On a more serious note, Smith’s injury is just the latest in a litany of them for the team’s bullpen. Tyler Thornburg hasn’t made an appearance this season and is currently being shut down for a few days. Hector Velazquez was put on the 10-day DL recently. Bobby Poyner’s spent some time there, too.

Naturally, news of Smith’s DL stint created an all-too-familiar reaction:

.@EvanDrellich: No use in pretending Red Sox bullpen is fine https://t.co/EoVqYcx8aH

— NBC Sports Boston (@NBCSBoston) May 15, 2018

The trade deadline is 76 days away. The Red Sox will certainly be in the market for bullpen help.

If you're Dave Dombrowski, why wait? https://t.co/M4umftqGTm

— Chris Mason (@ByChrisMason) May 16, 2018

Red Sox NEED to renovate their bullpen. Exceptions, Joe Kelly and Craig Kimbrel. Everyone else needs to go.

— Ozzy Torres (@ozzyunchained) May 15, 2018

I get it. There are unquestionably deeper bullpens in baseball than that of the Red Sox. But before we go smash the panic button, a few things to consider:

• The Red Sox bullpen has pitched 147.2 innings this season, which is good for 19th in baseball. You can choose to view this as a bullpen that’s still relatively unproven or you can choose to view this as a bullpen that doesn’t necessarily need to be relied on as heavily as others, thanks in part to a talented starting rotation. It’s not the strongest point, but that’s why I listed it first.
• Before Wednesday’s game, the top four relievers this year, based on FIP, have been Marcus Walden, Joe Kelly, Craig Kimbrel and Heath Hembree. The latter three are not only healthy but playing a prominent role in the bullpen; outside of Matt Barnes, no pitcher has thrown more innings than the Kelly/Kimbrel/Hembree trio.
• The Red Sox bullpen has the seventh-best FIP in baseball. Their 8.6 percent walk rate is sixth-best in the league, and their 26.3 percent strikeout rate is fifth-best. Teams aren’t hitting the ball hard against them (31.3 hard-hit percentage — seventh-best in MLB), and they’re doing an average job keeping the ball in the park (11.7 HR/FB percentage — 15th in MLB). And people say this isn’t a quality bullpen?
• Losing Carson Smith for an extended period of time again would be a colossal bummer. With that said, Smith’s season… hasn’t been all that impressive so far. His strikeout rate hasn’t quite bounced back yet and he was walking over one more batter per game. There’s been a ton of hard contact this year, too. He hasn’t been bad, per se, but the Red Sox aren’t in danger of losing their best relief pitcher if he goes down for a while.
• Joe Kelly is good this year. We’ve talked about this recently, but it’s worth repeating because hell yeah Joe Kelly is good this year. This could easily open up Joe Kelly: Set-Up Man, which is not great for my nailbeds, but those are of little importance to you and quite frankly, not that important to me either, in a gross kind of way.
• This opens the window for Bobby Poyner, which is an intriguing silver lining. Over The Monster had a nice piece on Poyner the other day, and the addition of another dominant lefty reliever is always a fun wrinkle. In the best case scenario, Poyner settles in as a late-inning lefty, giving the team 100 percent more late-inning lefty options than they had before his promotion.

Let me be clear: the Red Sox could absolutely still use some bullpen help – but they could use bullpen help in the way that every team in baseball could always use more bullpen help. Losing an average-or-barely-above-average reliever is never good, but Smith wasn’t the backbone of the Red Sox’ relief pitching. Telling Red Sox fans not to panic is more often than not an exercise in futility, but please, Red Sox fans, don’t panic about this. Panic about Andrew Benintendi, instead!

Header photo by Kim Klement — USA TODAY Sports

Presenting the full list 2017 Roster Recaps, listed with the authors that wrote them. An asterisk denotes a player who has, as of March 13th, dearly departed the Red Sox. We’ll miss them all terribly.

Catchers

• Sandy Leon (Cam Ellis)
• Blake Swihart (Jake Devereaux)
• Christian Vazquez (Brett Cowett)

Infielders

• Xander Bogaerts (Chris Teeter)
• Chase d’Arnaud* (Matt Kory)
• Rafael Devers (Kory)
• Marco Hernandez (Cowett)
• Brock Holt (Devereaux)
• Tzu-Wei Lin (Cowett)
• Deven Marrero (Cowett)
• Mitch Moreland (Cowett)
• Eduardo Nunez (Teeter)
• Dustin Pedroia (Kory)
• Hanley Ramirez (Devereaux)
• Josh Rutledge* (Cowett)
• Pablo Sandoval* (Cowett)
• Sam Travis (Teeter)

Outfielders

• Andrew Benintendi (Ellis)
• Mookie Betts (Kory)
• Jackie Bradley Jr. (Cowett)
• Rajai Davis* (Daniel Poarch)
• Steve Selsky (Ellis)
• Chris Young* (Cowett)

Pitchers

• Fernando Abad* (Ellis)
• Matt Barnes (Cowett)
• Blaine Boyer* (Cowett)
• Roenis Elias (Poarch)
• Doug Fister* (Kory)
• Heath Hembree (Kory)
• Brian Johnson (Teeter)
• Joe Kelly (Ellis)
• Kyle Kendrick* (Poarch)
• Craig Kimbrel (Cowett)
• Austin Maddox (Ellis)
• Kyle Martin (Poarch)
• Drew Pomeranz (Ellis)
• Rick Porcello (Teeter)
• David Price (Ellis)
• Noe Ramirez* (Poarch)
• Addison Reed* (Ellis)
• Eduardo Rodriguez (Cowett)
• Robbie Ross* (Cowett)
• Chris Sale (Cowett)
• Robby Scott (Cowett)
• Carson Smith (Teeter)
• Ben Taylor (Cowett)
• Hector Velazquez (Devereaux)
• Brandon Workman (Ellis)
• Steven Wright (Kory)

Header photo by Winslow Townson — USA TODAY Sports

Over a year ago, Travis Sawchik at Fangraphs took note of a particular claim to fame Boyer had: batters couldn’t barrel him up at all. Sure, he couldn’t strike anyone out and he didn’t induce grounders, but getting weak contact? That’s intriguing. Batters can exert a ton of control over how hard they hit something, but can pitchers affect that? It’s something to look into, at the very least.

The Atlanta Braves were willing to roll the dice on it, as they signed Boyer to a minor league deal with a spring training invite a mere four days after that piece was written. He nearly made it onto their 25-man, but was cut on March 25th. Boyer was scooped up by the Red Sox in mid-April on a minor league contract, got called up at the end of May, and has stuck with the organization ever since.

What Went Right

He started striking people out. Boyer had a 9.2 percent strikeout rate in 2016 and it jumped all the way to 18.5 percent in 2017. Not many pitchers can more than double their strikeout rate like that, so that’s just a tad bit insane. One possible source of this was an improvement in velocity for his fastball, as his four- and two-seamers both saw at least a 1 MPH jump in their average velo from last year, while both his slider and curveball registered drops of at least 1 MPH. When your fastball sits in the mid-90s and your Uncle Charlie comes in below 74, you’re gonna catch some batters swinging early. Boyer was now 1) touching 95 with regularity and 2) getting more whiffs than ever before. Naturally, the contact rate dropped, and Boyer sure looked like a contributor out of the bullpen, especially when he first showed up.

What Went Wrong

He couldn’t dodge barrels like Mario anymore. Boyer registered exactly 130 balls put in play against him, and he had the 231st-best barrel rate among all pitchers with 130 or more balls put in play against. There were only 375 qualified pitchers, so Boyer wasn’t even average. So if he wasn’t getting weak contact, what was he getting, exactly? A whole lot of nope. Of all the relievers that threw at least 20 innings for the Sox, Boyer had the lowest groundball rate by far, at 34.1 percent. He didn’t have the highest fly ball rate within those qualifiers, but he did have the highest line drive rate — at 29.4 percent. For reference, Joe Kelly came in second with 23 percent. Sure makes that .370 BABIP and 5.44 DRA look justified, doesn’t it?

Left-handed batters crushed Boyer to the tune of a .919 OPS. Thankfully, he didn’t see many, but that wasn’t the only mark against him here. There wasn’t a leverage bracket here he really excelled in. His best work was during the 8.1 innings of medium leverage he had, but his strikeout rate would shrink back down to 9.7 percent in those spots, and make that .726 OPS against look really flimsy.

A couple injuries turned him into a piñata in July and August, contributing to a terrible 11-inning stretch. A right elbow strain early in July produced a .900 OPS against until he was put on the disabled list on the 16th, and a neck strain affected his entire August, causing him to miss two weeks and saddling him with horrid 1.278 OPS against in that month. There’s a lot of BABIP inflation and small sample size warnings here, but with Boyer’s batted ball profile being what it is, it doesn’t seem like it’s entirely bad luck.

What To Expect

Boyer is 36, is a reliever, and despite honest improvements in getting whiffs, his batted ball profile has taken a turn for the worse. That’s a recipe for disaster when it comes to projecting his next season. There’s some hope he can rediscover his barrel-avoiding magic that he showed in 2016, but that’s more of a pipe dream than anything. Expect very little out of Boyer in 2018, and cherish anything he does well. Wanting more than that will probably end in disappointment.

Photo by Bob DeChiara — USA TODAY Sports

Why? Funny you should ask, because that’s sort of what this paragraph is about. It’s really one specific reason only, namely Hembree is lousy against right-handed hitters. Or at least we know he was last season. Over his career which, admittedly isn’t much beyond last season, he’s been… well, it’s harder to say. His career numbers kinda bounce around a bit. Some support the idea he’s been worse against righties and some say he’s been worse against lefties, and it depends on which you look at. On the whole, he was roughly at least similarly mediocre regardless of which side of the plate you faced him from. But last year? Yikes. Double yikes! And last year is more than a fly in the ointment, it’s like a herd of elephants. And this herd doesn’t like ointment.

We know so much about baseball now thanks to advanced stats, and coupled with our understanding of things like launch angles and pitch planes and all these other miraculous steps towards true baseball enlightenment, we really can pin stuff down now better than ever before. But one of the things which isn’t yet readily apparent is why some pitchers struggle against some hitters. Or, if you want to get brutal about it, why was Heath Hembree so damn terrible against right-handed hitters last season? Tell me that, StatCast, you righteous jerk!

What Went Right

As stated above, the overarching numbers put up by Hembree in 2017 were fine. Good, even. A pitcher who strikes out 26 percent of hitters while walking under seven percent is going to be effective. And he was. Basically. Technically. Eh…

What Went Wrong

Well, 10 homers in 62 innings is a good amount and I mean “good” as in “bad.” Also, what the hell with righties, man? Hembree had a 4.88 FIP against normal hitters, but held the weirdos to a 1.16 FIP. That’s insane. Against opposite sided hitters he was peak Pedro, but against same-sided hitters — the ones he should have an advantage over — he was flaming hot diapers shooting from an industrial furnace. Look, I’m tired and comparisons aren’t coming easily right now so can we please agree that’s really bad? Thank you.

What To Expect

Hembree’s overall effect was meh. So meh in fact that Hembree, who threw the third-most innings of any Red Sox reliever behind Kimbel and Matt Barnes, was left off the playoff roster. So 2018? Who the heck knows anymore. Relievers are like lottery tickets, even when you already have them on your roster. Would it honestly surprise anyone if Hembree figured out things against right-handed hitters a bit and turned himself into a seventh inning power guy? Or how about if he was hot poo against lefties as well as righties and got himself cut from the roster by June? The truth likely lies somewhere in between, where PECOTA sleeps.

But as long as Hembree can’t be counted on to get right-handed hitters out, he’s nothing but a back of the bullpen type, and there’s very little separating him from some dude in Triple-A with a live arm and a major league dream, regardless of how impressive his overall numbers looked at the end of the season. For 2018, expect a guy who gets some Ks and glowers a lot from the mound like a modern-day scary reliever type-dude, but is prone to the occasionally badly timed walk and the always badly timed dinger. Those guys grow on trees now, but, to Hembree’s credit, they don’t all have his beautiful curly locks. Dress for the job you want, not the job you have, right? For now that’ll have to do.

Photo by Winslow Townson — USA TODAY Sports

In the meantime, Austin Maddox would love your attention. If you’ll recall, Maddox sort of showed up out of nowhere in September, and was good enough to beat out Matt Barnes, Brandon Workman, and Heath Hembree for a spot on the ALDS roster. He apparently almost made the Opening Day roster out of camp last year, but the tail-end of Spring Training is a dystopian hellscape full of four-hour, split-squad nightmares that I try to forget. If the Red Sox made a decision on one of their 1,000 okay-ish right-handed relievers on the last day of Spring Training, I certainly missed it.

Nonetheless, the team was clearly high on Maddox heading into the 2017 season. Over 36 innings in Triple-A, Maddox posted a 3.70 FIP and was striking out over a batter an inning. While those are certainly good enough to warrant a promotion, Maddox also struggled mightily with control. He was walking 14 percent of the batters he faced, far and away the highest rate of his minor league career. Still, everyone ever drafted by the Red Sox and all the season ticket holders get a shot at making the roster for September call-ups, and Maddox took advantage of that.

In 17 innings of work for the Sox, Maddox carried a 2.64 FIP while posting a stellar strikeout-to-walk ratio that settled a shade below 18 percent. A Brian McCann dinger in a late September blowout was the only run scored against him all year, so that’s kind of impressive. He’s doesn’t really have a third pitch, but he does have a fastball that lives in the mid-to-high 90’s, so I can live with that. Predictably, an overwhelming majority (14) of his 17 innings last season were in low-leverage situations. His .150/.190/.150 slash line against righties is bursting at the seams with intrigue, but it’s hard to take any numbers seriously with such a small sample size. His fly ball percentage sitting at 60 percent is alarming, but again small sample sizes blah blah blah baseball writing is just making a point and then copping out of it.

WHAT WENT RIGHT

Maddox made the ALDS roster. Just walked right in and beat out, like, three pitchers the Red Sox had been relying on all year despite only throwing a handful of innings.

WHAT WENT WRONG

Not making the roster out of Spring Training, I guess? Getting taken yard by Brian McCann probably isn’t that fun. The team he’s employed to play for got thoroughly overwhelmed in the playoffs. His cable bill probably increased.

WHAT TO EXPECT

It’s hard to know who ranks above who now that Alex Cora is making the decisions. If the team still views him as a better option than Barnes, Hembree or Workman, he’ll be a prominent member of the bullpen. He’ll be a part of the thrilling right-handed middle relief competition that goes on during Spring Training, and I, for one, cannot wait.*

*that’s untrue.

Photo by Patrick McDermott — USA TODAY Sports

It’s fun because it’s silly, because it’s juvenile, and because it’s utterly unnecessary. I love that they’ve spent time figuring this thing out – you do this, and you do this and I’ll do this, no wait let’s try it this way, and on and on – time which has been spent together, working as friends.

Winning baseball is fun. Any team that wins is fun. And this 2017 Red Sox team wins, so by definition they are fun. But this team is more than fun-because-they-win fun. This team is straight up roller-coaster milk-coming-out-your-nose yelling-out-the-moon-roof-of-a-moving-car fun, and the outfield dance is only one reason. Here are many, many others.

1. Anytime anyone tries to hit a ball past Dustin Pedroia.
2. Chili Davis. On one end of the cool cat scale you have former Yankees catcher Brian McCann, who probably dresses like an old timey school marm and hits puppies with sticks for fun. On the other end of the cool cat scale you have Chili Davis, who plays jazz trumpet in clubs until 4am and will chat you up long after that. Does he really play jazz trumpet in clubs after games? Who knows, but metaphorically speaking absolutely.
3. Hanley. The Red Sox drafted him and then they dealt him away. That happens. Baseball is a business. But through all that, through two other organizations and a literal decade of time, dude still felt an attachment to Boston and wanted to come back. I’ll never forget that. Also he’s a total goofball whose helmet needs to be crazy-glued to his hair. We should get a Kickstarter rolling for that.
4. Hanley’s homers. GOOD GOD Y’ALL, those things GO. When he gets a hold of one it’s a sight to see. I tell ya, A SIGHT TO SEE!
5. You know what’s fun? Stuff that is exciting! And you know what’s exciting? Any time the Red Sox get a base runner! Will he steal? Maybe! Will he be thrown out at home by 30 feet? Maybe! Exciting! Fun!
6. Andrew Benintendi’s hair.
7. Andrew Benintendi’s swing.
8. Andrew Benintendi.
9. You know how when Mookie stands in the batter’s box and glares back at the pitcher his lip does this little curl thing, kinda like Elvis Presley used to do? I love that.
10. Craig Kimbrel is striking out more than half the batters he’s faced this season. He’s at 51.8 percent right now! Exclamation point! Vomit! YELLING! Fifty-one point eight perWHAT! AHHHHHHH! That’s a lot is what I’m saying.
11. So this kid who is 20 years old was playing for Salem, Virginia in the Carolina League last season and now he’s the starting third baseman for the Red Sox and he’s always smiling like that time he smiled after he turned around a 103 mph fastball from Aroldis Chapman and tied the game in ninth inning. That was a smile!
12. Joe Kelly’s velocity readings are fun!
13. Joe Kelly’s great stuff is funny because it’s not real, which is fun!
14. You know how the Yankees aren’t doing great and are always mad and they are paying Aroldis Chapman a lot of money to be awful? That’s not directly related to the Red Sox but it sure is fun anyway!
15. The standings! You should look at them sometime. They are great fun.
16. Mookie sometimes fools fielders and thieves bases from them.
17. Jackie’s defense. Have you ever seen him miss a ball? Like, ever?
18. Sandy Leon and his occasional magic. You never see it coming and then POW! Right in the kisser!
19. Brandon Workman last pitched in the majors in 2014. You know who started the most games for that team? Jon Lester, John Lackey, Clay Buchholz, Jake Peavy, Rubby De La Rosa, and Workman. That’s a long time ago! Then Workman got hurt and rehabbed and then he got hurt again and rehabbed and his rehab didn’t take and he had to start and stop and start and stop and start and stop again. Poor guy as recently as this season was throwing 87 in the minors and getting lit up. Now he’s back in the mid-90s and looking like a worthwhile piece of a major league bullpen. That’s persistence. That’s perseverance. That’s impressive. Also, remember that time he batted in the World Series? Less fun, that.
20. Addison Reed will probably help eventually!
21. Eduardo Nunez: How bad must the Giants have been that they couldn’t win with this guy?
22. Remember that time Doug Fister looked like Chris Sale? That was fun! (We’ll ignore the time Chris Sale looked like Doug Fister.)
23. Robby Scott might not be your favorite Red Sox, but he’s one of mine. Remember Daniel Nava? Scott is the reliever version of Nava. Like Nava, Scott went undrafted and started his career in pro ball only Scott played for the Yuma Scorpions of the independent league where he was teammates with Jose and Ozzie Canseco. It’s like wanting to be a baseball player and the only job available was with the circus. He almost quit baseball to become a teacher, which considering his circumstances, made perfect sense. But now he’s in a major league bullpen!
24. Fenway Park. I don’t care that the seats are small and everything costs a fortune. Okay, I care, but the point is that’s the place Ruth played, where Williams and Yaz and Ortiz all made their names. It’s worth it, it’s worth every bit of it. Fenway is on the top of any list of major league ballparks because it’s living history, but also because it’s damn beautiful right now. Really, it’s at the top of any list of pro sports stadiums that you have to visit. It’s the best.
25. Fernando Abad has been okay!
26. Rick Porcello’s immaculate inning. Remember that?! That was crazy!
27. Rafael Devers’ triple play. Remember that?!? That was crazy!
28. Unexpected stuff is lots of fun, when it’s good, and Porcello’s 2016 was exactly that. Drew Pomeranz has taken up where Rick Porcello’s 2016 season left off. Pomeranz has been as valuable as Jose Quintana and Jake Arrieta by BP’s metrics, and as valuable as Dallas Keuchel and Justin Verlander by Baseball Reference. Pomeranz has been what the Red Sox thought they were getting when they signed David Price. He’s been that good.
29. Chris Young’s weird short-armed swing is so weird. How does he hit the ball? I don’t know!
30. Chris Sale has over 253 strikeouts which coincidentally is the same number of times I would strike out against Chris Sale were I to bat against him 253 times.
31. Heath Hembree’s hair. It’s like he saw the movie Coming To America where Eddie Murphy’s character wears soul glow hair goop and thought, yeah, that’s what I want.
32. Have you seen those embarrassing high school pictures the relievers (probably Joe Kelly) have hung in the bullpen? They’re hilarious!

This is only a partial list. There’s also Brian Johnson’s complete game five-hitter against the Mariners in May, Tzu-Wei Lin getting three hits in a 15-1 win over the Blue Jays, and of course, that time Deven Marrero hit two homers in the same game off Jose Quintana. It really does go on and on with this team. They are a ton of fun, and that will be true whether they go out meekly in the first round, or win the World Series. Even after a spanking from Cleveland, I look forward to the next Red Sox game. Fun times are good.

Photo by Ken Blaze – USA TODAY Sports

That’s why it’s time to get on board with Brandon Workman. Workman has quietly been increasing his workload, throwing 46 pitches in 3.2 innings spread out over the last seven days. In fact, in the month since Workman returned, he’s thrown more innings (16.2) than any pitcher in the bullpen. He has the best WHIP (0.78), is walking the fewest amount of hitters (3.3 percent) and has the second-lowest average against (.193) of anyone who’s thrown at least 10 relief innings in the last 30 days. Teammates think he might even be better than he was before Tommy John:

Matt Barnes said he thinks Brandon Workman might be better now than he was pre-Tommy John.

— Jason Mastrodonato (@JMastrodonato) August 10, 2017

Basically, Workman has been at least the second-best relief pitcher over the last month. Given Kimbrel’s (relative) shakiness over that same period of time, a convincing argument could be made that Workman’s been their best option since he returned.

He’s been great in high leverage situations, too. There was this performance against Kansas City:

And then this against Cleveland:

Given that he’s shown the ability to be relied on in big spots – not just this season, either – and that the Red Sox generally don’t have many better options, it makes no sense that of Workman’s 17.1 innings this season, 11.2 of them have been innings designated as “low leverage.”

At this point, I’d argue there’s no clear preferred choice for who gets the eighth inning. If you’re terrified of pitching your set-up guy on the road, is he really a reliable set-up guy? Workman’s even got his old fastball back, touching 95 on multiple occasions this season:

(Interesting note: Workman has completely given up on throwing his change up this year)

A healthy Workman that’s pitching this well deserves more chances to prove himself in high-leverage situations. He was a successful set-up guy in the World Series before health derailed his career – now that he’s seemingly back on track, it’s time to give him the eighth inning and see what he does with it.

Photo by Kim Klement – USA TODAY Sports

And yet, here I am, asking more of him. Not with regard to how he pitches when he pitches, – that would be ridiculous, look at those numbers – but the latter part of that phrase, the ‘when he pitches’ part, is something I am interested in seeing some adjustment back to the early part of the season. If he was more flexible with his usage he could be even more valuable to the team than he is currently.

Up until the middle of June, John Farrell was using Kimbrel in ways that we had not previously seen him be used: multi-inning outings, entering in the eighth inning, only throwing the eighth inning, entering mid-inning with runners on-base. It appeared to (finally) be a move toward what the analytical baseball crowd has been yearning for, for years: use your best reliever in the game’s most important moments, not just in the ninth when they can get a save. The simplistic description of the idea is that Craig Kimbrel is the team’s best reliever, so he should be used to extinguish opposing team’s rallies at any point from (roughly) the seventh inning on (i.e., the high-leverage moments). Not sit and hope the other, lesser, pitchers hold the line until he can run in and end the game. Last year, we watched Terry Francona maximize Andrew Miller’s value down the stretch, into the playoffs and throughout this season, and Dave Roberts start doing something similar with Kenley Jansen last October that has carried over into this season.

While it seemed as though Farrell and Kimbrel were heading down a similar path as Francona/Miller, Roberts/Jansen and others, over the last month Kimbrel’s usage has reverted to that of your bog-standard capital ‘C’ Closer. He has made ten appearances, with each lasting a single inning in the game’s final frame, excepting Saturday night’s blown save against the Yankees when he got the last out of the eighth. While Kimbrel set the pace for the team in average leverage for April and May (yes, Robby Scott had some huge moments), in June, Matt Barnes led the way, and so far in July, Joe Kelly has had by far the most difficult tasks. This is not an ideal situation. As with the lack-of-platooning, this is not meant as a criticism of John Farrell’s managing. Kimbrel’s change in usage was driven by Kimbrel.

A report on Kimbrel from Peter Abraham in The Boston Globe focused on Kimbrel’s routine-oriented approach to his role, and how he feels most comfortable pitching at the end of games:

“It’s really all I know. I like getting the last three outs.”

Even though what that statement means for how he is used frustrates me, I completely understand where Kimbrel is coming from. It really is all he knows. Of course he likes being the guy who gets the fireballs raging on the big screen as he runs in from the bullpen, and being the guy at the start of the handshake line after a win is sealed up. All of that stuff is incredibly rewarding, and has directly led to his being a very rich man. It reinforces that what he has been doing is correct. So I get it. It is terrifying to try a new thing when a certain thing (or sequence of things [e.g., unnecessary arm dangle]) has worked, and worked so ridiculously well, for so long.

But here is another thing among all of these things: his ability to throw a baseball past an opposing batter is unlikely to change if he enters a game at 9:40pm or 10:00pm instead of 10:20pm. Just as it didn’t when he was asked to do so in the first couple of months of this season, again excepting this past Saturday night. It will require an adjustment to his current routine and I recognize that can feel uncomfortable, but, as we have seen with the fanfare and performance of Miller, Jansen, Felipe Rivero in Pittsburgh, and Chris Devenski in Houston, it works just fine and will come with similar levels of adulation and money (probably).

To be clear, I am not asking for Kimbrel to increase his workload to match that of a mid-70s reliever who throws three innings each time out – Abraham’s story highlights how his workload is a clear concern. Rather, I am suggesting that it would be to the team’s advantage for him to be more flexible in when his workload is distributed, such that he is more effectively deployed. Even Kimbrel should want the Red Sox to stop giving Kelly/Barnes/Heath Hembree/whichever-eighth-inning-guy-they-trade-for the ball when the game is on the line prior to the ninth inning. Those are all fine pitchers, but they are not Craig Kimbrel. He should get the ball. Kimbrel taking on a more flexible role could even adjust the team’s plans for the deadline. Who knows? But the whole thing is dependent on Kimbrel buying in to the concept and he seems unlikely to do so. That is the rub. Miller (and Francona and Cody Allen) bought in to the idea and stopped worrying about saves. Jansen (and Roberts) bought in. Even Aroldis Chapman bought in for a couple of months in order to earn a ring, but has since made an about face. Maybe someone should start hanging pictures of Miller and Jansen in Kimbrel’s locker every day.

For what it’s worth, John Farrell seems to not want to push his star reliever into greater flexibility, saying in that Abraham article: “We arrived at a pretty defined approach and we need to adhere to that.”. You really don’t need to, John, but, again, I understand how it seems that way. There is the chance, remote as it may be, that Kimbrel will break if he is not used in the way he prefers. But the change I am suggesting does not even need to be all that drastic. Hell, it was somewhat in place for two-and-a-half months. And, at the All-Star Break, Kimbrel was 12^th in FiveThirtyEight’s Goose Egg measure, which attempts to break the assessment of relief pitching from the tyranny of the save and credits pitchers for clutch, scoreless relief innings, even in tied games. But Kimbrel can, and should be higher than 12^th. Manage to the Goose Egg?

In any case, I wonder what will happen with Kimbrel’s usage if the standings are close in September. Will things change? The way this offense is going I suspect the team is going to need to eek out a few tight ball games. How about in October (if the Red Sox get there)? Will the adherence to a single-inning, ninth-inning role continue? I hope not. There is precedent for an angry Craig Kimbrel wanting the ball in a playoff game for more than just the ninth. Give in to your anger, Craig. In the end, while the status quo with Kimbrel is undoubtedly great, things could be even greater if he accommodates flexibility into his role and leads this team on a run through October.

Photo by Kim Klement – USA TODAY Sports

First:

And then:

I admit it is somewhat tricky to see, but I am trying to point out that Joe Kelly started both of the first two hitters he faced on Sunday with two strikes. Going 0-2 to both batters is good. But he needed seven more pitches to get Robbie Grossman to ground out, and ended up walking Jorge Polanco on eight pitches. I know he got hosed by the ump in the Polanco at-bat, but the walk is not good. Joe Kelly routinely throws his fastball 100 mph and can back that up with a decent-ish slider or curveball. The team was winning 17-6. Grossman is a pretty good hitter. Polanco is not. Kelly should be able blow these guys away and get everybody home for the day.

For Kelly, this issue – not striking batters out with his overpowering great stuff – is not isolated to his mop-up duty on Sunday. On the season, Kelly’s strikeout rate (K%) as a reliever is down almost 20 percentage points from last season. It is still early (he has only thrown 16.0 innings), so a few of multi-punchout innings will change things quickly, but the drop through the first six weeks is concerning. While the exact reason for Kelly’s drop in strikeouts is not clear, there are thing that jump out. For instance, his ability to get batters to swing and miss dropping from previous levels on all three of his pitches:

Batters making more contact against him will certainly limit his strikeout totals, but it is not the case that batters are jumping at his pitches early and limiting him from getting to strikeout counts. As he did on Sunday, Kelly is often getting batters down to two strikes, but he is not finishing the battles with strikeouts the way he did last year. Kelly’s outing on Sunday reminded me of a discussion that Ben and Jeff (or is it Jeff and Ben? Are we even doing that for this new duo?) had on the 1029^th episode of Effectively Wild about pitchers who were adept at getting to two-strike counts, but not so adept at striking batters out. This year, Joe Kelly is one of those pitchers. According to Baseball Savant, Kelly has thrown over a third of his pitches with a two-strike count. That ranks 29^th among the 407 pitchers who have thrown at least 100 pitches this season (through Sunday’s games). Kelly’s inability to convert those two-strike plate appearances to strikeouts has him on the other end of things: among that same group of 407 pitchers he ranks 400^th in two-strike strikeout rate. The plot below shows how odd Kelly has been:

He has no problem getting to two-strike counts, but once there he has not been able to send batters walking solemnly back to the dugout. The obvious suggestion is that he needs to hone a put-away pitch. Throwing hard, as he does, is nice, but major league hitters can hit hard. Perhaps he needs to take something off to increase the movement on his fastball. Or more reliably locate his slider on the edge of strike zone (away to righties, in to lefties). Of course, this is easy to say from my seat at home, and Kelly has likely already considered putting them into practice and that is another thing entirely. But, jokes aside, Kelly has the stuff to do it and resume being the dominant reliever he was for a couple of months last year. Him getting back to being a dependable option for John Farrell in high-leverage moments that really demand a strikeout would be a welcome development.

Interestingly, Kelly is not the only one in the Red Sox bullpen having some difficulty finishing batters off once getting them to two-strikes. Heath Hembree owns the third-highest rate of two-strike pitches at 39.65 percent, but like Kelly is below average in those two-strike pitches turning into strikeouts. If you want to see where he falls on the scatterplot, go here. It is difficult to complain too much about Hembree’s performance so far this year. He has been great and is actually striking batters out at a higher rate than he ever has since coming to Boston. Imagine if he converted more of those two-strike counts. Maybe those old ‘Closer of the Future’ projections were not so far off base.

Kelly and Hembree are important parts of a Red Sox bullpen that has been really, really good to this point in the season. It stands to get even better if these two start converting more strikeouts, and Tyler Thornburg and Carson Smith eventually return in the form that they were last seen. All this count-based analysis could just be an early-season mirage and they will naturally return to average-ish levels over the next six weeks. Better yet, Kelly and Hembree could continue to throw strikes, but refine their put-away pitches and rack up more punch-outs. As we’ve seen, they’re just one strike away.

Photo by Greg M. Cooper – USA TODAY Sports

The four-game series in Detroit left a bad taste in our mouths, and for some of the players, that’s a very literal statement. Apart from the anemic, flu-riddled roster that was fielded, John Farrell’s managing late in games wasn’t always proactive. A couple of those games were very winnable, yet the Red Sox lost both, and ended up winning just one of the four games against the Tigers. Most of the gripes stemmed from the loss on April 9th, which saw the Sox score five runs in the top of the 8th inning, only to give up the lead in the bottom part of the frame. So let’s take a deeper look at that.

To start off the bottom of the 8th, Heath Hembree is brought in to deal with Nick Castellanos and Miguel Cabrera. The only other person warming in the bullpen is Robby Scott, who’s supposed to keep Tigers manager Brad Ausmus from pinch-hitting with a lefty. It’s not really needed, seeing as there’s no way in hell you’re using a bench bat over Castellanos, Cabrera, or Justin Upton.

In dominating fashion, Hembree blows through Castellanos and Cabrera, with the strikeout of Castellanos being a shining example of pitch command.

Sliders and fastballs on the black. They had a plan to attack him, and they executed it perfectly.

Now, after those two outs, Hembree struggles with Victor Martinez, and walks him. That’s not particularly bad, since V-Mart is a good hitter, and having Hembree face a guy who can bat lefty could’ve gone much worse. The issue is the next plate appearance with Justin Upton, because Hembree lost all control.

It looks like a pitiful firework. You can’t even tell what they were trying to do here, and the contrast with the Castellanos PA is striking. This was a clear sign that Hembree needed to be taken out.

At this point, the situation had escalated into a high leverage outing, and needed a good reliever. Was Craig Kimbrel up in the bullpen? No, it was still only Robby Scott that was warm, with Joe Kelly getting loose. Farrell has no choice but to put in Scott, as Tyler Collins is up next. However, since he was forced to make a move too early, Ausmus counters with Mikie Mahtook, and Mahtook doubles in the tying run. Farrell then brings in Kelly, who proceeds to load the bases, and then walks in the go-ahead run. Kelly might not have been fully warmed up, but he couldn’t even get a pitch in the lower half of the zone against any of the three batters he faced.

You can blame the players here for not performing, and that’s a legitimate gripe. Hembree’s command disappearing and Kelly being less than effective aren’t thing’s a manager can control. That’s solely on the players. But a manager can – and you can go as far to say that he’s supposed to – put his players in the best possible positions to win, and that’s what Farrell did not do here. Scott really shouldn’t be used against right-handed hitters, Kelly ended up being a human panic button, and Kimbrel was nowhere to be found.

After last year’s playoffs, managing decisions have had more light shined on them, especially when it comes to reliever use. The wildly successful way Terry Francona used Andrew Miller and Cody Allen almost demands adaptation, because being set in archaic bullpen roles is simply throwing away flexibility. But this response to not using Kimbrel is frustrating to hear:

Farrell: “There’ll be a time this season when we go to Kimbrel for four outs, but not in Game 3.”

— Brian MacPherson (@brianmacp) April 7, 2017

If each game counts the same, why wouldn’t you use him now? Sure, you don’t want to blow out your bullpen early, but that was a winnable game. Even if the decision doesn’t work out, it would’ve been better to put your best foot forward and given yourself a chance.

That’s another thing when it comes to managing – you can (and will!) make all the right decisions and still lose. That’s what happened in the final game of that Detroit series. Chris Sale pitched two outs into the 8th inning, then allowed a two-out double to Andrew Romine and walked Ian Kinsler. Farrell had the option of going to the bullpen for Castellanos, but Sale had consistently beaten him that day, and at that point, was there really an option in the bullpen you’d take over Sale? Probably not. Farrell made the right choice here, despite the go-ahead RBI single that followed. Sometimes, things just don’t work out.

Sometimes, things go better than you expected. Last night, Farrell tried to get one more out from Drew Pomeranz by having him face Chris Davis. Pomeranz jammed him on the last pitch, but Chris Davis is a very strong human, and was able to fight it off for a single. Hembree comes in, and gives up a single to Welington Castillo. This looks bad, until Hembree strikes out Trey Mancini. Schoop grounded out to third to score Davis, and Hembree got JJ Hardy to groundout. The most brilliant move here was Farrell keeping Robby Scott warm in the bullpen, preventing Buck Showalter from using Seth Smith or Hyun-Soo Kim, who are both better hitters than Mancini. Just by keeping a lefty ready, Farrell deprived a team of two good hitters during an inning where they sorely needed them. That’s good managing.

Look, I don’t like to point fingers at Farrell for everything that goes wrong. He does some things badly, yes, but improving as a manager isn’t an instantaneous or obvious thing, and seeing stuff like what he did in the Orioles game gives me hope that he’s getting there. He’s not gonna manage circles around other teams, but with the talent on this team, he usually won’t have to do that. I’m probably reading too much into a week and a half of games, but there’s some baby steps here. We’ve just got to see more of them.