Rates & Barrels - Closer Committees, Reliever Strategy, Pitcher Workload Considerations & Forgotten Players

Episode Date: March 31, 2022

Important Show Links! Swab for Caryn: https://linktr.ee/SWABFORCARYN Steve Moyer Memorabilia Auction: https://kitsonauctions.hibid.com/catalog/351463/steve-moyer-estate-and-sports-memorabilia-auction/? Eno and DVR sort through the growing number of closer committees around the league and discuss their approach to build teams with enough saves potential. Plus, they discuss a question about the predictability of starting pitcher's workloads, opportunities for a few forgotten players, and a chance to help friends of Rates & Barrels (links above).  Rundown Bullpen News, Bullpen Blues? Cubs, Padres, Rockies, Reds It Gets Worse! Rangers & Pirates Clarity in Tampa Bay? Predicting Starter Workloads Greg Allen & Forgotten Players Battling for Time This Spring Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to Rates and Barrels. It is Thursday, March 31st. Derek Van Ryper here with Eno Saris. On this episode, we will try to make sense of the latest batch of bullpen news. It is coming from every corner of the league, it seems like, and it makes you wonder if you still have drafts left over the next week or so, or one week away from opening day. Should you change your strategy for relievers based on all the news that's trickling and all these potential sources of saves, but maybe fewer saves than you'd like it to be because we're talking about players who are sharing

opportunities. We also have a lot of great mailbag questions looking at innings pitched, jumps for pitchers, the impact of that, the predictability of that, some player questions sprinkled in as well, and a humidor follow-up. Everyone's into humidors right now. It's the new sticky stuff

you know yay I get to report on another random totally annoying thing to discuss that no one can quite understand that's the best that's actually your beat

your beat should be all the things that are strange and that people don't understand yes there is already an argument about relative humidity versus absolute humidity versus dew point in the in the comments of my article it's lovely i like it no but i don't i i don't want to make fun of this because I do think it is hard to understand and the reason is with warm temperatures you can fit more water into the air

so in 90 degrees in Atlanta, yeah, there is more raw water in the air however in 70 degrees in San Francisco relative to the amount of water that can be in the air at 70 degrees, it's more humid. So I can see how that would be a tough thing to get across.

And then in the end, it's the relative humidity. This is one of the revelations from the article that came late. So we've talked about this a lot. I don't want to talk too much more. But one of the revelations that came late is absolute humidity matters. However, the recommendation from the Committee on Competition in the past has been that all balls should be stored at 70 degrees. So if you assume that all balls are stored at 70 degrees, then what matters is relative

humidity. And that's why we're here. Petco is the most humid. Therefore, Manny Machado is going to be one of the largest benefits of the humidor, I believe. So the debate rages on though. I love that there are debates about dewPont in the article. That's awesome. Let's get to the bullpen news or bullpen blues or both, really, depending on your perspective. I got at least 10 teams on the rundown today that we're going to talk about because their situations either have become more clear or have new entrance. It's like the Royal Rumble. more clear or have new entrance. It's like the Royal Rumble. It's just you don't know who's coming out from behind the curtain next to run down and dive into the ring and battle for saves

for a lot of these teams. But we'll start today with the Cubs. The situation there has been pretty fluid throughout this draft season. I think there's been a slight preference for Rowan Wick most of draft season, but he's been very cheap. They've added a lot of interesting bargain relievers over the course of the winter. David Robertson is there. Michael Gibbons is there. Chris Martin is there. And then they have Manuel Rodriguez, actually a young holdover that could be another option. And he's maybe the most exciting arm of all of these but maybe the least likely to have a significant share of the role from the jump just because of the limited track record that he has so what are you doing right now if you're looking at this cubs closer situation cost is not really

an issue these are late round darts right now if you want to take a chance on this bullpen i like manuel rodriguez i like chris martin i don't love rowan wick and i kind of want to fade the whole bunch i'm not sure that there's an obvious i want to put my finger on this guy oh that's kind of weird i don't want to put my finger on this guy. Oh, that's kind of weird. I don't want to put my finger on any of those guys. I just mean, I don't want to attach my name to any of these guys. You know what I mean? It's like weaseling out of this one. Partial save.

We're going to give you a hold on that one. Not a save, but a hold. But I mean, do you get what I'm saying? Like I just, it's not super clear to me. I think I would fade Wick. I have like, I got him once, but I, the reason I got him was because I thought I could, you know, handcuff him easily to Michael Givens. And then Michael Givens went, and then I was like, well, that's silly. My numbers say Michael Givens is better. Michael Givens went. And then I was like, well, that's silly. My numbers say Michael Givens is better.

So if there's anybody that Pitching Plus likes, it's Michael Givens. However, Michael Givens hasn't appeared yet in a spring game, I believe. Fun. I actually like David Robertson here. There you go. I think he's going to go. I mean, I had a 12-team league.

I was the co-manager the other night. I think we got him in the 27th round. So again, what are your last few picks? And the reason I like David Robertson is because the last times we've seen him healthy, he's been very good, right? If you look at 2017, 2018, 2021, the Sierra was under three each of those years. Plenty of strikeouts. The walk rate kind of flirts with that high end of what you're willing to accept. But I don't know if the home run issue we saw in 2021 or in 2019 can really be considered a home run issue because we're talking about a combined 18

and two-thirds innings and i know the the stuff plus number was actually pretty good on robertson for the little bit we saw him in tampa last season that's been important in the past it may not be as much anymore with a more refined idea of what stuff is you know but it's not classic closer view no but i could just see it being kind of like the i don't know the ian kennedy situation a year ago mark melanson this big curveball gets the outs you know older reliever that just is comfortable in the situation and gets through it despite not having the same weapons that he used to have. That kind of makes sense in my mind

and you can just mix and match everybody else. And I do think one of the things that is a bit of a separator when I'm looking at these crowded bullpen situations is any pitcher that might have some legitimate workload restrictions. I think the best pitcher that this might apply to right now is Ken Giles. If you have someone that you can only use 70% of the time when you'd want to use them,

you're probably going to keep them in the simplest, clearest, you're going to get up now and you're going to pitch in this spot. And I think that could actually apply to someone like Robertson, given his age and recent injury history too. So he's the guy I like the most of this bunch. But I think as we move through these other teams, we're going to find that there are other situations that I might have ranked ahead of trying to sort out what the Cubs are going to do. I want to ask you about the Padres. A couple of injuries there.

Pomeranz on a long-term IL stint right now. Luis Garcia, who I liked throughout the winter, is hurt right now. Yeah, he's banged up right now too. And it seems like it's whittling down to Emilio Pagan and Robert Suarez. Robert Suarez seems to be a little more of the draft market favorite for this opportunity. But there's another possible option lingering out there. If they want to use Denelson Lumet in short relief, he'd make a heck of a closer.

Yeah, that's the bold prediction. I believe he didn't use the word bold prediction because then he would have had to send me some money. You'd have been just kidding. Just kidding. I mean, I was one of the very earliest adopters. I don't know. Some would have to do a deep dive on that one.

But Jeff Passan did a bold prediction that Denilson Lemaitre would be the closer for the Padres, and he would do a good job of it. I could totally see it. He's a two-pitch pitcher. Bad command, bad injury history. You know, a lot better with the high VLO. So I think he's a natural. I mean, it's kind of a guy that people thought would be a reliever going in.

So I think that's a possibility. Pagan, every season there's one beat writer who says that it's going to be Pagan. And every season so far it hasn't been. He's been giving up runs, but striking out five and three and a third, whereas Suarez has been striking out more than I expected, five strikeouts in three innings after some reports that he was more of a sinker baller. Pierce Johnson, five strikeouts in two innings,

just keeps humming along, has the stuff plus to close, but not the velo and not seemingly the support of the masses. I, again, find this one really difficult to prognosticate. There is no incumbent with a history of closing games, so you can't even go with a closer experience, as useless as that might be, or useful. And the Velo candidate is not even really super clear, although I guess that's Pagan.

I don't know what he's throwing these years. I wish I had Vilos on everybody. And I suppose Suarez has the cleanest slate this spring, although not really. Pierce Johnson hasn't given up a run. So why not Pierce Johnson is what I'm saying. Why not Pierce Johnson? Give it to him.

He was there last year. He did a good job. And his roles, I think, were very low leverage initially and became more high leverage as the season rolled along so i could see it i think this is one where i want to figure out who it is because i think it's going to be one of the better payoffs of a lot of these teams because i think this might actually be a one closer person yes but that's the thing i think the common theme here for me is of all these teams that say they're going to share these save opportunities, how many of them are lying?

How many of them will fall into a pattern? How many of them will eventually have a seventh inning guy and an eighth inning guy and a ninth inning guy? Oh, man, I wish I could remember who it was. But there is somebody who said it will become obvious and you will know and we will know. That was what a manager quote was. That's just like life philosophy you know nothing makes any sense but one day we'll all make sense and you will know oh great i love that also for the perspective of being report a reporter like asking them that

question i would just i would laugh pretty hard if that was the answer to my question, who's the closer? All right, so you're pushing Pierce Johnson, and you like this situation maybe a little more than the Cubs? You're more likely to take a shot on Johnson than you are on Manuel Rodriguez? I think they're going to be a better team. I think they're going to create better saves chances. I think it's a better bullpen, so it's not going to be a big mess all the time. And I think Pierce Johnson is the steady Eddie candidate who's the closest to having done it before.

Yeah, I realize I don't know enough about Robert Suarez to say he's no good or he's good. So given that Pierce Johnson costs almost nothing compared to Suarez costing something more, yeah, at price, Pierce Johnson. And for what it's worth, at price, Pierce Johnson. And for what it's worth, at price, it's Michael Gibbons for me in Chicago. I'm just a little bit more likely to avoid it.

Fair enough. I think in this San Diego situation, if I've got five remaining drafts that aren't AL only, I think if I had one each of Suarez and Pagan, that would probably be optimal for me. So this no help whatsoever from the two of us combined. We kind of say we are waffling. Try, try to get in there.

But, you know, we don't know. We'll know later. The Rockies are pushing for a three-man committee. I took a late flyer on Alex Colomay in mixed out wars two weekends ago. That's probably my first and only Colorado reliever on any roster this season. That was a desperate late $1 dart throw, hoping that pre 2021 Colomay might show up and we'd get that rare Colorado closer that actually does just hold the job for most of the season and roll up 20 to 25 saves along the way. But if it's a three-person committee the entire time, given the ballpark, given some of

the flimsy underlying skills that each of those three can show, it turns into a nightmare. And it's weird to me that Robert Stevenson wouldn't be the guy that is actually their best reliever in closing, but maybe they're doing the thing where they're using Stevenson to get those toughest three outs and then just letting the chips fall where they may with the rest of their relievers. Yeah, it's funny. Early in draft and hold season, it was Carlos Estevez,

and then Alex Calame was signed, and then the manager said, we want a strikeout closer. Well, Alex Calame is not the historical strikeout closer, but guess who we want a strikeout closer well alice colman is not the historical strikeout closer but guess who has the best strikeout rate out of any of these guys in spring colman has four strikeouts in two innings well yeah yeah exactly let's tied with carlos estevez with four strikeouts let's not go that route tied yeah exactly um historical strikeout rates say it's daniel bard i wouldn't be surprised if it came all the way back around the court carousel back to carlos estevez i kind of doubt with him saying that they want strikeout rate that it's going to be calming

well so i would say the favorites are bard and estevez if you're are you drafting either of them though um you know late late and drafting holds yeah because uh they might be closer to saves than say you know the third best reliever on a better team all right um i'm out i got my one one chance at getting it right for the Rockies, and no, I don't see enough there to pursue the others. Yeah, it would be much better if they announced one because you don't even really want a Rockies close. That's your point, right?

You don't even really want a Rockies closer, period. You don't want to take one where it's like a 50% chance at getting a Rockies closer. Yeah, exactly. I do think the next situation is pretty interesting. I liked Lucas Sims quite a bit earlier in draft season. He's got an elbow injury that has him on the IL. or rocky's closer yeah exactly i do think the next situation is pretty interesting i liked lucas sims quite a bit earlier in draft season he's got an elbow injury that has him on the il to begin the season it seems like art warren is the favorite to be at least he doesn't get mentioned in a couple

places that was interesting yeah and louise sessa is among the the other names that they could consider for the role so is there anyone else popping for you in the cincinnati bullpen while sims is unavailable that is going to be sessa or strickland and i was like dude i'm sorry it cannot be strickland in that ballpark in that park what are you doing no come on i'm fading that one and sessa's just not, I don't know. He's just not what I think of. I think of Sessa, and I thought they acquired him as such, as like Nestor Cortez-ish, you know, like a lefty. He is lefty, right?

Pitching staff spackle. He's the kind of guy that you use when someone goes for it. Yeah, Sessa's a righty. But I did think that he could do more than one inning. So I thought he was like a righty Nestor Cortez where it's like two, three innings. That's what I want out of Cortez, by the way. And that's neither here nor there. Warren is still my favorite.

I like Warren. Ryan Hendricks throws really, really hard, but pitching stuff does not like the shape of his fastball. And I think that does become more meaningful when you're talking about homers or not homers. And that becomes even more meaningful in Cincinnati than it is in Arizona, amazingly. So I still think it's Warren, even though he wasn't mentioned.

I think Sessa would be a weird pick, and I'm absolutely out on Hunter Strickland as much as he's been a nice person when i've talked to him yeah i just i don't think that's a good fit of skills and ballpark for that particular role i think if you put them in a very cavernous environment then maybe you could talk yourself into giving that a shot in a situation like what they have walk rates don't actually have a correlation to save opportunities and i think it's because it takes a lot of walks to blow a save right you if you have a high walk high strikeout guy he could

walk one or two and then strike out the side and you're just and you're like well that got a little hairy but it's fine home run rates are like oh we lost the game uh and that's what i see with hendrix and and with hendrix and strickland so maybe sessa is like uh you know got a little bit more of an ability to keep the ball on the ground, but Warren has the best combination of everything. So it gets worse as you dig further into these teams that are not sure about what they're going to do.

The Rangers, for some reason, aren't necessarily making Joe Barlow the closer right now. See, here I call BS on the whole thing. I say BS, you manager. see here i call bs on the whole thing i say bsu manager i say you are trying to take the pressure off your young closer and telling him don't worry it'll be or you're trying to put the pressure on your lung closer whatever it is you're just talking that's what i say because joe barlow is very very clearly the best reliever on that team. And he went 11 of 11 on save opportunities last year.

I don't know why you would be like, oh, and now we're going to give it to Spencer Patton, who strikes out not as many players as you, wasn't as good as you last year, and didn't have as many save opportunities, and has a 12 ERA in spring. I know, I know, I know. I'm just saying. you know what I mean? Like why, why would it be Spencer Patton? It doesn't make any sense. Could it be Matt Bush?

Cause he throws hard and he's, he's a great story. He's coming back and he does have some experience maybe, but I say cream rises at the top. Joe Barlow keeps his job. Joe Barlow is still a good pick. I think if there's a legitimate threat of anyone else, it's Greg Holland because of old and done it before, which is not necessarily the only reason you can be a close word here. He's lost three miles on his fastball and never could command it.

I'm not in. I was actually surprised that he ended up on another roster. I kind of thought last year might have been it. But here he is, maybe pushing for some early saves. I would still be on the Joe Barlow plan. In fact, I think if there's a dip as a result of this news, it's kind of an opportunity to get in. Yeah, I think you buy in this case. I'm curious what you're doing, though. I know you've liked David Bednar throughout draft season. I've liked him as a value relative to

other closers. And now the pirates are talking about him sharing with Chris Stratton. There's not enough there to share. That to me is the problem. A good team can share saves. A last place team can't really share saves because then the pie is too small. And they're both righties. So it's not going to be like a righty lefty situation.

I don't know what uh i don't know what the thinking is i do i did have a revelation about this uh this morning as i was walking the dogs and oh my goodness dude we went to a dog psychiatrist and the dog psychiatrist has put us on a training plan where every time the dog sees a human or another dog, I have to say yes and give it a treat. And it has turned me into this babbling idiot that's like, we like dogs. We like people. We get treats, you know? And so the whole walk is so exhausting.

Also, we have two dogs and they want us to walk them separately. So now the answer always, if there's a problem in your life, work harder, right? walk is so exhausting also we have two dogs and they want us to walk them separately so now the answer always if there's a problem in your life work harder right it's gonna be more work to get out so anyway uh i don't know well oh i still managed to have a revelation about baseball doing all this babbling crazy talk shaking my microphone i'm like laughing i'm belly laughing at my desk which which, you know, of course came from Amazon and is very flimsy,

is shaking. So I'm trying to hold everything together over here. You should see it someday. It's ridiculous. But the chances of our dogs being friends and you being able to bring the dog over sometime are going up. They're going up.

They're getting better. Now they look around, they look for dogs. So they're like, oh, I get a treat if I see a dog. In fairness to our friendship, I put the expectation at zero. Because you met my dogs. I met your dogs a few times.

And Hazel's great about leaving other dogs alone. And I just thought, that may never happen. So if it does, that's wonderful. But I'm going to set my mind that that's just probably never going to happen. And, you know, we'll see. And it had to do with when I did some work for, you know, the lockout.

I was trying to look through and I was trying to look through the different possibilities of what they were discussing, right? Like, oh, remember that they had that thing where it's like, if you are over, if you're over

29 and a half and you have four and you and you're in your third year of arbitration or second year of arbitration you become a free agent something like that right so i was looking into the financial impact of that and what it would cost the owners to do something like that and blah blah what i found was the number of people number of baseball players that are in their third year of arbitration per team is around one and a half. One and a half. And that's weighted way more towards the big market teams having like two or three and small market teams having zero. Many small market teams have nobody in their third year of arbitration. And so we've had this history of being like, oh, do teams want to try and keep players cheaper by moving the saves around? Do they, you know,

try to keep young pitchers from getting too expensive, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I think that's actually, that was my revelation was the reason we haven't been able to prove that in the numbers is because there's a large part of teams who don't care, you know, just want to win games now. And then even the cheap teams can probably be like, is David Bednar going to be here in five years? Is he going to be here in five years is he gonna be here in three years he could he would actually probably create more trade value as a closer than it would cost us in money in the short term and

he's not gonna be here at the end anyway you know and so like we're not gonna pay the tax of the second year of arbitration the third year arbitration for a closer because he won't be a pirate you know so like put that tax on other people right like rack up his value in arbitration that's what i'm saying on somebody else like yeah like you like make him a viable trade candidate you know i think when my mind works like that when i'm like oh yeah make it worse for someone else like that's awful that just means that I have like that little bit of evil business mind. And I just need to get that out. That's terrible.

Well, anyway, I obviously do because I made this, had this revelation. But I actually think that in the end, the better pitcher will get more saves in Pittsburgh. I think it's pretty clearly David Bednar. So there may be some bumps in the road. Maybe he only gets, maybe it's 2010. Maybe it's like, you know, 20 for Bednar,

seven for Stratton. Maybe he does rob some saves. But I would say the general expectation, and this is something you can probably hear as we're going through these, the general expectation for me is no longer one guy gets all the saves. And I think this is where maybe we cross over into general strategy

on saves. I think this is obvious even in Milwaukee, even in Chicago's South Side, places where people are paying really big dollars for their closers. Craig Kimbrell is still there, man. I think he's going to get some saves. there's going to be some days where they're like hey let's give Hendricks a blow you know and in Milwaukee Hader came up in a system where he was the setup guy forever and then there were

years where he didn't even get as many saves as you expect yes he's a really good pitcher and the things will be so low and the strikeouts will be so high that yes it's still probably worth investing in on him but like this i this problem in baseball of the closer by committee is pervasive it is here to stay and there's nothing to do about it except for maybe have four or five closers on your team reduce the expectation for how many saves you're going to get i've wondered if how much this how much this strategy can vary based on the format that you're playing.

So if you're in a 10-team mixed league, okay. How many of these committee guys do you really want to have on the bottom part of your roster? Oh, yeah, don't even bother. I think that might be the kind of league where you're just going to find saves as opportunities are clarified. That's the kind of league where i might take hater or hendrix in the in the second or third because especially if you had like two rp slots on 10 team league yeah man like get one of the best because you don't want to be fooling around with in the in the dirty water well i think you can yeah you can churn so many other roster

spots in a league of that size that if you're not churning when everyone else is churning that gives you a potential advantage i think you know in 12 and 15 teamers especially then it becomes more difficult because you have to decide on draft day how much of my roster can i allocate to uncertain relievers and then how quickly am i going to drop them right we're going to get a look at a series from every team when the season begins and then we I going to drop them, right? We're going to get a look at a series from every team when the season begins, and then we're going to have in weekly leagues free agency running on that Sunday night. So will three to four days be enough of a peak for you to say, yeah, you know what? I took one established closer early with the inflated tax, whether it's Hader or Hendricks or Presley or Diaz or Iglesias or Chapman or Romano, Jansen, whoever you like.

It doesn't matter who for the sake of this argument. You got one. And then you went and you took a shot on four more relievers late. Maybe not at the end game, but one kind of round 18 and then the last three after round 24. This is my general strategy right here. Yeah. I think this is a pretty common strategy. Yeah, I think this is a pretty common strategy.

Do you just immediately burn through all of those relievers you drafted based on the information you get from the first weekend, knowing that if all of these teams that we're talking about, maybe a few others, are using committees, that what they did the first weekend isn't necessarily indicative of what they're going to do through the next couple series. What if Stratton gets the first save series. Bednar still gets 25, right? Right. Are we walking into a trap if we churn too quickly

when we're talking about these committees? I think the investment cost in these players is so low for the after-round 25 guys especially. In a 12-team league, you're drafting those players, thinking about week one, and then preparing yourself to cut them in most cases for week two because you're streaming those players thinking about week one and then preparing yourself to cut them in most cases for week two because you're streaming pitchers or you're looking for somebody who's got favorable hitting matchups. I mean, that's just how smaller leagues tend to work. But I wonder

how much because people tend to overpay early for players because the mindset on the waiver wire is I have to get guys right away because jobs change hands quickly. And the longer I have a player, the greater the impact is he's going to make. I agree with that as a general premise. You should be aggressive early in fab, but it might be actually one of the worst years, one of the worst times ever to be extra aggressive with early saves if we trust that these teams are going to be as fluid as they say they're going to be extra aggressive with early saves if we trust that these teams are going to be as fluid as they say they're going to be and that's why i just find this this whole mess to be really tricky like how firm do you want to be on the guys you draft and how quickly are you going

to buy in when you start to see a team that was talking about a committee leaning into maybe one or possibly just two out of their three plus candidates. Yeah, there is one piece of news that we haven't gotten to yet where it's pretty easy. And I thought Peter Fairbanks might be one of the bulk guys there along with Andrew Kittredge. And the news is that he's not even going to be ready for six weeks. So I actually, I'm happy about that to some degree because I'm like, hey, there's my dropper. There's the guy I, at least I know because there's, it is one of the hardest things is that first ADP run. I'm already setting it up. You know, I'm already starting to like put players

in those, in those categories. And I'm looking for a guy to drop off my roster because you still have that like oh i just drafted him glow you know like well i draft him because i like him you know like and then you have to be like well i had to drop one of these guys uh so fairbanks was uh made it easy on me jalen beaks is throwing 96 so he might actually be the the sort of bro hug to Andrew Kittredge's mostly taking the saves. I think that just makes Andrew Kittredge a little bit more of a traditional closer, and he's at 97, which is sort of amazing. I think there's been times where Kittredge has thrown like 91 for a season. But he's at 97, and I think he's the closer. I think he's mostly the closer. I think he's still going to get like 20 saves.

And if he's on your wire, I think that could be a nice little handoff where if you're really nervous about somebody, then make that switch. But I'm still keeping Joe Barlow. I'm still keeping David Bednar. I'm not dropping those guys yet. But if you want to get out of the Rowan Wick situation, you could drop Rowan Wick for Andrew Kittredge. There might be some leagues where that is a possibility.

Yeah, I think Kittredge is among the early winners where because the Fairbanks absence isn't just a couple of weeks. This isn't quite the red situation where Lucas Sims might be back reasonably quickly. It's going to be a prolonged absence for six weeks, I think, for Fairbanks. Yeah. So I'm looking at the Rays historically and I know we were always mix and match. Alex Colomay had 47 saves in 2017 for the Rays. Alex freaking Colomay.

He had 37 the year before that in 2016. Sergio Romo got to 25 for them in 2018. That wasn't that long ago. They usually have one guy who gets over 20, right? Even recently. Even Emilio Pagan in 2019, he had 20. Yeah. Emilio Pagan had 20 saves for the Rays in 2019.

I forgot about that completely. I think it's a little bit of comfort and familiarity, and just the manager just feels like, you know, this is my best idea here. Right. And Diego Castillo probably would have got to 20 last year if they hadn't traded him to Seattle in July. He was at like 18 or something, right?

14. 14, yeah. He probably got six more in the final two months, so they would have had a 20 save guy last year. And if you drafted Deo Castillo, you got 14 saves in five months and you got really good numbers and you probably got value

out of him. I had a 12 teamer. Yes, it saves was holds, but Deo Castillo was a really good part of why I won that one. If he was your third source of saves last year, you'd be fine with it. Cost-wise, I don't think he was priced up above that. I think that's how he was treated,

like a third closer option. I think Kittredge, I wouldn't be surprised if he gets a late bump in terms of just how people treat him, but I'd be in on the increasing price because things have thinned out there, and I think there's more fear than there should be with the way that the rays manage that bullpen i do want to talk about something though we're talking about you know strategy and should

you bid up at the top because now we're talking about all this mess at the bottom right and it's just like all the churn and stuff and so some people see all that churn and like my first reaction is oh look at all that churn why would i invest a lot in closers it's just a lot of churn other people see that churn and say oh i better got to invest a lot to stay out of the churn. I got to get the good ones, right? And I think there's merit to both. I don't think that either one of those ideas is wrong. But I did want to look at some historical ADP. So here is 2021 Fantrax ADP for RPs, right? Hayter, Hendrix, Chapman, Diaz, Iglesias. We're all good on all those, right? Those guys are all still in that group of seven or eight closers

that everyone seems to think are safe. And they all had good seasons that year. Chapman had the worst, but it was still worth it. Next group, it gets a little bit dicier we get presley fine jansen fine-ish corinne shack total loss corinne shack though i'm not a victory lap guy i really am i'm not just i'm just pointing out i think with corinne shack though the warning signs were clearer with him than they have been with other closers that have failed us in the top 10 range at the position in the past.

Okay, but I would say that more about Brad Hand myself. Brad Hand was next. I was so out on that, you couldn't be more out. Right. And then Trevor Rosenthal was next. So in the second five, you're below 50-50. All right. Next group is Kimbrell, Devin Williams, Rafael Montero, Will Smith, Alex Colomay.

You're again below 50-50 on that. I'm not sure why people were drafting Williams quite that early last year. I never fully understood it. Next group is Taylor Rodgers, Richard Rodriguez, Matt Barnes, Amir Garrett, and Drew Pomerantz. Oh, super stable group. So, okay, let's go back a year. So you're below 50-50, except for the first five, which was a total hit. Let's do 2020.

I think you should just go back to 2019. Yeah? Because you don't like what you're going to hear. No, go ahead. Run the numbers for 2020. I think you should just go back to 2019. Yeah? Because you don't like what you're going to hear. Run the numbers for 2020. Hader, Yates, Osuna, Hendricks, Hand. You're what? You're three out of five.

It's not as good as last year. Three out of five on the first five. Okay, let's go back to 2019. You're right. 2019. Diaz, Trinan, Jansen, Chapman, Hand. Hmm. It might be five for five again. That was a better year than 2020.

Well, that was the year that Edwin Diaz fell apart. That was the, yes. That was the down year for Diaz. Number one closer. Is that anything more than normal variance for a short reliever? But that's part of my point. I mean, you have a lot more variance on a closer that you're judging off of 60 innings than you do off of a third baseman who got 650 plate appearances.

Yeah, I mean, just look at what's happened in the years that have followed. Diaz is still in the circle of trust. Yeah. 2018, Jansen, Kimbrell, Chapman, Osuna, Knievel. I don't even remember what happened that year. I would assume that Knievel didn't work out in Milwaukee that year. He got hurt one of those years.

Yeah. That might have been the year Osuna got the discipline. Yeah, the domestic violence suspension i mean i'm not taking a victory lap on that but i still think that's not that's three out of five no knable knable got hurt and it was 2019 he didn't pitch and then then there's a there's a last uh part for me which is that so we've talked about the top and so maybe the top five does have different outcomes than the rest i will give you that i would say that over the things that we looked at the top five hit four out of five uh i'm so sorry if you spend a third round pick on

one of these guys and you get the one but um uh there's also the idea that at the end of the year, when you do the values, there's always a lot of value that was on the wire or was a late pick, right? Do you have some earned value reliever numbers in front of you from Roto-Wire maybe? I mean, I will, but the problem with saves is that it's not, we know this,

this is why we've talked about it for 38 minutes so far today already, it's just that it's opportunity over skill, and we've been talking about it for years, it's something where the most skilled reliever over time is less likely to get these opportunities, to get these chances.

More likely. The most skilled reliever is less likely to get them now than they used to be because of the way bullpens have changed. Because we're now spreading it around. And that creates value. It creates value just because of the way someone who's the third or fourth most talented pitcher in that group

ends up being the most valuable in our game. That's why we have these rapid shifts in value that are very difficult to predict it's a long-term problem that i don't know what the resolution really is going to be we've talked about the stat category changes but yeah what do you think jake mcgee last season was actually worth in a five by five league we'll say say 12 teams. Very common format. We'll use the Roto-Wire earned auction values.

Like 10 bucks or something. Jake McGee, last season, it's loading, loading, loading. Jake McGee was $9, which that was with some struggles in the second half. And he was just announced as being the leader of the community there, I guess. Here's the thing that like nine dollars in a vacuum people are listening if they don't play auctions or don't

think about values this way or like what does that even mean what it means is edwin diaz was only worth 10 kimbrough's only worth 10 pressy was only worth 10 romano was only worth 10 class a was worth 11 this is more this is my point this is my point This is my point even more than the hit rates. You can get that value somewhere else on the wire late in your draft. So why spend so much at the top to get that? I know there's like a, you want to be sure of it. It's like floor versus fab shots in the dark and stuff. But I will never take a second round closer. See, I'll never do it.

Because I can get someone who's worth that on the wire or late in the pick. Like, it happens every year. I think that's more true in a 10-team league or even a 12-team league and less true once you get to a 15-team league. And that's a big difference in the formats. I think where you're seated in the draft order matters because what you're passing on in each spot changes a lot.

If you're at the one-two turn and you double tap closers, you're giving up on really good $30 to $35 players to get those closers. It does drop to about $20 players if you're at the turn two-three or something. At that point, the top end closers could actually make value. Now you're passing on, and from a starting pitcher standpoint, you're passing on like Sandy Alcantara or Lucas Giolito instead of like Woodruff or, you know, one of those guys. But then there might be a game theory fallacy here where if you aren't willing to take them at the 1-2 turn,

you're not going to get them. And no similar players theoretically exist at three four turn except for the fact that they end up existing in the end you just don't know who they are or you're less likely to know who they are uh yes i mean that's that's the crux of it that's that's what we're talking about um i just uh i just i feel like i find closers every year. I feel like I do find and saves. I do try to always have one. I do try to have my one. I try to have one good one.

But this year in my main event, I ended up with Bednar, Soto, Tyler Rogers, which is the worst collection of relievers coming out of that draft. which is the worst collection of relievers coming out of that draft. I would love to do an off-board bet with you right now. Where do you think I end up in saves? All right, 15-team league with that start. I want to see what odds you give me. I'm not going to suggest it.

I want to see what odds you'll give me. Where will you bet? What's the over-under? Place in the standings and saves. I think you've got to set the spot right around six and a half standings points in saves with that start. That's like eighth? Eighth or ninth, something like that.

I'm taking the over, baby. I'm betting on myself. Taking the over. Highly encouraged on this podcast. Always bet on yourself. We'll have to figure out what's on the line. Soto encouraged on this podcast. Always bet on yourself. We'll have to figure out what's on the line. Soto's having a good spring. Chris Stratton might not be that good. So there's

ways to feel good. Plus, you get to churn. You get to take chances. And I think if you trust your model, if you trust what you see, you can trust what's happening. I have that shot. I have a place on my roster that's going to be dedicated to prospecting for saves. That's the opportunity cost here. I have to have a place on my roster that's going to be dedicated to prospecting for saves. That's the opportunity cost here is I have to have a place on my bench that is a reliever

that I'm trying to get ahead of the saves thing. Apologies to anybody who's tuned into the podcast for the first time just in the last week or so that we're obsessing over relievers as much as we are going into the last week in a draft. But this is the biggest part of the puzzle for a biggest late swings too right and i think you know we'd like getting one of those top closers i still like cory knable where he's going even look at the more recent adp numbers i mean in some rooms that are pushing closers a lot you might have to go to like pick 85 or 90 to get them but the adp there is is about 125 in NFBC leagues over the last five days.

I think he's kind of in that sweet spot of a guy that could just be really good and have all of the job to himself. So he's definitely among my targets in that range. I know the Dodgers are saying that Blake Trinan's embracing the fireman role. Still comfortable with him in the same range because fireman could be ninth inning sometimes just based on how it goes. This point there, Brewsdahl Gratterall is a lesser version of Blake Trinan.

Like he throws the same pitches. He throws the same pitches and he's not as good. So there's no way if I'm the Dodgers manager that I pitch Blake Trinan in the seventh and then throw Brewsdahl Gratterall in the ninth against the same team. No way I'm doing that. So maybe it's Vessia, maybe it's Hudson,

maybe those guys get some time, but I don't think it's Gratterall. I'm going 20-10-5. 20 saves for Blake Trinan, 10 for Hudson, and 5 for Alex Vessia. And I'm doing a similar thing in San Francisco. If McGee holds a job, he was one of the largest droppers. I don't really want McGee because he was one of the largest droppers

after Sticky Stuff Enforcement. He has one pitch. I could see him losing the job. But I think Tyler Rodgers is going to get like 10 to 15 saves and have like a 190 ERA again and be like the surprise out of that bullpen again for some reason and a really good deeply pick not a good 10 12 team pick um and so that's what i wanted to say about san francisco i know we said on the closer preview that lou travino's skills make him one to

pretty much ignore at the price but it seems like of all of these guys, he's actually closer to having a job to himself. So are you in this landscape of committees around every corner? Are you more willing to accept a skills flawed, has the job option in someone like Trevino, who also now ticks the box of being on a bad team where wins might be very difficult to come by? I just, I think I like puck a little by. I just, I think I like Puck a little bit.

I just don't, he's almost on my do not draft list. That's where he's been for me, but I'm finding myself more tempted with him. But the other guy that's on my radar who wasn't even just a few weeks ago is Matt Barnes. I'm warming back up to the Matt Barnes at price worth taking the chance on. Whitlock is like stretching out and i don't

know what that means i want to look real quick i have the mlb spring stats up let me look at the red socks let's look at how many so what what does stretching out mean it means like five innings and three appearances or something right is that our guess five innings in two appearances he might be a starting pitcher if whitlock is a starting pitcher there's nobody else I think is taking that job from Barnes so there could be some value in that spot as well so hopefully there's some paths here if you don't get what you want up top or if you're trying to support those saves with some viable middle range options I think there's a handful of guys you can get before you fall into the committee carousel situation. Let's get to some other mailbag questions here.

There's one here from Gary the Great about innings, pitch jumps. More or less, Gary was just asking if we have more ability to predict year-over-year increases than we think. Not just you and I, but the community at large. He was curious if any of us or other people we know have looked at past player performances and more toward the organizations and manager preferences to see if teams have trends that they like to follow. So the examples he used in the email,

Tampa as an organization that limits pitcher innings per start, which they do for a lot of different reasons, younger guys, injured guys. Also optimizing for performance. Avoiding the third time to the order penalty, and then older school managers like Dusty Baker, and maybe Bob Melvin's like this too, that might push their starters further in games

maybe than they even should. So what do you think about this being a little more predictable than the broader community might make it out to be. I do know that Alex Anthopoulos once in a press conference said that everybody just increases workloads by 20% and they don't know why they do it. You've mentioned this before and I kind of chuckle

because I'm like, it can't be that, it just can't be that much of a blindfold situation. It can't be, right? Like, was he chuckling as he said it was he messing with people like what i mean he does say things like that sometimes with a tone is important yeah it could have been a joke but i would say that i think that workload is uh being understood in a in a different way um and the best teams now are tracking every little thing about how you throw.

They'll put a pulse, which is like a thing that actually directly measures stress on your elbow. And they'll put that on you while you're throwing bullpens. They'll look at your arm slot and your velo in bullpens and in games. And they'll judge your fatigue. There's this whole sort of acute to chronic where you're supposed to build up the ability to go out and pitch by working all the time. Pitchers pitch all year round now, right? So it is kind of funny to be like,

pitchers pitch all year round now. They basically don't take any time off and yet we're gonna say, no, that's enough. That's enough. And the whole idea is that acute stress, which is game day stress, is worse. And then you have to build up the chronic stress the working out the ability to do that acute and there's a relationship between the two

so i would just say that it's super complicated the stuff that's out there about innings jumps i think is not very good tom verducci has a thing called the Verducci effect, where if a pitcher jumps more than 20% or whatever, they get injured. I believe that the methods he used were faulty and that it's been basically debunked by people at Baseball Perspectives and other places. So I don't think that you look at a big workload jump and say, ooh, watch out for that guy. That guy's going to be in trouble. So I don't think that you look at a big workload jump and say, ooh, watch out for that guy. That guy's going to be in trouble. So I don't do that.

And as for trying to predict what Shane Boz will do this year, I still use the 20% figure and shrug. I look at what they did last year, I add 20% to it, and that's sort of my baseline. I think Corbin Burns is also mentioned in Gary's email too, because he went from 59 and two thirds innings in the shortened season to one 67 last year. That's going to be true for almost everybody.

Right. So you have that kind of lingering there, but I think the other wrinkle with that is if you look back at Burns in 2019 Burns through 71 and a third innings between AAA and the big leagues in 2019. So it's been a little while. He was transitioning from the bullpen a little bit. 2018, he got over 100.

He got to 116 that year. So even if you go back to his previous high, all the way back in 2017, he was 145 and two-thirds working as a starter between high A and AA back then. 167 is only 20-plus more than that. Would have been more had he not missed time because i do like to look at previous highs i actually think if you if you need something to think about the previous high in the minors gives you a little bit of a background context like how much more has

this has this person pushed themselves like last season versus their career max in volume how many times have they gone through the the acute stress process as you've called it right like how many times they've done that and just kind of see like are we far away like 80 to 100 innings away from their previous max or are we within that even though it's been debunked the verducci effect range where okay like we've seen a workload like this before and pitcher wasn't hurt after that. The role just changed. Like you can start to put together a little more background and come up with a story that might make a little more sense that they've, they've, they know how to go through arm care.

They know how to deal with that late season fatigue because they've done that before. I think that's kind of where I'm more interested in, in those past workloads. Yeah. I definitely look at, at look at past previous high, especially since we had 2020 as this big shrug emoticon in the middle of everybody's numbers. We're just like, I don't know. I don't know what they threw.

I don't know how they threw during COVID. I don't know who they threw to, what their program was. So, I mean, it is part of why injuries are at an all-time high over the last three years. It's COVID, it's the lockout, and it's not fun. If Burns is injured this year, I don't think it's necessarily because he had a large increase in innings. It might be because of the stops and starts that are associated with throwing during a lockout. And in fact, I think young pitchers might be at the most risk after this lockout because older pitchers

have their routines like you saw Max Scherzer come out right and throw five innings in his first start because it was March like 25th and he was like yeah dude by March 25th I'm normally throwing five innings I've just been following my normal arm care routine like I'm ready to go you know but then you see Luis Patino who's about to make his spring debut so and then if somebody might be like well that's because of an innings screen crease I'd be like no it's because he's a young pitcher you know who's who doesn't have an established arm care routine who hasn't uh who maybe didn't didn't follow his one one during the lockout you know and didn't have any conversations with his team so it's all really hard to point to one thing in any case but i do

like if a pitcher through and there's also a difference between relieving and starting if a pitcher through 85 innings last year um as a starter that just didn't get to the innings i would say yeah that guy could maybe get to 110 120 i think that's possible if the guy threw 85 as a reliever though I don't know how many more I give him as a starter because okay see Jeff Samarzo once said like you know 85 pitches 85 innings as a reliever is really hard he says if you do that two or three times in a row you're gonna have an arm problem and I know that's just like you know one pitcher sort of just anecdotal evidence, but we have looked at that. I have looked at that. And like Scott Proctor, 85 innings, two or three years in a row for the Yankees, it was never the same again. So I do think that there is a limit to what you can do as a starter he did the arm care routine he did the five-day plan he did he was a starter and he did it for most of the season like he did it for like more than half the season in today's you know numbers right so like that guy going 120 wouldn't i wouldn't bat

an eye at it yeah i think this is a recurring topic on our show because of the uncertainty that is probably always going to be there to some degree. And I think one thing that you hit on that is really important to keep in mind, too, the individual workload in the offseason, the training methods that are on the pitchers, they have changed. They've evolved. They've improved, I think, in many ways. But they still vary a lot from pitcher to pitcher, from young pitcher to old pitcher, from pitchers that have facilities and access to facilities to throw versus guys that don't. There's just a lot of extra variables tacked on that unless we get information from the players themselves to understand what they were doing, we're left to guess or left to wonder in a lot of these cases. Thanks a lot for that question, Gary.

Let's get to a question about Greg Allen, because I kind of forgot about Greg Allen. And he was a guy that I liked a few years ago in Cleveland. I thought he would be a good source of cheap speed. If you remember back in 2018, he actually had 21 steals for Cleveland, hit 257, 310 on base, not much power, but cheap speed plays. Right now he's battling for a spot in Pittsburgh. It looks like he's going to play a decent amount to begin the season. I'm curious. This is a broader question inspired by the mailbag question. Do you have any blast from the past types,

players that you used to like two, three, four years ago who have come back around with a new opportunity to compete for some playing time and appear to be winning some playing time in spring training. Actually, it's always on these teams, right? Anthony Alford, I believe, is also slated for some time in that outfield. And I feel like we've been waiting for Anthony Alford for a long time. I still think that the strikeout rate, you know,

he can hit the ball hard and and Greg Allen can make can make contact if you could only put the two guys together you'd have a hell of a player all for for anyone who doesn't know though was playing college football he was a two-sport athlete far into his early adulthood and I think that makes it very difficult to hit major league pitching. I think that his baseball age versus his actual age, there's a gap. And I think you can get kind of tricked by what you'd see on the back of the baseball card, what you'd see on the fan graphs page and say, ah, it's just not going to happen for Anthony Alford. I think when you have raw athleticism like that to be that good of a two-sport athlete,

that's the kind of player the Pirates should be giving some chance to. Whether that's part-time role, full-time role, I mean, that's obviously dependent upon who else they have and all these other factors. Greg Allen. Okay, so Greg Allen's interesting because we're always looking for cheap speed. He was in the Yankees system last year, and the numbers were pretty good. The only thing I'm a little worried about is for the brief time we saw him in the big leagues, the K-rate spike. I'm not going to take 48 plate appearances

and take much of that. He was really good in AAA. Again, old for the level. Still running. 26 for 28. Not a lot of power, though. 26 for 28, though, in 73 games. He walks.

Doesn't strike out a lot. Most of it stops. This is the kind of guy that emerges to have cheap speed, at least for NL only leagues, maybe even for deeper mixed leagues, though, just because of how that depth chart is kind of open at so many spots. Yeah, it is interesting. I'm biased towards the Anthony Alford types that hit the ball hard and only if they can make a little bit more contact because i think that major league front offices are biased that way with the with the influx of stat cast i think major league front offices are mostly looking at quality of contact barrel they want power at every position they don't really want to have a position

where there is no power however that might lead lead someone like Greg Allen to slip through the cracks and maybe he can be straw-like where he just gets enough doubles power, enough defense, and enough OBP to be an average major league player. I mean, his projections say that he can do that. He can get to a half a win in a third of a season. That gets him pretty close to being a league average player, which is two wins. So my bias is a little bit more towards Alford, but maybe Allen is the play here. They're definitely NL only.

I'm in a league that's a 20-team OBP dynasty where I could see him being a late-round pick. I think part of the reason I would carry that little bit of added interest to, though, is that the Yankees have had a lot of success in the past. Having depth players in the NRI role, getting those guys to add some power, but getting those guys to just break through and be productive. I think that they saw something in him, even though he's getting that chance in Pittsburgh now.

Kind of like the Urshela, you know, like, yeah. Or like the Dodgers with Sheldon Noisy. They saw something in Noisy. He's back with the A's now, so now I'm kind of curious what happens with Sheldon Noisy because he could play a lot in Oakland. Kyle Isbell might fit in this conversation. Not as old.

Tough home park. I think Kyle Isbell fits into this forgotten conversation because he's graduated from prospect list, I believe. So there's players that slip into that group every year. If he ends up finding playing time, they're intriguing skills. Put together a nice spring so far. AAA last season.

The Royals were hitting the ball so hard this spring. It's crazy. At a certain point, you're like, is the stat cast up broken? Is it working correctly? Yeah, we never wondered that. Oh, but there is some signal in the spring training stats. I just want to mention that Dan Rosenheck had a column where he found that including spring training stats

improved projections, and that mostly the signal comes from strikeout and walk totals and ground ball totals. So if you are looking at a player that is hot this spring, it's even possibly smaller sample than usual because of the short spring. But if you're trying to use spring numbers to find some sort of breakout, I would look at strikeout, walk, and ground ball numbers. Yeah, this is always that time of year where you start to kind of fall into the, well, it's a small sample, but these things are going well. So I'm interested again. I mean, I think we talked about Kestin here maybe a week ago.

We're saying, hey, maybe that Luis Urias injury, does that open up playing time? I didn't think it does because it's on the left side of the infield and all the resulting changes don't really let Hira play defensively. But he's hitting this spring. And I think with Rowdy Tellez and Hira, that could end up being more of an ongoing job battle than people would like it to be. I mean, there's plenty of people out there, myself included, probably you as well. I would like to just see them both in the same lineup. First base and DH makes that possible. That just became more complicated a few weeks back

when they added Andrew McCutcheon to the fold, though, because they expect McCutcheon to be their primary DH this season. Yeah, here is exactly what you're talking about. But I would point out he's hitting with a 32% strikeout rate. I guess that would be an improvement for him, but it's not such an improvement.

I would believe it more if he had a 20% strikeout rate. I would love it if he had a 20% strikeout rate. Have you looked at the video? Alex Fast had a tweet where he had his old swing and his new swing together, and I was like, i i see one like very tiny movement it's different i was trying to watch the old video because will salmon wrote about it for the athletics i was watching the old swing when it was broken and then i was watching him hit with the new swing i was like i don't think i see a lot here he used to do something

a little bit weird with his ankle before he picked up his foot. Now he picks up his foot. But it's a very small thing. I would be surprised if that was everything. If they didn't really fix him in a way that cuts the swing and miss, but they fixed him in the sense that he's at least still doing damage when he connects. Look, he was a 30% K rate guy

when it was working when he debuted back in 2019. 19 homers in 84 games with a 30% strikeout rate. I think the thing that we've always wondered about with Keston Hira was the K rates were good up through AA and it weren't horrible the first time at AAA, it was at 26%. What does that mean for his long-term strikeout rate? Well, I thought initially when we first talked about it,

there was room for him to get back down. The longer we go, it's just not happening. It's led me down this path of wondering, what else can we find in hitters' profiles at those other levels? What can't those pitchers exploit that could be a major flaw that big league pitchers can exploit? And with Hira— The big warning sign might have been when he got to AAA, his swinging strike rate went to 14%.

Right. As much as the strikeout rate going up, it was the swinging miss on every single pitch. Yeah, because I think at AAA, you're going to have guys that are fringy major leaguers, guys that have that crafty veteran approach. Command of secondary pitches. Mm-hmm. And better command makes a huge difference. So I think my expectations for Hira are that he'll be a useful contributor

in a real-life context this year. Stretches. I think there'll be an injury, right? Like he's the next guy for the Brewers, right? I think maybe'll be an injury, right? Like he's the next guy for the Brewers, right? I think maybe he goes down and then he's the first guy up. It's possible. Still has one year for options left. So they can do that if they want to.

But I think you have to wait for something to change in the depth chart before a guy like that gets an opportunity. That's a lot of guys that you're talking about this late in spring training. Anybody else that's caught your eye this spring on the position player side that you're like, oh, hey, there's an opportunity? I don't know if it counts. It's just one thing. But I saw Clint Frazier hit a pretty big dong the other day.

And he's not cut his strikeout rate either. He's got eight in 24, so that's an easy math to do. I don't even have to look at my calculator for that one. Jorge Alfaro's been hitting, and I've just sort of dismissed the possibility of him playing enough to be relevant, but with a catcher eligibility. If Nola doesn't get healthy, I think there's even catcher one possibility there.

I think there's the connection to Preller from Preller's time in Texas, and I've seen how that has led jerks in pro far to significant volumes of playing time. So I don't want to write off that something like that could actually also propel Alfaro to more opportunities than I expected. Aside from a nice run here in a half dozen Cactus League games, just kind of putting him back on leaderboards and back into our minds. We had a couple of important emails we shouldn't forget about. Yeah, we got a couple of very important emails.

We have a listener of the pod, a couple of listeners of the pod who have a friend, one of these listeners. It's his wife who is battling a rare and aggressive form of leukemia. Her name is Karen. She's the one in the fight right now. And there's actually an opportunity for people to do a cheek swab to find out if they're a match for blood stem cell transplant, which would be huge for her chances of survival. Without a match, her chances with chemo are about 10%. With the match, they would jump all the way up to 70%. So there's a link on the video right now if you're watching us on YouTube. I'll also post links in the show notes. Very important. The swab kits are free. They're looking for people between the ages of 18 and 40

in good general health. So if you meet that criteria, everything's done through Be The Match, which is a nonprofit that connects cancer patients to potential donors. So please, if you're able to do that cheek swab, register for that. I'll be sure to put link in the show notes for today. The other bit of help some people out that we can do here. There's an auction taking place right now. You may have seen Ron Chandler write about this on The Athletic probably two weeks ago now. We lost a friend in our community, Steve Moyer, I think four years ago now during the labor weekend. Steve was a friend to many of us in this space and he was survived by two daughters.

And Steve actually had a huge collection of baseball memorabilia he'd talked about for a long time. That was actually put up for auction recently. That auction will end on Sunday. It's an online auction. It's open to everybody. So I'll put the notes or the link for that in the show notes as well.

So if you're able to find some items that are of interest to you, all the proceeds from that auction go to Steve's Daughters, which is really huge just to be able to help out a friend of ours that we lost much too young just a couple of years ago.

So opportunities to help others are out there. Steve's one of those people you just miss him every time you get together for those live events and larger than life. Hilarious guy. 100% with you. So that's going to do it for this episode of Rates and Barrels. If you have drafts this weekend, good luck with your drafts.

Again, try to help out if you're able to do so. And again, if you have any questions, drop us a note. Ratesandbarrels at theathletic.com we are back with you on monday i'll update the pitching ranks uh today and uh good luck and thanks for listening