Koji is inextricably tied to the 2013 championship team, of course. His campaign that year was one of the most uniquely dominant pitching performances I can remember, high-fiving his way through countless high-leverage innings on the way to the title. In honor of the end of Koji’s MLB career, I spent some time thinking about how his unbelievable 2013 season stacks up against other performances in recent Red Sox history. Let’s take a look at the competition and see who boasts the best individual bullpen season among Red Sox teams since 2007.

Honorable Mention: Junichi Tazawa, 2012

44 IP, 26.2 K%, 2.9 BB% 0.20 HR/9, 1.42 ERA, 1.82 FIP, 2.14 DRA

I wanted to make sure I mentioned Junichi Tazawa in this piece because, while I don’t think he has an individual season that quite ranks among the best of the past ten years, it feels as though he’s been underrated historically among Boston fans. Images of his rough final seasons in Boston are perhaps a little too fresh in people’s minds, but Tazawa was a workhorse for the Red Sox who deserves some warmer recognition.

Tazawa started the 2012 season pitching for Triple-A Pawtucket, and he hit the ground running as soon as he came up to the big-league club to replace Mark Melancon (remember him?). A lot of praise is (deservedly) spent on Koji’s absurd aversion to walks in 2013, but Tazawa actually managed a lower walk rate in 2012, allowing only five free passes in his 44 major league innings. Perhaps most notably, Tazawa was a horse – he pitched 86.1 innings between Triple-A in the majors in 2012 and exceeded the 60 IP mark in each of the next two years, while pitching almost exclusively high-leverage situations. John Farrell leaned on Tazawa almost to a fault, and although his overuse created issues in later years, he was an indispensable piece of the bullpen puzzle for some time.

Tazawa never got the kind of glory a traditional closer would — high-leverage, non-closing relievers have historically struggled to get consistent recognition — but I haven’t forgotten about him.

5 — Daniel Bard, 2010

74.2 IP, 25.8 K%, 10.2 BB%, 0.72 HR/9, 1.93 ERA, 3.36 FIP, 2.96 DRA

Statistically, Daniel Bard’s 2010 might not quite compare to the other seasons mentioned on this list, but it’s the context of his brief run as the team’s setup man that gets him here. Bard once looked like the future of the Red Sox bullpen, a potent fireballer with some of the most ridiculous stuff I’ve ever seen. Across his first three seasons in the majors, he averaged close to 98 miles per hour on his fastball and 84 on his notorious wipeout slider, making hitters look completely futile with hilarious regularity. This utterly absurd, 99 mph something that he dropped on Nick Swisher in 2011 might be the greatest individual pitch in MLB history.

Evidently, it wasn’t meant to last. As we all should well remember, a doomed attempt to convert Bard into a full-time starter destroyed first his command, then his confidence. After the wheels came off in 2012, Bard shuttled around the minor league teams of the Red Sox and other franchise, trying desperately to regain some of his former self. It didn’t work, and this past January, he retired at 32 years old.

In 2010, though, Bard was at the peak of his powers, and the heir apparent to Jonathan Papelbon in the closer role. The warning signs were hanging around — the walks in particular were a little too high — but he had that sparkling sub-2.00 ERA and he certainly looked good, so we were all willing to look past it. His 2011 might have been a little more steady in terms of peripherals, as he cut back on the walks significantly, but Bard Fever was never stronger than that first full season in the majors. He may have washed out dramatic fashion a couple years later, but I’ll always remember him for that dizzying peak.

4 — Andrew Miller, 2014

42.1 IP, 40.6 K%, 7.7 BB%, 0.43 HR/9, 2.34 ERA, 1.69 FIP, 2.00 DRA

These days, we know Andrew Miller as one of the most dominant relievers in baseball, and the foremost example of managers prioritizing high-leverage situations over traditional save situations. He’s not actually the Indians’ closer, but he’s their best bullpen arm and a force of nature in the late innings.

Years ago, though, Miller was a struggling journeyman starter who couldn’t establish himself in the majors. Miller had no command over his pitches, and hitters more or less had their way with him — in some ways, it was not entirely dissimilar from Bard’s late career. Miller hit his nadir in 2010, when he posted an ERA north of 8.00 across 30.2 innings in the majors and one above 6.00 in 85.1 innings in Triple-A.

The Red Sox got their hands on Miller with a minor league deal thereafter, and by 2012, they’d finally embraced him as a full-time reliever. It was exactly what he needed; the walks came down and the strikeouts went way up. Miller’s 2014 was the peak of this Boston reinvention, short-lived as it was. He struck out over 40 percent of the batters he faced and combined with Uehara and Tazawa to form one of the most formidable late-inning units the Red Sox have fielded in recent years.

Unfortunately, they were formidable, but futile. The 2014 Red Sox were terrible, falling to the bottom of the AL East immediately after the 2013 championship, and if there’s one thing terrible teams do, it’s trade their relievers. Relievers, after all, are the most immediately expendable way for struggling franchises to bring quick prospect value to their farm team. Miller went to Baltimore, and while Eduardo Rodriguez looks to be a valuable starting pitcher for years to come, it still hurt a bit to see Miller dominating the 2016 playoffs with Cleveland en route to their World Series loss to the Cubs.

3 — Jonathan Papelbon, 2007

58.1 IP, 37.5 K%, 6.7 BB%, 0.77 HR/9, 1.85 ERA, 2.45 FIP, 2.41 DRA

You knew he was going to pop up here eventually.

Arguments can be made either way between Papelbon’s 2006 and 2007 seasons, but for me, his integral role in the 2007 championship gives that year the edge. Papelbon was a buzzsaw for his entire career in Boston, and the closest answer the Red Sox have ever had to the greatness of Mariano Rivera. He had a manic, unhinged energy on the mound, and while that persona would go on to cause him problems in later years, it made him an instant fan favorite at Fenway Park. There were few more exciting moments in a Red Sox game than Papelbon walking out to “Shipping Up To Boston.”

Papelbon was essentially the spitting image of the traditional closer role, a fastball-centric fireballer who lived and died with his mid-90s four-seamer. He was also remarkably durable, pitching 60 innings or more in nine of his 10 seasons from 2006 to 2015. Ironically, 2007 was the one he didn’t, but he still threw 58.1 frames and appeared in 59 games. These days, he likely wouldn’t stand out quite as much in the current landscape of MLB relievers, but for the late 2000s, he was perpetually near the top.

In addition to his regular season performance, Papelbon threw 10.2 scoreless frames in the playoffs en route to the Red Sox second championship in four years. He was a consistently great playoff performer, with an ERA of exactly 1.00 in his 27 career postseason innings, but would never make another postseason appearance after the team’s short-lived stay in 2009. Papelbon flamed out as aggressively as he pitched, but he’s among the most important bullpen arms in the history of the franchise. The fact that he’s only third on this list is a testament to how great our next two entries really were.

2 — Koji Uehara, 2013

74.1 IP, 38.1 K%, 3.4 BB%, 0.61 HR/9, 1.09 ERA, 1.61 FIP, 1.78 DRA

In 2013, Koji Uehara struck out 101 batters and walked only nine. Think about that for a minute.

If his career started 10 years earlier, teams would likely have laughed at the idea of using a pitcher with an 88 mph fastball as their closer. It was still a fairly weird concept in 2013, and he didn’t even begin the season as the closer. Closers have always traditionally tended towards the “97 mph flamethrower” type, which makes Koji one of the most unique pitchers to fill that role in recent baseball history. He didn’t have crazy velocity, but he did have a dominant sinker and a supernatural command of the strike zone, and in that particular 2013, hitters had no idea what to do with him. He was simply impossible to square up on. He allowed only five home runs on the season, and had a line drive rate of only 11.3 percent. For reference, Papelbon’s career-best mark in that regard was 15.3 percent.

The magic was fairly short-lived. For his following two seasons, Koji was merely very good rather than transcendent. Hitters started to catch up, and home runs became a greater bugaboo as he aged – he allowed twice as many in 2014 despite pitching 10 fewer innings. His strikeout-to-walk ratio slipped from above 10 in 2013-14 to around five in 2015-16, still a solid mark but not superhuman. In essence, he just got old.

That 2013 season was magical for a lot of reasons. The Red Sox were a team of cast-offs and underappreciated players like Mike Napoli, Shane Victorino, Jarrod Saltalamacchia, and Stephen Drew. In other words, Koji was right at home. A return to the Red Sox this season was never really realistic — the Red Sox have more than a few right-handed relievers and his level of play isn’t where it once was — but it’s still bittersweet to see him leaving the league. Hopefully the Yomiuri Giants are prepared for some aggressive high-fives.

And somehow, it still wasn’t the greatest season we’ve seen from a reliever in recent seasons. That one came just last year.

1 — Craig Kimbrel, 2017

69 IP, 49.6 K%, 5.5 BB%, 0.78 HR/9, 1.43 ERA, 1.42 FIP, 1.89 DRA

The Red Sox paid a hefty price to acquire Kimbrel two seasons ago with a prospect haul beyond what you’d typically expect for a reliever in most situations, especially considering he was coming off a 2015 season in San Diego that wasn’t quite up to his typical level. While effective, his 2016 season wasn’t quite the performance you’d want to see from a player with such a price tag, either; he walked an enormous amount of batters en route to his first season with an ERA above 3.00. Some of the sheen started to come off one of the greatest bullpen arms in history.

Because of all this, I think it’s actually possible we collectively didn’t appreciate Kimbrel’s 2017 enough. It may well have been the best season of his career. Kimbrel struck out just shy of half the batters he faced — astonishingly not even a career-best in that regard — and he did it with the best command of the strike zone he’s ever shown. If there’s ever been some kind of weakness to Kimbrel’s game, it’s that he historically issued too many free passes (career walk rate of 9.5 percent), but it seems he finally just decided to… not do that anymore, I guess? Kimbrel he walked only 5.5 percent of the batters he faced, stranded 93.9 percent of the baserunners he allowed, gave up only 11 earned runs, and pitched 69 of the nicest innings from a reliever in Red Sox history.

While the 2018 Red Sox bullpen isn’t exactly a known quantity — Carson Smith and Tyler Thornburg are returning from long absences due to injury, while Joe Kelly and Matt Barnes are solid but unspectacular middle-inning guys — Kimbrel is money in the bank. He’s among the greatest relievers in baseball history, and he somehow still seems to be getting better. If he continues to limit his free passes like he did last year, it’s entirely possible he could replace his own spot on this list. Wouldn’t that be something?

Photo by Kim Klement — USA TODAY Sports

Boston’s pick in the fifth round of the 2011 draft has, by Baseball Reference WAR, out-produced every player taken in the first round of that same draft. That would be Mookie Betts.

Partly that’s a function of the fact the Red Sox have been a better team than the Orioles over that time. Thus when Baltimore has picked it has more often been at the top of the draft where more is expected to come of the selection, whereas the Red Sox have often picked later where star power is much harder to come by.

But even then, the Red Sox have still done better than Baltimore. There are probably other teams that have done better than the Red Sox over the past three decades (going much deeper into draft history is pointless as the draft has changed so much since) but though they exist they likely aren’t many. Take for example, Boston’s pick in the fifth round of the 2011 draft has, by Baseball Reference WAR, out-produced every player taken in the first round of that same draft. That would be Mookie Betts, and that would be amazing.

Of course, that’s not the only time the Red Sox have had a non-first round pick and (to date) got more production out of it than any of the first rounders used that in that same draft. They did it in 2004 when they used the 65th overall pick to take Dustin Pedroia. If you want to hold this exercise to just the first round though, well, even then the Red Sox have done well. The following draft, 2005, the Red Sox had the 23rd pick as compensation for Orlando Cabrera signing with the Angels. They used it on outfielder Jacoby Ellsbury, the sixth most valuable player (B-R WAR) taken in that draft.

So the Red Sox have scored when they should’ve scored and scored when they probably shouldn’t have scored. But they haven’t always nailed it. In 2010, they used the 20th overall pick on Kolbrin Vitek with Christian Yelich taken three picks later. Vitek never made it above Double-A, retiring four years after being picked. Even so though, the 20th pick isn’t a surefire star waiting to happen. That’s more like a guy you’d hope could turn into a solid contributor. Vitek never was that (why he’s mentioned in this paragraph!) but missing out on the 20th overall pick isn’t something to quit over. Oddly enough, current Red Sox star pitcher Chris Sale was selected seven picks earlier, but I digress.

The real problem, as the Orioles can attest to, is getting a top-ten pick and blowing it on nothing. The Red Sox haven’t officially done that yet, but it’s pretty close. Trey Ball has a 5.53 ERA in Double-A and is looking less like a future rotation cornerstone and more like a guy who gets dropped in the end of an insubstantial trade, or even converted to the outfield because why not? Worse, Boston took Ball with a bunch of still promising guys available (Austin Meadows, JP Crawford, Hunter Dozier, Christian Arroyo, Aaron Judge), though that’s how every draft is. There’s always someone promising available. The trick is knowing who it is.

You have to go pretty far back to find so high a pick go so badly for the Red Sox. In 1995 the Red Sox took pitcher Andy Yount two picks before Roy Halladay went to the Blue Jays, but that was with the 15th overall pick, not the seventh. In 1994 Boston took Nomar Garciaparra with the 12th pick, and in ’93 they took Trot Nixon with the seventh pick. Hard to complain about either, even if Nixon didn’t ever quite live up to the star power that was projected upon him.

Since Theo Epstein took over the GM’s seat in early 2003 the Red Sox have been incredibly good at getting value out of the draft. It’s hard to win three World Series in fifteen years without getting something substantial from the draft. The Red Sox built the foundation of their first World Series winning team through trades and free agency, but their second, the 2007 team came far more from the draft. While there were ’04 crossovers in Jason Varitek and David Ortiz, and free agents like J.D. Drew and Julio Lugo, the ’07 team was also Kevin Youkilis, Jacoby Ellsbury, Dustin Pedroia, Jon Lester, and Jonathan Papelbon. The 2013 team was similar in its composition. Lots of free agents and players acquired in trades, but with a solid core of home grown players like Lester, Pedroia, Felix Doubront, Clay Buchholz, Will Middlebrooks, and Ellsbury, with assists from Xander Bogaerts and even Jackie Bradley.

Looking at that 2013 squad, you can still see the roots stretching back to Theo Epstein and Boston’s first world championship in almost a century, but so can you see the future, or as we here in 2017 say, the present. The Red Sox don’t owe it all to the draft. They’re not the Rays or the Astros, but the draft has provided the Red Sox with a lot of value and a sizable amount of star power over the past few decades. So when going to look for Boston’s biggest draft busts or some such thing, you’ll have to be searching for a long time. Or, put more succinctly, the Red Sox aren’t the Orioles. Because when it comes to the draft, the Red Sox are hobgood at it.

Photo by Eric Hartline – USA TODAY Sports

The Red Sox were playing the Orioles. Jonathan Papelbon, the man who has devolved from making history coming out of a bullpen to living in infamy for what he’s done in a dugout, gave up back-to-back doubles to Chris Davis and Nolan Reimold with two outs, and then Carl Crawford couldn’t handle a sinking liner from The Great (Robert) Andino. Reimold scored. Five minutes later, in a different east coast game, Evan Longoria hit a 317-foot liner into that weird little left field corner in Tropicana Field to cap a comeback from being down 7-0 to the Yankees, and that ended it all. The Red Sox were out of the playoffs.

The stunning part wasn’t that the games ended the way they did – the Red Sox were playing so terribly and the Rays were the exact opposite of that – it was how quickly how the roof caved in on that team. Boston had a 95% win expectancy in that final game! And it was all gone in an improbable instant.

After Mark Reynolds struck out, it took about 15 minutes for the Red Sox to lose everything. Ten minutes to the end of the game, and then five minutes to lose their ticket to October. Some say that’s still the best day of baseball ever, and I’d be inclined to agree with them, despite the debilitating mental trauma it gives me. Normally one game wouldn’t mean much in the long run, but this time, it was wildly different.

The effects of that night were shocking, yet oddly predictable. Apart from losing out on the postseason, the team’s 7-20 record in September probably torpedoed whatever chance Jacoby Ellsbury had at getting an MVP award, despite posting a 30-30 season with stellar defense and 7.91 WARP. Instead, the voters boarded the Justin Verlander hype train and rode it coast-to-coast, giving him and his 7.45 WARP not only the Cy Young, but the MVP award as well. To be fair, Jose Bautista outperformed both of them, but his team didn’t even sniff the playoffs, so that shows you what the voters truly valued here.

Then came the blame game. Smear pieces, chicken and beer, scapegoats, Tito Francona popping pills, you name it. Francona’s option wasn’t picked up either. Then the Cubs offered Theo Epstein the chance to be the greatest general manager in baseball history, and he took it. The Red Sox were handsomely compensated, of course, by getting Chris Carpenter. No, not that one. This one.

You know what happened from then on. Ben Cherington, Bobby Valentine, and whatever the hell 2012 was, for the most part. The Red Sox, who were so stable and so soundly built, just fell apart. Apart from the core of the team, nothing really seemed all that good.

The Nick Punto Trade and 2013 changed that. Cherington dumped a boatload of money on the Dodgers, used it to get useful players (no, not you, Ryan Dempster), and watched nearly half the 25-man roster have the best seasons of their careers. The Red Sox went and won a third title in 10 years with guys that made baseball so damn fun to watch, like Koji Uehara and Mike Napoli. It was exciting, magical, and most of all, it felt like redemption. It was also just one season, and one that wouldn’t be replicated. That isn’t an insult to a World Series-winning team, it’s a realization that it’s incredibly hard to do all of that again and still win it all.

While it’s been good since August 2015, everything between 2013 and that month was mostly bad. Since 2011, the Red Sox haven’t finished a season where they weren’t either first or last place in AL East. The worst-to-first thing was nice in 2013, but the oscillation in success really does a number on the guys in charge. After the 2014 campaign became an injury-plagued mess and the 2015 season crashed and burned in June, Cherington was replaced with Dave Dombrowski. It’s been a ride, to say the least.

The success of the Red Sox in 2016 feels different. The 2011 squad won 90 games, but that record feels hollow, and even more so when you’re looking back on it. This one, with the explosion of youth and the spectacular offense, is like a beginning. Guys like Mookie Betts, Jackie Bradley, Xander Bogaerts, and Andrew Benintendi make this team feel like it’s only starting to do great things, and that says a lot when those four have already combined for 13.7 WARP this season. Hell, Mookie Betts does so many spectacular things that it’s hard to pick just one, but here goes:

David Ortiz, the last man standing from all those near-mythical World Series teams, is playing so well that the statement “he’s having the best final season ever” isn’t hyperbole. Dustin Pedroia didn’t hurt his hand for the billionth time, and now he’s hitting. Hanley Ramirez is barreling up every single thing. The old guard – well, relative to the young guys – is doing amazing stuff again. This is good. This is fun. The best part is that it’s likely to keep happening.

The 2011 Red Sox had a bunch of guys flounder during their tenure on the team, and the 2013 team was good thanks to a lot of short-term additions complementing the players left from the Epstein years. Neither of them looked like they were built for continued success. This year’s team bucks that trend. With all these good young players, these Red Sox are set to be good for a while. The foundation for future teams is there.

I said the 2013 season was like a redemption. The 2016 season is like a rebirth. There’s more here than just one good season. With any luck, they’ll be great again next year, and hopefully a for few years after that. The Red Sox are, truly and thankfully, back.

Photo by Greg M. Cooper/USA Today Sports Images