One of the more frustrating baseball developments in recent years is that we no longer have a right to know who is and isn't closing for each team. It's not a high priority for managers to tell us. I suspect many of them don't even know.
Many closer scenarios will take weeks to settle, to the extent they ever do. The trend is toward looser bullpen designations, with the best reliever not always (but still usually) being reserved for the ninth inning.
What I'm saying is the pursuit of saves involves a lot more guesswork than it used to. And I'm here to offer my best guess, along with my degree of confidence, for every bullpen. By presenting it in terms of a "pecking order," you can also find candidates for holds, if that's a stat of import in your league.
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: low
Chances of committee: high
Who's rosterable? Scott McGough
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: high
Chances of committee: low
Who's rosterable? Raisel Iglesias, A.J. Minter
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: high
Chances of committee: low
Who's rosterable? Felix Bautista
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: high
Chances of committee: low
Who's rosterable? Kenley Jansen
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: low
Chances of committee: medium
Who's rosterable? Michael Fulmer, Brad Boxberger
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: low
Chances of committee: medium
Who's rosterable? Kendall Graveman, Reynaldo Lopez
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: medium
Chances of committee: low
Who's rosterable? Alexis Diaz
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: high
Chances of committee: low
Who's rosterable? Emmanuel Clase, James Karinchak
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: medium
Chances of committee: low
Who's rosterable? Daniel Bard
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: low
Chances of committee: low
Who's rosterable? Alex Lange
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: high
Chances of committee: low
Who's rosterable? Ryan Pressly
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: medium
Chances of committee: medium
Who's rosterable? Scott Barlow, Aroldis Chapman
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: low
Chances of committee: medium
Who's rosterable? Jimmy Herget, Carlos Estevez
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: medium
Chances of committee: high
Who's rosterable? Evan Phillips, Daniel Hudson
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: low
Chances of committee: high
Who's rosterable? none
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: high
Chances of committee: low
Who's rosterable? Devin Williams
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: medium
Chances of committee: high
Who's rosterable? Jhoan Duran, Jorge Lopez
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: low
Chances of committee: medium
Who's rosterable? Adam Ottavino, David Robertson
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: medium
Chances of committee: low
Who's rosterable? Clay Holmes
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: low
Chances of committee: high
Who's rosterable? Trevor May
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: low
Chances of committee: medium
Who's rosterable? Craig Kimbrel, Seranthony Dominguez
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: medium
Chances of committee: low
Who's rosterable? David Bednar
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: high
Chances of committee: low
Who's rosterable? Josh Hader
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: medium
Chances of committee: low
Who's rosterable? Camilo Doval
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: medium
Chances of committee: high
Who's rosterable? Paul Sewald, Andres Munoz
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: high
Chances of committee: medium
Who's rosterable? Ryan Helsley, Giovanny Gallegos
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: medium
Chances of committee: high
Who's rosterable? Peter Fairbanks, Jason Adam
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: low
Chances of committee: low
Who's rosterable? Jose Leclerc, Will Smith
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: high
Chances of committee: low
Who's rosterable? Jordan Romano
Pecking order |
Confidence in top guy: low
Chances of committee: medium
Who's rosterable? Kyle Finnegan