Going To The Well A Lot & Having It Go Well
Posted by Steve Lombardi on June 18, 2010
Call this one "Teams who have used their pen a lot this year so far and had pitchers do well when called" - for lack of a better name. Using Baseball-Reference.com's Play Index Pitching Game Finder, I asked it show me which teams, in 2010, to date, had the most game appearances by a member of their bullpen where the pitcher threw at least one inning and didn't allow any runs. Here's the leader board:
| Rk | Tm | Year | #Matching | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | SDP | 2010 | 134 | Ind. Games |
| 2 | TEX | 2010 | 115 | Ind. Games |
| 3 | NYM | 2010 | 112 | Ind. Games |
| 4 | ATL | 2010 | 108 | Ind. Games |
| 5 | PIT | 2010 | 107 | Ind. Games |
| 6 | CIN | 2010 | 107 | Ind. Games |
| 7 | LAD | 2010 | 106 | Ind. Games |
| 8 | HOU | 2010 | 106 | Ind. Games |
| 9 | WSN | 2010 | 102 | Ind. Games |
| 10 | TOR | 2010 | 100 | Ind. Games |
| 11 | STL | 2010 | 99 | Ind. Games |
| 12 | BOS | 2010 | 99 | Ind. Games |
| 13 | MIL | 2010 | 96 | Ind. Games |
| 14 | MIN | 2010 | 95 | Ind. Games |
| 15 | KCR | 2010 | 95 | Ind. Games |
| 16 | LAA | 2010 | 94 | Ind. Games |
| 17 | CHW | 2010 | 94 | Ind. Games |
| 18 | COL | 2010 | 92 | Ind. Games |
| 19 | CHC | 2010 | 92 | Ind. Games |
| 20 | SFG | 2010 | 91 | Ind. Games |
| 21 | DET | 2010 | 87 | Ind. Games |
| 22 | FLA | 2010 | 85 | Ind. Games |
| 23 | CLE | 2010 | 85 | Ind. Games |
| 24 | ARI | 2010 | 85 | Ind. Games |
| 25 | SEA | 2010 | 84 | Ind. Games |
| 26 | BAL | 2010 | 82 | Ind. Games |
| 27 | PHI | 2010 | 81 | Ind. Games |
| 28 | OAK | 2010 | 81 | Ind. Games |
| 29 | NYY | 2010 | 81 | Ind. Games |
| 30 | TBR | 2010 | 79 | Ind. Games |
.
Of course, you have to keep in mind here, if a team has a lot of starters who go deep into games, there's less need for pitchers to come out of the pen and show up in a game. And, that would have an impact on a list such as this one...
June 18th, 2010 at 3:01 pm
Perhaps it would be better to see how many times a bullpen has combined for one or more innings without allowing a run... but the advantage to this search is that it notes that one individual's excellent bullpen outing shouldn't get ignored if the next guy botches the job.
June 18th, 2010 at 3:42 pm
No surprise that the Padres are up there with Gregerson and Bell slinging. But the METS??!
Un. Sus. Tainable.
June 18th, 2010 at 4:11 pm
The meaning of the list is highly debatable. Teams that use their bullpens a lot, even with good results, tend to see that bullpen wear down by the end of the season. The Padres' bullpen may help them get to the playoffs, but will they have enough gas down the stretch?
June 18th, 2010 at 6:22 pm
Are these old eyes of mine failing {likely}, am I losing my mind {A sure bet, but let's not go into that}, or are the Rangers actually SECOND on this list? As I alluded in response to an earlier post, maybe having Nolan Ryan bulldogging the Rangers is their best move since they hired Teddie Baseball to manage them, back when they were still the {OMG!} Washington Senators.
June 19th, 2010 at 1:03 am
Curious that the Yankees and Orioles are so close together on this list, when they're so far apart in so many other ways.
June 19th, 2010 at 5:15 am
Not so curious I don't think. If starters don't go deep then there are more opportunities for a reliever to pitch a scoreless inning. Meanwhile someone named Mariano pitches a scoreless inning practically every appearance. Normalizing this list by total bullpen appearances would probably make a significant difference.
June 19th, 2010 at 1:03 pm
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