Oak’s Corner: Extreme Closer Chaos

The Week That Was

In a season where a number of players started incredibly slow and turned it on (see Matt Carpenter, Kole Calhoun) Rougned Odor is a prime example. Through the first two months of the season, including a DL stint for a hamstring injury, Odor was hitting .204 with only one homer and one stolen base through 31 games. Since the start of June, Odor has completely flipped the script, hitting .308 with 13 homers and eight steals in 54 games, again establishing himself as a valuable second baseman in fantasy leagues.

Looking at Odor's season at a whole, a couple impressive points stick out, most notably his .273 batting average a year after hitting a revolting .204. He has seen some real BABIP extremes over the last two seasons with a .224 mark in 2017 and a career-high .327 this season. Of course, it needs to be pointed out that in that higher BABIP is a nice bump in his hard contact, as he currently has a career high 43.2 percent hard hit rate. Odor has always been known as a guy who never takes a walk, but that has shifted a little bit this year as he currently carries a decent 8.4 percent walk rate, easily the highest of his career and he even somehow threw in a five-walk game earlier this month. He has clearly become a better overall hitter this year and that's really started to show in his fantasy numbers over the last two months. I'm always a bit hesitant on Odor based on his past profile, but I like the strides he has made while still maintaining his aggressive hitting mindset. I'm holding him and not selling him high off this recent run.

Mallex Smith has been on quite the playing time roller coaster in the 10 days since the trade deadline. When the Rays acquired Tommy Pham and Austin Meadows in separate deals, it initially looked like the Rays would employ a Pham/Kevin Kiermaier/Meadows outfield on a daily basis, pushing Smith to a strictly bench role. The Rays decided to send Meadows to Triple-A, pushing Mallex into a timeshare with Carlos Gomez, but then Pham broke his foot and Smith resumed his role of playing almost every day for the Rays and he even led off multiple times this week.

The interesting aspect of Smith's season is that he has actually been really good. Drafted in fantasy leagues merely for some stolen base upside, Smith has stolen 25 bases already to help out there, but is also hitting .298 in 367 plate appearances, truly a big plus in fantasy leagues. His walk rate is quietly good, too, for a guy with no power at 8.7, and that has led to him posting a solid .368 OBP this year (good for 60 points higher than Dee Gordon). In a season where finding stolen bases has been tough, his 25 puts him in a tie for seventh in all of baseball, and he has really turned it on as of late with seven steals already in only eight August games.

In his first two seasons in Tampa Bay, Smith fell right in line with his reputation as a stolen base specialist by not hitting the ball hard with a hard hit rate around 21 percent, and while he will never be someone with a big number in that stat, he has bumped it way up this year to 29.5 percent. I really like what I have seen from Smith at the plate and on the base paths in the last couple of months, and he would certainly be someone I'd try and trade for now that his playing time is locked in for a while if you need stolen bases in your league.

Streaming pitchers and finding starters in free agency has been tough in 2018, but one surprising guy who has been huge for teams so far this year is the Giants' Dereck Rodriguez. The son of Hall of Famer Ivan Rodriguez has been a godsend for the Giants and fantasy teams as of late, posting a 1.50 ERA over five starts and 36 total innings since July 1. On the season, Rodriguez has made 11 starts, compiling a 2.34 ERA over 73 innings. His strikeout rate is currently only 7.52 K/9, in line with his prior minor league seasons, but he did flash some strikeout upside with a 9.48 K/9 rate in 50.1 Triple-A innings before his callup to the Giants.

On the downside, he has allowed a lot of hard contact with a 43.4 percent hard hit rate along with an elevated 25.2 percent line drive rate. With those hard hit numbers, I have to imagine the .263 BABIP is going to rise and take his ERA along with it, which won't be a surprise to anyone. However, he's one of the guys who passes the eye test for me, especially in his recent starts. I really like how he mixes and commands four pitches, and he's able to get by with a 92 mph fastball by keeping hitters off balance. In his 11 starts, he has managed to give up more than three earned runs only once and has only allowed more than two walks in only two of his starts all season, a great sign for a rookie. He's going to experience some hiccups as all young starters do, but he pitches in a great home park and from watching his starts, I think he is a hold for me and I will just try and avoid the tough road starts.

FAAB Feelings

German Marquez – Rockies pitchers are always a tricky deal, but Marquez has been on a nice roll as of late. He has allowed three earned runs or fewer in six of his last seven starts with a very nice 3.15 ERA over 45.2 in that stretch. His last three starts have been especially impressive, throwing 20.2 innings (with at least six innings in each start) with 27 strikeouts against only five walks. He has seen a very nice strikeout bump so far this season to 9.72 K/9, and while his walks are a bit higher than 2017 at 3.15 BB/9, he struggled badly with his command in April and that is still affecting his walk rate and he has been under 3.00 BB/9 in each of the past three months. His velocity has maintained the 2017 bump to 95 mph, but this time with the velo bump, his swinging strike rate has also increased to a career high 10.9 percent.

Marquez has increased the use of his slider (which was a new pitch for him in 2017) to 14.4 percent, and it has worked well for him with a 5.9 positive pitch value on the pitch per Fangraphs. Marquez has two starts this week, and the good news is that they are out of Coors Field for the week (Marquez has been much, much better on the road this season), but they are against two good teams in the Astros and Braves. The Astros offense is struggling a bit at the moment due to injuries, but they are likely to have Carlos Correa and Jose Altuve back for that series. I like that the starts are away from Coors, but the matchups do temper my enthusiasm a bit, but with his current run of good starts and the strikeouts he has posted of late, I think he's worth a bid this week (he's available in about half of the NFBC 12-team leagues), especially if you find yourself needing strikeouts in your league.

Hunter Renfroe – There is no doubting the power in Renfroe's bat and he showed that in 2017, hitting 26 homers in 479 at bats in his first real run in the majors. The flip side to the homers was that it came with a .231 batting average and a 29.2 percent strikeout rate. In 2018, he has faced a bit of a time crunch in a crowded Padres outfield for much of the season and even did a 10-game stint in Triple-A, but I really like what I have seen from Renfroe, especially as of late. On the year, he has dropped his strikeout rate to 25.5 percent while also bumping up the walk rate to 8 percent. A closer look into his profile sees a massive jump in his hard hit rate from 34.6 to 46.3 percent, a number that puts him in the top 15 in all of baseball among players who have more than 200 plate appearances.

It is true that some of the improvements in strikeouts and walks can be traced to him sitting against some righties as they strike him out a lot more (28.7 percent strikeout rate vs. righties), but I find it a positive that he has hit righties hard with a 45.9 percent hard hit rate. He's only hitting .236 on the season against right-handers in 140 at-bats, but even with the strikeouts, if he continues to make that much loud contact, I think that number has to rise at some point. With the injuries in the Padres outfield and the fact that the team is far out of the division race, I think Renfroe is going to see a solid run of playing time (and has already started to, homering in four straight games) the final seven weeks as the Padres try to figure out how they will look in 2019. There's even some buzz that the Padres may try Wil Myers at third base when he comes off the DL to attempt to alleviate the outfield logjam. If you're in a situation where you can stomach a little bit of batting average downside for Renfroe's legit power ceiling, he could be a sneaky add for the rest of the season and he's readily available, as he's currently only 9 percent in NFBC 12-team leagues. (Note: I wrote this about 10 minutes before he just hit a ninth inning, game-winning grand slam off Joakim Soria, so his price will likely bump a bit after that).

A Closer Look

Well, the bullpen situations sure blew up in the last couple days. There's movement everywhere, and I detail four of the situations below. I didn't even get to Colorado as Wade Davis exploded yet again on Thursday night, allowing three earned runs and two homers while only registering one out. Bud Black has stood behind Davis up until now, but it goes without saying that if Adam Ottavino is available in your league, it's time to make that no longer the case.

In Miami, Kyle Barraclough has been taken out of the closer role after a slew of rough outings, and while it looks like the role could be shared, the most likely to slide into the role is Drew Steckenrider. Steckenrider was having a great start to the year before he hit a brutal stretch of outings where he allowed runs in four straight appearances including an 0.1 inning, six-earned run disaster against the Braves. Since that rough patch, he has been really solid, compiling a 1.80 in 30 innings with 28 strikeouts and 11 walks. The Marlins may not win many games over the final seven weeks, but the 27-year-old Steckenrider should slide into the role and has a good chance to stick, as the Marlins test to see if he could be in the mix for saves in 2019.

With the injury this week to Kelvin Herrera and the very slow recovery of Sean Doolittle's foot, the National closer goes another direction this week, as it appears Ryan Madson will take over the majority of the role, also as usual, his workload will be monitored. The Nats are still in the race in the NL East and should certainly win enough games where even two-thirds of the saves for them would provide some value to a fantasy team needing saves. After a 2017 where Madson rediscovered his peak form with a 1.83 ERA and the highest strikeout rate of his career at 10.22 K/9, Madson hasn't been quite the same pitcher this season. He currently sports a 4.32 ERA through 41.2 innings, and his strikeout rate has dropped to 8.42 K/9. On the plus side, Madson's velocity is actually the highest of his career at 95.8 mph, and his swinging strike rate has actually increased a tad to 13 percent. The veteran has slipped a bit off his late career surge last year, but with the job on a good team, he is a must bid this week needing saves. Just know he will not grab every save chance, because the Nationals will make sure not to overwork him.

The Brewers' bullpen situation gained a good amount of intrigue on Thursday, as Corey Knebel failed to retire a batter while walking three guys and ended up allowing four earned runs after Joakim Soria surrendered a grand slam to Hunter Renfroe before leaving the game early with a sore groin. After Knebel's exceptional 2017 where he emerged as one of the best closers in baseball with 39 saves and a 1.78 ERA, he has scuffled some in 2018 and also had an extended stint on the DL. After the implosion Thursday, Knebel's ERA is now 4.79 as he continues to have issues with free passes. His walk rate sits at 4.54 BB/9 on the year. After the game, manager Craig Counsell indicated that Knebel would see a couple of lower leverage situations coming up to try and get him right.

I think the job likely ends up going to back to Knebel at some point, but the leash has gotten significantly shorter, especially when one looks at the season Jeremy Jeffress is having. Pretty quietly, Jeffress has been elite all year long with a 1.32 ERA in 54.2 innings. He has raised his strikeout rate considerably to 10.04 K/9, a big note since the lack of strikeouts was always the concern on him, even when he was saving games for the Brewers in 2016. His swinging strike rate supports the bump in strikeouts. It sits at a career high 12.8 percent. All three of his pitches have a positive pitch value, and his move to throw more breaking balls than ever (only 54.4 percent fastballs) has clearly helped. With Knebel struggling and Soria dealing with a sore groin, Jeffress makes an interesting speculative play where you need saves. A quick hat tip to my friends and excellent NFBC players Nick Sackett and Brian Slack, as I noticed they added Jeffress in the Main Event last weekend for a mere dollar; being a week ahead on these relievers can make a huge factor in the standings the rest of the way.

Just before I submitted this article, the Twins traded Fernando Rodney to the A's. I'm not yet sure how I feel about Rodney shooting his arrows for the A's, but in fantasy leagues, the key is that this opens up the closer job in the Twin Cities. I want to see how the Twins handle a save opportunity this weekend, but the first guess of who takes over is Addison Reed who just returned from the DL and is signed to a sizeable contract.

After back to back fantastic seasons, Reed has struggled in Minnesota with a 4.60 ERA. Homers have been a big issue for him. He's allowed eight already in only 43 innings. His strikeout rate has dropped to 7.74 K/9 as his velocity has slipped to 91.1 mph, but one has to wonder how healthy he was prior to hitting the DL. I think the contract and past closer experience gives him the first shot, but if he's not physically ready to grab it, the next in line would be Trevor Hildenberger, but his ERA isn't anything special either at 4.50 as he has also struggled with homers. Without a report from the manager or a real game save opportunity yet, it's tough to guess what they will do there, but my current lean is to follow the money and bid Reed this weekend.

Series of the Weekend

Mariners at Astros – After a first half where the Mariners were playing fantastic baseball and were a great story, they have sputtered recently. They now find themselves seven games back of the division leading Astros after winning game one of their four-game set in Houston. The M's looked very secure in the pursuit of one of the two wild card spots in the American League, but the A's recent run of home runs and pitching sorcery has put the Mariners 2.5 games out of the playoffs at the moment. The downturn in their play was not completely surprising as they were winning a ton of one-run games and their run differential sits in the negative. The A's hot run out of nowhere has magnified the Mariners struggles, but even after the two teams swapped places, the Mariners still find themselves right in the playoff mix with seven weeks left, and the Mariners and A's could be swapping places all the way down to the final week.

With all of the good stories with the Mariners season, the one tough one so far has been that of Felix Hernandez. The former Cy Young award winner has had an amazing career, but after slipping over the last couple of seasons, he has fully fallen off this year. Coming into this series, Felix has thrown 124 innings over 23 starts and has compiled an ugly 5.73 ERA with a 1.44 Whip. The most startling thing looking at his profile is that the velocity on his fastball is now under 90 mph for the first time in his career and is only four mph different than his changeup, which sits at 85 mph. Hernandez has always suppressed hard contact well throughout his career, even in his past few seasons, but that also left him this year as his hard hit rate is at 39.5 percent, easily the highest number of his career. The Mariners announced on Thursday that Felix is heading to the pen for now; I thought earlier this year he might be able to "crafty" his way through getting guys out, but nothing he is doing right now reveals any reason for optimism.

The Astros have managed to stay in first place despite injuries to the middle of their order as Carlos Correa, Jose Altuve and George Springer currently reside on the disabled list, although Correa is expected back on Friday, and Altuve should be back soon after. Their insanely good pitching has carried them most of the season and they lead all of baseball with a sizeable margin with a 3.00 ERA as a team (really crazy!) and they have still not had to have anyone besides their five man rotation make a start all season long, although that will soon change with Lance McCullers hitting the DL.

With all the injuries on offense, the stability and production of Alex Bregman has been huge for the Astros. After a very quiet start the to the year where he hit only one homer in his first 35 games, Bregman has turned it on in a big way and now has 22 homers, 75 runs, 71 RBI and eight swipes in 112 games. Bregman had a lot of draft helium this offseason, and it peaked late in March as he ended up with an ADP of 33.5 in 34 NFBC Main Events drafts. That price looked rough early, but he has earned it since the start of May, and along the way he grabbed shortstop eligibility this year while filling in there for Correa. He made his 20th start there earlier this week to lock in that multiposition eligibility for 2019. His last two months will obviously have a say in his draft price next year, but I fully expect him to be a second-rounder and likely fall in somewhere around pick 25 in ADP next year.