he gave up 2 of the team’s 3 runs in their 3-0 loss.   That kind of sealed his fate for being left off the playoff roster.     Hopefully he can come back in 2025 and approach is 2024 stat sheet.

 Lastly, current free agent Ryne Stanek – why look elsewhere?

100%:  63 games.  ERA of 4.88,  WHIP of 1.319.  8 HR allowed,  55.1 innings, 67 Ks with 25 walks

95%:  60 games.  ERA of 3.38, WHIP of 1.1625.  6 HR allowed  53.1 innings,  65 Ks with 20 walks

What a difference a few bad days can make.  Two of the three were with the Mets, including his first game after the trade where he gave up 3 earned runs to Atlanta after jetting across the country following the trade, then his other poor showing as a Met was his only appearance back in Seattle about 3 weeks after he was traded from the Mariners in a game the Mets suffered a 12-1 shellacking.  Stanek only gave up 4 of them!     So the body of work for the Mets only: 

100%:  17 games.  ERA of 6.06,  WHIP of 1.304.  3 Homeruns allowed,  16.1 innings  23 Ks with 8 walks

90%:  15 games.  ERA of 2.40, WHIP of 1.000.   1 Homerun allowed,  15 innings  21 Ks with 6 walks

So taking out those two anomalies (I’ll forgive his bad start and again pitching against his old teammates), those are some pretty positive numbers he put up down the stretch.    Even with the blown up ERA (full year of 4.88, Mets only of 6.06), his WHIP was just over 1.3.      Last note:  9 of his good 15 appearances were perfect, and one other was hitless.

I would like to have this guy back – they could do a lot worse.   Just need to look past that 6.06 ERA.

In conclusion

While I haven’t rolled up the analysis on the rest of the pen, for 5 important members of the 2024 staff, a couple poor games separated them from having really good statistical years.   My sense is that is true for relief pitchers in general.  The great ones somehow get through a full year unscathed by one or two bad days as miracles.   The good ones limit their bad days to a couple and can move on past them. 

 Remember’s Reminiscing:   December 3 Birthdays

 Eight former Mets are celebrating birthdays today:    

Happy Birthday to Dave Eilers, Wayne Garrett (one of Reese’s unmentionable third baseman – and one of my favorite players when I was a kid), Mark Bradley,  Kevin Morgan (owner of the record for the smallest stat sheet of anyone to ever play for the Mets), Paul Byrd, Tobi Stoner, Matt Reynolds, and the late Darryl Hamilton (another one of my faves when he came through).