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

Over the past two weeks, most BP Boston authors have published 2017 Offseason Oracle columns in which we’ve gone in depth over what we think will happen (not what we think should happen) this offseason. Go read them. For a quick overview of what we think is in Boston’s future, refer to this handy chart:

Look forward to our “where we went wrong” post in March!

Photo by Joe Nicholson/USA Today Sports Images

Nonetheless, I’m going to go in a different direction today for a couple of reasons. The first is that other people are doing it much better than I could or would. Go read everything you can find about the slugger, because each piece is worth reading. The second is that I’m a strange person who is unhealthily obsessed with zigging when everyone else is zagging. I’m also very much into relievers, in case you’ve never read anything I’ve written. So, with that being said, I’m going to spend the rest of this post saying goodbye to another one of my favorite Red Sox players of the last few years.

As you can tell by the picture at the top of this post, I am talking about Junichi Tazawa. To be clear, there is nothing official that has come out to suggest that 2016 was definitely the righty’s final season with the Red Sox. It does seem very likely to be the case, though. You never know what kind of moves will be made during the offseason, but the Red Sox will almost certainly have Craig Kimbrel, Matt Barnes, Heath Hembree and Joe Kelly throwing out of their bullpen from the right side in 2017. Then, there are Koji Uehara and Brad Ziegler, who would both be higher priorities to re-sign. This is without mentioning the possibility of promoting someone like Kyle Martin, the comeback of Carson Smith and/or Brandon Workman and the possibility of bringing in someone from outside the organization. All of this, combined with the fact Tazawa was relatively disappointing for much of 2016, indicates the Red Sox are likely to let him walk this winter. My goal is for Tazawa’s second-half performance to not be the lasting impression of his tenure in Boston.

To start with, how Tazawa even made it to the majors is a fascinating origin story that doesn’t get told enough. He came over from Japan, but not in the way most players from that region do. Instead of playing for an NPB team for the first eight years of his career, he skipped that step and was signed by the Red Sox as an international free agent. This decision has gotten him essentially shunned from Japanese baseball, as he’s not allowed to play in the NPB for two years after leaving the majors, and was not allowed to pitch for his country in the 2013 World Baseball Classic. It’s an unfortunate — and quite frankly, unfair — treatment of a tremendous talent who decided he’d rather hit the open market than be tethered to whichever NPB club drafted him for eight years.

Beyond that, however, Tazawa truly made his mark in Boston despite flying under-the-radar for much of his career. He was first called up in 2009, pitched poorly for 25 innings, then didn’t make the majors again until the end of 2011. After that, his career took off.

Since this is Baseball Prospectus, we like to focus on the numbers. Tazawa does not falter there. From 2012 to 2014, he was arguably the most underrated reliever in all of baseball. He was at least in the discussion. He was in the top 20 percent of relievers in ERA in that span and the top 12 percent of relievers in FIP. His best quality has always been his ability to control the strike zone, which is shown off by the fact that his 5.3 K/BB ratio over that time ranks fourth among 170 qualified relievers. (Off topic, but Koji’s K/BB in that span was 11.2!) Tazawa was never really put in the closer role, and things didn’t go exceedingly well in the situations where he was, but he put up great numbers in an important set-up role.

Even beyond the stats, other fond memories should not be forgotten. The start of the production portion of his career, 2012, is near the top of that list. Obviously, not much about that year is positive. This was the Year of Bobby V, and there weren’t many fun times watching that team on a daily basis. Tazawa was one of those bright spots. He came out of nowhere to emerge as a legitimate weapon, and him being on the mound was one of the few times you could feel confident in the Red Sox. In fact, it was his most impression season by DRA- and cFIP, as he put up marks of 82 and 74, respectively.

It was this season that set him up for his greatest triumph, which was the 2013 campaign. Tazawa had proven himself a useful weapon, and John Farrell rode him all the way to the World Series. He threw in 71 games that season with a 3.16 ERA, more than a strikeout per inning and an above-average DRA and cFIP. Then, he took over in the playoffs and allowed just one run over 13 appearances in seven innings of work.

Of course, the moment he’ll always be remembered for was his battle with Miguel Cabrera in Game Three of the ALCS. He came in trying to hold on to a 1-0 lead with runners on the corners and one out with arguably the best hitter in the world at the plate. He threw him nothing but mid-90’s fastballs and set Cabrera down on four pitches, helping the Red Sox win that crucial game.

Relievers are always inherently underrated, especially if they never serve as closers. They don’t help in fantasy, and they rarely celebrate on the mound after a big win. They are hugely important pieces of good teams, though, and Tazawa embodies that fact. He’s almost certainly going to be somewhere else next year, and hopefully he’ll pitch well and extend his career as long as he can.

Then, in 2023 or in 2033 or whenever it happens to be, the Red Sox will honor that 2013 team. All of the players will come out on the field, and Tazawa will be in the middle of them. The camera will pan over him, and we’ll laugh since we’ll all have forgotten about him. Hopefully, though, the memories of all his success come flooding back. It’s appropriate that his likely departure is being overshadowed by Ortiz’s, as that’s how he spent his career. But Tazawa deserves his small moment in the sun, too.

Photo by Bob DeChiara/USA Today Sports Images

Top Play (WPA)

IT WAS HANLEY RAMIREZ’S WALK-OFF HOME RUN WITH TWO OUTS IN THE BOTTOM OF THE 9TH INNING TO CAP OFF A FIVE-RUN COMEBACK AND BEAT THE YANKEES. (.752)

It was, in a word, spectacular.

Bottom Play (WPA) 

Also in the same inning that HANLEY RAMIREZ HIT A WALK-OFF HOME RUN WITH TWO OUTS IN THE BOTTOM OF THE 9TH TO CAP OFF A FIVE RUN INNING AND BEAT THE YANKEES, Xander Bogaerts happened to hit a grounder to third and Chris Young – who pinch-hit for Andrew Benintendi – was tagged out trying to score (-.094).

Key Moment 

HANLEY RAMIREZ HIT A WALKOF-just kidding twice is enough. Let’s take a look at the ninth again. It started off with Aaron Hill pinch-hitting for Jackie Bradley against old friend Tommy Layne, which, you know, whatever. If you want thoughts about the decision, www.Twitter.com is a great place to start.

Hill struck out in three pitches. Chris Young was then called on to pinch hit for Benintendi and reached base via hit-by-pitch on a pitch that more grazed than hit him. He then stole second.

The Yankees then bring in Dellin Betances after working him the previous two nights, and he walks Pedroia. Pedroia immediately steals second and Young goes to third. That pesky little Bogaerts fielders choice happens next and now men are on first and second with two outs and David Ortiz is at the plate. Ortiz bloops one into center (.057), Pedroia scores and Bogaerts heads to third.

It’s now 5-3, Yankees. Mookie Betts comes up and pokes one through the left side, Bogaerts scores (.075) and Marco Hernandez, who’s running for Ortiz, goes to second.

Now it’s 5-4 Yankees. Mookie then advances on a passed ball and the Sox have men on second and third with two outs and Hanley Ramirez at the plate. He rips a 3-1 98mph fastball into the centerfield seats and the Red Sox have their first walk-off home run since Mike Napoli did it in June of 2014.

Blouses.

Trend to Watch

The bullpen had quite the task last night after starter Eduardo Rodriguez left the game with one out in the 3rd after allowing four runs on eight hits. Heath Hembree, Junichi Tazawa, Robby Scott and Joe Kelly combined for 6.2 innings of one run ball. It was another monster effort from a unit that’s been sufficiently better in September. Joe Kelly even got a win!

Additionally, the Orioles lost in Tampa, so the Sox picked up a full game on Baltimore.

What’s next

Watching Ramirez’s homer again, that’s what. But baseball-wise, the two teams face off again in the second of their four-game series. It’ll be Luis Cessa vs. Clay Buchholz.

Photo by Greg M. Cooper/USA Today Sports Images

• The Red Sox went into the top of the eighth inning with a 6-4 lead on Wednesday but the bullpen couldn’t hold it and when the team finally got off the field the game was tied 6-6.

• Just the day before the pen turned a 3-3 tie into a 4-3 lead for Tampa in the eighth inning.

• That came on the heels of the bullpen blowing up Sunday’s game by giving up a billion runs in the sixth inning of what had been a 4-2 Red Sox lead.

• You may be detecting a pattern here.

• The bullpen has been having trouble holding leads lately.

• But it’s not just been the bullpen. Drew Pomeranz gave up a two-run homer in the sixth inning on Tuesday to erase a 3-1 lead before the pen gave up the deciding run later.

• Last Thursday. Pomeranz gave up a run in the sixth and another in the seventh to turn a 1-0 lead into a 2-1 deficit. The pen even held it there but the offense couldn’t come back and that was that.

Broadly defined, these are all failures in the clutch. Some more than others, but the Red Sox have been lousy in high-leverage situations. Situations with a lot on the line equates to clutch. The concept of clutch is a sticky one for sabermetricians. Basically it goes like this: clutch is not a repeatable skill, at least not as far as we can prove. Now before you jump through your computer, out into my living room, and down my throat, let me say this:  clutch exists. It’s as real as your subscription to Cat Fancy or that huge scratch in the middle of your living room floor. When a player steps up in a tough situation and comes through, that’s clutch. But the fact that it happened doesn’t make it more likely that it will happen again given the same set of circumstances.

Now we get back to the Red Sox. The Red Sox, as you may have noticed from watching them and as I hope I’ve shown from that partial list above, have been remarkably unclutch offensively this season. I wrote a bit about that at the beginning of August right here in this space and nothing has much changed on that front. However, in that piece I focused on the offense, but really, the offense isn’t the problem. Sure, Travis Shaw maybe can’t hit, and Jackie Bradley and Xander Bogaerts have been ice cold all August, but even if that’s the new normal, this team can still be expected to score a lot of runs. Their problem is and has been pitching, and the bullet points above show that the problem is ongoing.

I’m not sure I realized the extent of it until I got a message from our own Brett Cowett. He pointed me towards this statistic from FanGraphs, which shows how team pitching staffs have performed in high-leverage situations this year. The list sorts teams by ERA in high-leverage situations. It should be noted that, in high-leverage situations, teams have very high ERAs, much higher than normal. This likely has to do with the fact that there isn’t much margin for error, there are already runners on, etc. To prove the point, the best pitching staff this season in high-leverage situations is the Cubs and they are the only team with a team ERA below 7.00. So it’s tough. Most teams’ ERAs are between 7.00 and below 10.00. Very few teams are above 10.00. Even fewer are above 11.00. After that you’re left with two teams. You can probably guess at least one of them. That’s right, the Diamondbacks are one! I’m impressed. The other one is the Red Sox, who are actually worse than the Diamondbacks. The Red Sox have a team ERA of 12.42 in high-leverage situations this season. That is unfathomable.

The Red Sox have a team ERA of 12.42 in high-leverage situations this season. That is unfathomable.

Now not all of that is bad luck. Part of it is that the Red Sox haven’t had a stopper in the rotation all year long, part of it is that outside of Craig Kimbrel, they don’t have anyone who has been very good getting those vital innings. A bullpen that was supposed to feature Kimbrel, Carson Smith, Koji Uehara, and Junichi Tazawa instead features a lesser version of Kimbrel, the sad remains of Tazawa, and that’s about it.

To further illustrate the point, FanGraphs also has a stat called Clutch. I don’t want to harp on it too much as I’m not an expert on it, but I will say that the Red Sox pitching staff is second to last in it. The point is, when the game comes down to one pitch, when the series is on the line, the Red Sox have performed well below their true talent level. One could look at that data and say they’ve played that way because they’re soft, but I don’t think so. I think this is due partly to a lack of high end relievers, the kind of guys who were supposed to be in Boston but for various reasons mostly never showed up, but I also think this is just bad luck.

For example, just look at the horrible sixth inning that blew the last game of the Kansas City series wide open. Eduardo Rodriguez gave up a double and walked two, then got a fly ball out. John Farrell pulled him at that point, opting for Matt Barnes. With a 4-2 lead, one out, and the bases full, this is a high leverage situation. So how did Barnes do? Well, horrifically, obviously, except not really as badly as it might seem. He faced five batters, four who put the ball into play. Two of the four balls in play were absolute rockets. The other two though? They were as weakly contacted hits as you’ll ever see. I don’t have the data on it, but I bet hits like those go for outs well over 90 percent of the time. This time they didn’t though and that’s how things got way out of control. Some of it was bad pitching, but some of it was good pitching, or at least a good process that led to a bad result.

The Red Sox bullpen may not get better this season, but even if they don’t, they should be more effective in the future simply because, while being clutch isn’t a repeatable skill, neither is being unclutch. Being bad is a skill, and they are good at that, but even bad major league pitchers get outs.

Photo by David Banks/USA Today Sports Images

Top Play (WPA): With the bases loaded and two outs in the bottom of the third inning, Owens have up a two-run double to J.D. Martinez (.195). The pitch Martinez hit wasn’t all that bad, but Owens had walked Jarrod Saltalamacchia to lead off the inning (a common theme) and, after an Erick Aybar double and two quick outs, the Red Sox elected to intentionally walk Miguel Cabrera to load the bases. The move didn’t work out. Yes, Martinez is one of the hottest hitters on the planet right now, but it was a pick your poison scenario, as John Farrell said after the game. Electing not to pitch to Miggy wasn’t crazy.

Anyway, it was just a two-RBI double, so no biggie, right? Well, while the pitch Martinez hit was pretty good, the pitch Justin Upton destroyed for a three-run homer (.153) was not. Neither was the second three-run homer Upton hit two innings later (.029). It got ugly.

Bottom Play (WPA): A Cameron Maybin strikeout before the aforementioned Cabrera walk and Martinez double qualified as the bottom WPA play of the game (-.086). It didn’t slow the Tigers down much.

For the Red Sox, the worst play was a routine Xander Bogaerts fly-out with Dustin Pedroia on first and two out in the top of the third (-.026). Exciting stuff.

Key Moment: The first of the two Upton bombs, in this writer’s estimation. Sure, the Martinez double was bad, but the Red Sox are more than capable of coming back from a 2-0 deficit. A 5-0 deficit in the third inning is a different story.

On a happier note, Andrew Benintendi hit his first MLB homer in the top of the seventh off Shane Greene. He also hit his first triple earlier in the game and my god his hair is glorious.

Trend to Watch: A few negatives here.

First, Henry Owens can’t pitch in the majors again until (or rather, unless) he improves his command. Owens walked the leadoff batter in three of his five innings pitched and walked five batters overall. He missed plenty of bats, too (8 strikeouts), but none of that mattered. When you throw in the high 80s/low 90s, you’re going to get hit some. When you get hit, the bases need to be as empty as possible. That’s not the case with Owens, who isn’t an MLB-quality starter right now. Hopefully 2017 holds better things in store for the young southpaw.

Second … yikes, Junichi Tazawa. Yet another rough outing for the once-reliable setup man saw him allow three hits and two runs in two innings, though he did strike out three batters. Tazawa wasn’t bad enough to consider cutting outright but he wasn’t good enough to do much to make us feel better about his use, either.

Finally, the Red Sox weren’t able to do much of anything against Justin Verlander. That’s not surprising given the run the Tigers’ ace is on, but Pedroia, Bogaerts and Mookie Betts all went hitless in the game. Bad things happen when that’s the case.

Coming Next: The Red Sox take their show to Tropicana Field for a four-game set. David Price will face off against his old friends and Blake Snell, first pitch at 7:10 pm EST.

Photo by Kamil Kraznyski/USA Today Sports Images

Boston’s pen currently features seven relievers: Craig Kimbrel, Koji Uehara, Junichi Tazawa, Robbie Ross, Heath Hembree, Tommy Layne and Matt Barnes. We’ll organize them into three tiers. The top tier includes the first three guys on the list. Say what you will about Kimbrel’s increased home run and walk rate, he’s still an elite option. Koji is visibly aging but for now he’s in this class. Beyond the thought of Tazawa facing anyone who has ever been a part of the Blue Jays organization, he’s a rock in Boston’s pen.

Then there’s the next group. That’s Ross and Hembree. Ross has been susceptible to the home run and he still walks more than you’d like, but he’s been effective. Hembree has been, if anything, even better, but he’s such a fly-ball pitcher that the fear of homers raining from the sky is still there. All in all though, two effective if not elite relievers.

Then there’s the back end of Layne and Barnes. Some might put Barnes in the middle tier, but I don’t because he simply walks too many guys. He’s not immune to homers either, though it’s not a huge problem for him. Mostly he’s a competent reliever, but not an option for the back end of pen because he simply doesn’t throw enough quality strikes or, really, enough strikes. Layne is, I’m sure a nice fellow, but he’s really just a guy. The walks are high, the strikeouts league average or a touch below from the pen, and he doesn’t dominate lefties like you’d think a guy with his arm angle would.

When looking to upgrade the pen, it’s this last tier of guys that I’d look to improve upon. You never like to lose talent for nothing, but this team is all in on winning this season and frankly Layne isn’t doing much to help. Barnes could someday move into the second tier if his command improves, but stashing him back in Pawtucket shouldn’t be any kind of impediment to improving the bullpen in Boston right now.

There are two groups from where to draw that improvement. The first is starting pitchers who have flamed out at the major league level. That would be Roenis Elias and Joe Kelly. Kelly is currently hurt, and his groin injury is coming along slowly. If he returns this season, it should be as a reliever in Pawtucket. See if his stuff plays up in a bullpen role and go from there. In the meantime, Roenis Elias represents an intriguing replacement for Tommy Layne, assuming the team needs a lefty-on-lefty only reliever. Elias has been successful against left handers in his career, holding them to a .658 OPS with a 2.67 K/BB ratio. He has some speed on his fastball and deception from the left side, both of which could play up a bit in the pen. It must be acknowledged that taking a starter and making him a situational lefty isn’t exactly squeezing out all the marrow out of the bone, but in this season of Going All In, maybe it merits a shot.

In his last 10 appearances, Light has thrown 12 innings, struck out 13, walked four, and given up six hits and no runs.

The second group is composed of minor league relievers Pat Light and Kyle Martin. Light is likely the better known of the two, having already made his major league debut earlier this season. His fastball sits in the upper 90s and he’s reported to have reached 100 mph at times. He keeps hitters off that heat with a splitter and slider. The overall package can be downright dominating when the command is there, and after an initial bump in the road at Pawtucket after his call up, Light has been dominant. In his last 10 appearances he’s thrown 12 innings, struck out 13, walked four, and given up six hits and no runs. Overall he has 32 strikeouts and 13 walks in 26.1 innings in Triple-A and all with only one homer allowed. He’s spent time in Triple-A and made an appearance in Boston, so it’s unlikely the 25-year-old would be wowed by the lights (sorry not sorry). (Editor’s note: it is indeed Light who got the call to the majors to replace Eduardo Rodriguez on the roster.)

Pat Light isn’t the only one in Triple-A to pitch well out of the pen. Kyle Martin, the Red Sox 9th round pick in 2013 out of Texas A&M University has been putting up numbers that surpass Light’s. His strikeouts are up (11.3 K/9), his walks down (2.3. BB/9), and his ground ball tendencies help keep the homers down as well with just one given up in 35 innings so far this season. Martin does carry a 4.11 ERA, but his K and BB numbers are quite good and he keeps the ball in the park well so his potential as a fifth or sixth bullpen arm isn’t diminished.

None of these guys are the next Kimbrel, but deployed properly they can be upgrades on the current cast. Send Barnes down and see what Light brings you. See if Elias can help get lefties out better than Layne has been able to, or don’t, just bring up Martin instead. There are, believe it or not, options. And options are good, especially if they represent hope and if they don’t cost the team top prospects like Rafael Devers or Anderson Espinoza. If Andrew Miller is available at reasonable cost, consider making the move, but short of that, there are enough problems elsewhere on this roster that it makes sense to use the team’s resources on a position with fewer internal solutions, which, at least for now, rules out the bullpen.

Photo by Kelly O’Connor/www.sittingstill.smugmug.com

Thursday’s 8-7 win over the White Sox featured, among other things, the Red Sox failing to score more than one run off James Shields, a pitcher with an ERA over 20 and the mechanics of a drunk horse; the Red Sox holding the White Sox scoreless in bases-loaded, no-out situations twice late in the game; and a walk-off single by MVP candidate Xander Bogaerts. It was all quite something, but ultimately, for a team stuck in a losing microclimate and about to head off for a road trip, it was something necessary and good.

Top Play (WPA): In the eighth inning, Dustin Pedroia singled home Marco Hernandez to tie the already ridiculous game at 7-7. It’s pretty underwhelming as big plays go, but after the Red Sox inexplicably fell behind 4-0 against the game’s worst starter only to rally to a 5-4 lead against his replacement (that they would later blow), the wait made it great. Pedroia pulled the ball over the shortstop to tie it; he’s been going the other way a lot, but yesterday he was classic Pedey, taking his hits to left field.

Bottom Play (WPA): About that blown lead — Junichi Tazawa replaced Tommy Layne with one out in the seventh inning, two runners on, and the Red Sox up 5-4, and promptly gave up a home run to Jose Abreu, sending Chicago to a 7-5 lead. Coming one day after Koji Uehara’s implosion, it wasn’t a great sign, and given the bases loaded scenarios the Red Sox bullpen would subsequently enter into (and successfully negotiate!) it was yet another sign that God is still cackling at our plan to have one of the league’s great bullpens.

Key moment: Good news for aspiring left fielders: The Red Sox need you! Oy. Chris Young, who has merely hit everything in sight this season, pulled his hamstring as he rounded first base on a second-inning blast off the Green Monster that missed being a home run by mere inches. With Brock Holt still recovering from a concussion, Blake Swihart on the shelf and Rusney Castillo frolicking at a farm upstate, this is a… difficult situation. The Who had an easier time with their drummers.

Trend to watch: The Red Sox fell behind in the first inning yet again, with Rick Porcello being tagged for two runs in the first frame. I believe Dave O’Brien said Boston hasn’t scored in the first inning in 9 games, and while I’d love to confirm that, my day job is covering financial markets and the world is about to explode. The real trend today is watching your 401(k)’s value plummet. Happy Friday!

Coming next: The Sox head to Texas to face the American League’s best team. Tonight’s tilt features David Price against Nick Martinez. Last year, before this series, a Dallas radio station brought me on ostensibly to talk baseball. It was, in fact, a trolljob, and they apparently tried to get another one of us on this year for the same stunt and failed. Screw them and screw the Rangers, except for Beltre, of course.

Photo by Greg M. Cooper/USA Today Sports Images

Top Play (WPA)

In the 7th, Junichi Tazawa decided to challenge Manny Machado, the best player on either team, with a high forkball. Junichi Tazawa failed.

That dinger was worth a massive .359 WPA, and was a pretty loud microcosm of the night. The Orioles would crank out seven home runs this game, and this one might’ve been the shortest. It became a blowout so quickly after this one, that Adam Jones’ second homer was worth just .001 WPA. Baltimore was quickly approaching the smallest possible value for a home run at that point.

Bottom Play (WPA)

Look, Hanley, we know you can run. You’ve just been doing it too much lately. It took a pretty good throw, but Baltimore’s backup catcher Francisco Pena threw out Ramirez trying to steal second base in the 6th inning. That racked up a -.045 WPA, closely trailed by a Travis Shaw flyout in the 5th (-.044 WPA) and a Blake Swihart groundout (-.044 WPA), which in the 5th as well. It’s nice to see Hanley run, but he’s been running into outs quite a bit recently.

Key Moment

Mark Trumbo can go away now.

Staked to a one-run lead, Rick Porcello gave it away just one out into the bottom of the 6th. The wheels well and truly came off at this point, since the Orioles, having scored in both the 4th and 5th innings, proceed to score in the rest of the innings until the game ended. Porcello was forgettable, Robbie Ross wasn’t much better, Tazawa was unbelievably awful, and Noe Ramirez probably shouldn’t be in the majors.

Trend to Watch

The state of the bullpen. What are we to expect from it? It’s been a harrowing week for the reliever corps. The series in Toronto had its fair share of mishaps, from Koji allowing a flukish go-ahead homer to Josh Donaldson late in Friday’s game, to the complete bullpen meltdown in Saturday’s contest. Then, after three relatively good games, the bullpen imploded for consecutive games again, with the whole Layne-Buchholz-Barnes carnival on Wednesday, and then this fiasco. I didn’t expect the bullpen to be amazing all the time, but man, you really couldn’t have picked a worse road trip to self-desctruct on.

Coming Next

The Red Sox mercifully return home to play the Blue Jays once again, and Toronto will start R.A. Dickey to face off against one of the few not-terrible pitchers on the Red Sox staff in David Price.

Photo by Tommy Gilligan/USA Today Sports Images

Opinions on Tazawa were oddly split heading into the season, largely due to his poor performance toward the end of 2015. Back in March, the bullpen was split into two factions. The first was the elite tier, with Craig Kimbrel, Koji Uehara and Smith. Then, there was the massive group of middle relievers like Matt Barnes and Robbie Ross and all of the other guys we’ve seen prior to the seventh inning this year. Then there was Tazawa, who for some reason found himself stuck in the middle of those two factions rather than squarely in the first one. Through the first quarter of 2016, he’s showing that those who doubted he was part of the first group made a mistake.

Although he’s always been among the best at controlling the strike zone, Tazawa has taken it to another level this year with 10.7 strikeouts per nine innings.

There’s no other way to interpret what the righty has done this year; he’s been phenomenal. With Smith already missing essentially the entire season and now continuing that absence through the end of the year, there’s a strong argument that Tazawa has been the most valuable arm in the bullpen. We’re talking about a guy who, through Tuesday’s action, has a 1.53 ERA, 2.39 FIP, 3.16 DRA and an 83 cFIP through his first 17.2 innings. We’ve seen Tazawa excel before, but never to this level.

Looking a little deeper into his numbers, it’s clear that he has improved in just about every important area for a pitcher. Most noticeably, he’s striking out significantly more batters this year. Although he’s always been among the best at controlling the strike zone, he’s taken it to another level this year with 10.7 strikeouts per nine innings. It also looks almost entirely sustainable. To this point in the year, 307 pitches have thrown at least 250 pitches. Twelve of those pitchers have a higher swinging strike rate. The biggest key to this has been inducing plenty of swings on pitches out of the zone, as Tazawa has the sixth highest O_Swing rate of that same group of 307 arms.

At the same time he is showing off this vastly improved swing-and-miss stuff, he’s also allowing weak contact on a consistent basis. This is especially encouraging considering hard contact has always been Tazawa’s Achilles’ Heel. However, to this point in the year he’s allowed a .211 BABIP, a half of a home run per nine innings and a 49 percent groundball rate, all of which are career bests.

Overall, the key that has lead to both of these positive developments in Tazawa’s game all come down to the simple act of keeping the ball down in the zone. As I mentioned just a second ago, he’s had trouble limiting hard contact in the past, and that’s because he’s shown a tendency to leave a handful of pitches belt-high down the middle of the plate in every outing. That hasn’t been an issue this year, as you can see here.

As far as I can tell, the catalyst for this is a newfound release point. Tazawa has always been somewhat over-the-top with his release, but he’s adjusted that even more this season.

By utlizing this higher release point, he’s been able to get on top of the ball more consistently and drive it through the bottom of the zone. Additionally, as a guy who throws a huge number of splitters, it allows him to get sharper downward movement that drops the pitch out of the zone at the last second. That last part has been the most important development in his drive toward becoming a near-elite strikeout arm in 2016.

Now, the Red Sox find themselves with a difficult decision on their hands. Tazawa is set to hit free agency at the conclusion of this season, and he’s setting himself up to get a pretty payday when winter comes around, especially as the league is flocking toward a willingness to drop plenty of cash on career setup men. Last year, I made the argument that they should’ve extended Tazawa at that point, and obviously nothing in 2016 has changed my mind on that front. With that being said, the longer they take to come to a deal, the more likely he’ll find himself out of their comfort range. Whether he’s around for years to come or just months is inconsequential at this point. The Red Sox find themselves in contention for the first time since 2013, and having a strong base in the back of the bullpen is key to staying in contention. Losing Smith was a huge blow on that front, but luckily Tazawa has taken his game to a new level to offset that loss.

Photo by Bob DeChiara/USA Today Sports Images.