The Diamondbacks have elected to not only remove Brad Boxberger from the closer’s role but also to do away with set bullpen roles entirely for the remainder of the season, manager Torey Lovullo explained to reporters this week (link via Nick Piecoro of the Arizona Republic). Rather than deploy a set closer (Boxberger) and setup man (Archie Bradley), the D-backs’ late-inning decisions will be determined primarily based on matchups. Boxberger, Bradley, Andrew Chafin, Brad Ziegler and T.J. McFarland will be among the matchup options sharing late-inning duties, per Piecoro. The 30-year-old Boxberger has a 4.41 ERA and has averaged five walks per nine innings this season, but he’s also racked up 32 saves and fanned 68 hitters in just 49 innings of work. He’s struggled in particular as of late, surrendering a dozen runs in his past 11 2/3 innings of work. Boxberger will be arbitration-eligible for the final time this offseason after earning $1.85MM in 2018.
More from the division…
- Dennis Lin of The Athletic takes stock of the Padres’ wide-ranging slate of Major League debuts in 2018 (subscription required), noting that 14 different players got their first taste of the Majors in San Diego this season. (Francisco Mejia, who came to the Friars with just 14 career plate appearances, is effectively receiving his first MLB audition as well.) While the results have varied, 2018 gave Friars fans their first look at a number of potential building blocks, including Luis Urias, Mejia and Joey Lucchesi, among others. Notably, Lin speculates that given the Padres’ wealth of outfield options and questions surrounding Franmil Reyes’ glovework, he could become a trade chip in talks with American League clubs this winter. The 23-year-old has batted .265/.316/.525 through 215 plate appearances this season, including a monstrous .313/.365/.635 slash with nine homers and a dramatically improved strikeout rate since being recalled from the minors on Aug. 5 (104 PAs).
- Though the Giants’ hopes of contending have long since vanished, the team doesn’t have any plans to shut down rookies Dereck Rodriguez and Andrew Suarez for the final weeks of the year to limit their workloads, writes Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area. Rodriguez, a former outfielder and the son of Hall of Famer Ivan Rodriguez, has quietly been one of the NL’s best rookies in 2018, working to a 2.35 ERA with 7.1 K/9 against 2.5 BB/9 through 103 1/3 innings of work after signing a minor league deal this past offseason. Suarez, also 26, has given the Giants 145 1/3 innings of 4.33 ERA ball with 7.5 K/9, 2.4 BB/9 and a 52.4 percent ground-ball rate. Both have presumably worked their way firmly into the rotation picture in 2019 and beyond with their 2018 showings.
Failed to mention the Dbacks’s best option: Hirano.
*Dbacks’
I was about to make the same comment. He’s the DBacks most reliable bullpen option right now
Or Diekman
I really don’t think you want Diekman closing a game
new manager , manager has cost 3 gaemes this week alone
Please for the love of God just make Hirano the closer.
This is a legitimate question but has a team with a closer-by-committee ever won a World Series? Nothing comes to mind but I could be missing some very obvious ones. I’m not talking about a guy struggling in the playoffs and not getting the call to end games later in the world series. I mean going into the playoffs without a closer
Last years Astros
Ken Giles was the Astros closer. He had 34 Saves.
The World Series they had no set closer. Won 4 games by not going to Giles
Oh wow nevermind i completely missed what he said at the end.
Giles lost the job by the time the Series rolled around.
And Brad Boxberger has 32. The only difference is the D-Backs canned him before the playoffs instead of during.
In other words they did NOT get to the post-season with a “bullpen by committee.”
Thank you for the confirmation.
The 1990 Reds were the first team I can recall who won the WS with a bullpen by committee. All of their back end pitchers were closers – Randy Myers, Rob Dibble, and Norm Charlton. Myers did get the lion’s share of save opportunities during the regular season, but Pinella went to best matchups in the post season.
“The Nasty Boys.”
Nothing comes to your mind? I guess you missed the World Series last year
If every guy with defensive limitations got traded to the AL like everyone allllwaayyys speculates there would literally be twice as many players in the AL
Nobody realizes that that young NL players who can’t field aren’t appealing to the AL clubs.
Most of the AL clubs currently use that spot for seasoned, reliable hitters who can’t field and have to be full-time DHs
Franmil Reyes is the exact kind of player Peter Angelos loves. It would actually be fun seeing how many Hrs he’d hit here. The bad outfield defense and strikeouts are never a deterrent for the birds.
I’m sure all they’d need to offer is intl $$$.
Hirano just lost the game. Bull pen has imploded down the stretch CR the D-Backs
This wasn’t an impressive bullpen on paper either. I’m not too surprised they’ve had their troubles. Archie Bradley is the only one who surprised me. Thought he’d be locked in as a shutdown reliever. Boxberger was never going to be a great closer and the other guys are just other guys. Nothing exciting in that pen.
We lost playoff hopes weeks ago
Hirano is the best late innings pitcher in that bullpen, has Lovullo given him a chance to close games? No. Yet he’s talking about all these other pitchers. All of the other pitchers he talked about are not closers, at least Hirano has done it before-he should be at least given an opportunity to close it out, and he should have been given that opportunity quite some time ago.