Remembering My 2018 Predictions: Mariano Rivera Award & Trevor Hoffman Award

The original post was written on March 22, 2018 and it outlined my prediction for the Mariano Rivera and Trevor Hoffman Award winners. The Mariano Rivera Award goes to the best relief pitcher in the American League while the Trevor Hoffman Award goes to the best relief pitcher in the National League respectively. My predictions had Ken Giles of the Astros winning in the American League (and promptly punching himself in the face in celebration for it) while the National League winning was Wade Davis of the Colorado Rockies. What a tough day at the plate for me as I put up an 0-3 in my predictions. Tomorrow is another day for baseball though, that’s the beautiful thing about playing a game basically every day. 

Prediction Season is here at The Greedy Pinstripes and with the Division winners and Wild Card winners announced, the postseason done, and the New York Yankees named the World Series Champions for the 2018 season we will switch directly into awards season. Contrary to some beliefs the relief pitchers in Major League Baseball have their own award at the end of the season, the Mariano Rivera Award for the best relief pitcher in the American League and the Trevor Hoffman Award for the best reliever in the National League. Now I am not trying to incite a riot here or really even spark up a debate, although feel free to debate in the comments section or on Twitter by sending @GreedyStripes a tweet, but for that reason (both these awards and the American League and National League Cy Young Awards that we will cover at a later time) I feel like these pitchers should be disqualified from the running for AL and NL MVP awards. I just do, sorry. Without kicking the hornets’ nest any more let’s take a look at my predictions for the Mariano Rivera and Trevor Hoffman Award winners for the 2018 season. 

The New York Yankees and their closer Aroldis Chapman are at a bit of a disadvantage when it comes down to awards like the Mariano Rivera Award for the best reliever in the league. The Yankees have the best problem a manager can have, too many qualities relievers, too many relievers with closing experience, and too many weapons at one manager’s disposal to be able to single-handedly point out and showcase just one of them. For that reason, I cannot pick a Yankee to win the award, but instead I will choose a member of the team that knocked out the Yankees in the 2017 ALCS, the Houston Astros closer Ken Giles. Giles should have the most opportunities of any closer in the American League to nail down a save, and with the Astros offense behind him the right-hander should have a bit of wiggle room if he were to have an off night. These awards generally go to a pitcher on a winning team, for obvious reasons, so why not the closer on the team that I predicted to be tied for the most wins in the American League in 2018? Just makes sense to me. 

The Colorado Rockies built what the organization hopes to be a “Super Bullpen” during the offseason before the 2018 season and those efforts will yield great results for a team starved of quality pitching. The team has a staff of young starters with tons of upside, but it will be the bullpen’s ability to turn every game into a six-or-seven inning contest that will separate the team from the pack and keep the club in a lot of games that they normally wouldn’t have won. At the helm of this bullpen will be the Rockies closer, former Cubs fireballer Wade Davis. Davis should enjoy the lack of pressure pitching for the Rockies as opposed to pitching with the Cubs in recent seasons which should show not only on the field, but in his stat line as well. The fact that Colorado has also added big arms to help him like Bryan Shaw will only help Davis succeed giving him less innings to “mop up” and less jams to get out of, which could subsequently wear a pitcher down and inflate his stat line just a bit. 

TGP 2018 Predictions: Mariano Rivera & Trevor Hoffman Award Winners

Prediction Season is here at The Greedy Pinstripes and with the Division winners and Wild Card winners announced, the postseason done, and the New York Yankees named the World Series Champions for the 2018 season we will switch directly into awards season. Contrary to some beliefs the relief pitchers in Major League Baseball have their own award at the end of the season, the Mariano Rivera Award for the best relief pitcher in the American League and the Trevor Hoffman Award for the best reliever in the National League. Now I am not trying to incite a riot here or really even spark up a debate, although feel free to debate in the comments section or on Twitter by sending @GreedyStripes a tweet, but for that reason (both these awards and the American League and National League Cy Young Awards that we will cover at a later time) I feel like these pitchers should be disqualified from the running for AL and NL MVP awards. I just do, sorry. Without kicking the hornets nest any more let’s take a look at my predictions for the Mariano Rivera and Trevor Hoffman Award winners for the 2018 season.

The New York Yankees and their closer Aroldis Chapman are at a bit of a disadvantage when it comes down to awards like the Mariano Rivera Award for the best reliever in the league. The Yankees have the best problem a manager can have, too many qualities relievers, too many relievers with closing experience, and too many weapons at one manager’s disposal to be able to single-handedly point out and showcase just one of them. For that reason, I cannot pick a Yankee to win the award, but instead I will choose a member of the team that knocked out the Yankees in the 2017 ALCS, the Houston Astros closer Ken Giles. Giles should have the most opportunities of any closer in the American League to nail down a save, and with the Astros offense behind him the right-hander should have a bit of wiggle room if he were to have an off night. These awards generally go to a pitcher on a winning team, for obvious reasons, so why not the closer on the team that I predicted to be tied for the most wins in the American League in 2018? Just makes sense to me.

The Colorado Rockies built what the organization hopes to be a “Super Bullpen” during the offseason before the 2018 season and those efforts will yield great results for a team starved of quality pitching. The team has a staff of young starters with tons of upside, but it will be the bullpen’s ability to turn every game into a six-or-seven inning contest that will separate the team from the pack and keep the club in a lot of games that they normally wouldn’t have won. At the helm of this bullpen will be the Rockies closer, former Cubs fireballer Wade Davis. Davis should enjoy the lack of pressure pitching for the Rockies as opposed to pitching with the Cubs in recent seasons which should show not only on the field, but in his stat line as well. The fact that Colorado has also added big arms to help him like Bryan Shaw will only help Davis succeed giving him less innings to “mop up” and less jams to get out of, which could subsequently wear a pitcher down and inflate his stat line just a bit.

It’s Bird, it’s a Plane, no, it’s Gardyman!…

Credit:  David Banks/USA TODAY Sports

It is frustrating when the Yankees lose games they should have won so there was satisfaction with Friday afternoon’s stunning victory over the Chicago Cubs, 3-2, thanks to a ninth inning two-out, two-strike three-run home run by Brett Gardner.  The Yankees had their chances early in the game, but seemed to self-sabotage every attempt to push runs across the plate.  

The Yankees were fortunate that Cubs closer Wade Davis was unavailable after pitching in the three preceding games for the Northsiders.  Davis is currently 2-0 with an 0.00 ERA in 13 1/3 innings.  He has 15 strikeouts and has only given up four hits and walks.  His WHIP is a paltry 0.60.  I’ve read a few Chicago articles that think the Cubs upgraded the closing position with the addition of Wade Davis (a bit of a slam against Yankees closer Aroldis Chapman).  But with Davis unavailable, the Cubs were forced to turn to former closer, Hector Rondon, who had been displaced last July when Chapman arrived.  

Honestly, it didn’t feel like Gardner was going to emerge from the day victorious.  After he reached two strikes, he fouled off a couple of Rondon pitches to stay alive.  It felt like Rondon just needed to put one in the outside corner to earn his first save of the season.  Instead, he left the pitch in the exact spot that he shouldn’t have…low and inside.  That’s all Gardner needed to deposit the pitch in the outfield bleachers.  

The Gardner home run put the game in the hands of former Cubs closer Aroldis Chapman.  It wasn’t pretty when the first batter, Cubs shortstop Addison Russell, reached second base as a result of a Chase Headley error.  With the game-tying run on second and no outs, Chapman retired the next three batters which included a swinging third strike by Cubs powerful second baseman Javier Baez to end the game.

Hats off to Michael Pineda.  I know that he gave up two home runs, but he could’ve folded like a cheap suit as he has in years past.  He held the Cubs to only two runs on the solo homers and only three hits overall in six innings of work.  He struck out six and walked only one.  It was a quality start and there’s no way the Yankees could have staged the improbable comeback if not for Pineda’s efforts.  

The win moved the Yankees to 18-9.  They precariously remain in sole possession of first place in the AL East by a half-game over the Baltimore Orioles.  The Orioles beat the Chicago White Sox 4-2 despite starting pitcher Wade Miley being hit by successive line drives 12 pitches into the game that forced his departure.  

Aroldis Chapman received his World Series ring prior to the start of the game.  It was good to see him receive recognition for his contributions for helping to bring the first World Series championship to Chicago for the Cubs in 108 years.  People tend to remember the game-tying home run that a weary Chapman gave up in Game 7 but the Cubs would not have been in the World Series if not for #54.  

Credit:  Tannen Maury/EPA

Adam Warren also received his World Series ring as a member of the 2016 Cubs, but he chose a private ceremony (he wanted the spotlight on the Yankees closer since Chapman was part of the post-season team that won the World Series plus he didn't feel right wearing Yankees gear with a Cubs ring...'Attaboy, Adam!).  

It was also a fun day for former Cubs shortstop/second baseman Starlin Castro.  He received a standing ovation as the Cubs played his walk-up music when he came up to bat for the first time.  There’s no doubt it was an emotional day for Castro who remains appreciative of the Cubs for giving him his first opportunity in Major League Baseball.  

Credit:  Getty Images

Gary Sanchez was activated before the game and went 0-for-4 with a strikeout.  Kyle Higashioka was optioned to Triple-A Scranton/WilkesBarre after failing to record in a hit in 18 at-bats.  I had really been hoping that he could have gotten that first one out of the way before heading back to Eastern Pennsylvania.  

Have a great Saturday!  Sounds like it may be a cold, windy night in Chicago.  Hopefully it will be a memorable evening for the Baby Bombers in the Windy City.  

Predicting the AL & NL Relief Pitcher Award Winners

The Mariano Rivera Award for the American League and the Trevor Hoffman Award for the National League go out to the best relief pitchers from each league every single season. Last year it was one of the Yankees winning the award in Andrew Miller, could it be either Miller, Dellin Betances or Aroldis Chapman again this season or will we see a new American League arm grab the award? And with Craig Kimbrel out of the National League who will step up and grab the horse by the reigns for the National League Award? I have no concrete idea but I do have a prediction anyway. 

Andrew Miller is the reigning Mariano Rivera Award winner but I can’t see him winning the award once again in 2016. Aroldis Chapman will get the bulk of the saves opportunities in the Bronx once he returns from suspension keeping Miller more in the 7^th and 8^th innings then in the 9^th in New York. It may finally be Wade Davis’s time to shine. The Royals will likely have one of the best teams in the American League this year and Davis may get the most opportunities for saves than any other. Kelvin Herrera will likely pitch the 8^th and is little-to-no competition for Davis and I believe the award is his for the taking barring any sort of injury.

In the National League I’m going to go with another former New York Yankee that never should have been traded away, Mark Melancon of the Pittsburgh Pirates. Melancon will have one of the best outfield defense’s behind him, a great catcher in Francisco Cervelli and an offense that should net him a ton of leads and save opportunities. All he has to do is keep the ball down, cut down on the walks and steal those saves from the other team. Simple as that. 

IBWAA SELECTS MILLER, MELANCON IN RELIEF PITCHER AWARD VOTE

Los Angeles – The Internet Baseball Writers Association of America (IBWAA) announced the winners in its relief pitcher category Sunday, with the New York Yankees’ Andrew Miller winning the 2015 IBWAA Rollie Fingers American League Relief Pitcher of the Year award, and Mark Melancon, of the Pittsburgh Pirates, being selected as the 2015 IBWAA Hoyt Wilhelm National League Relief Pitcher of the Year.

Miller received 58 first-place votes (33.14%) and 414 points while being named on 124 of 175 ballots (68.89%). Others receiving first-place votes include Dellin Betances (49), Wade Davis (34) and Huston Street (11).

Melancon received 84 first-place votes (47.73%) and 517 points while being named on 125 of 176 ballots (69.44%). Others receiving first-place votes include Aroldis Chapman (46), Trevor Rosenthal (24) and Jeurys Familia (15).

Election results are as follows:

AL Reief Pitcher:

1st Place: Andrew Miller, New York Yankees – 414 points
2nd Place: Dellin Betances, New York Yankees – 372
3rd Place: Wade Davis, Kansas City Royals – 306

NL Relief Pitcher:

1st Place: Mark Melancon, Pittsburgh Pirates – 517 points
2nd Place: Trevor Rosenthal, St. Louis Cardinals – 359
3rd Place: Aroldis Chapman, Cincinnati Reds – 312

Ballot tabulations by Brian Wittig & Associates, using the Borda Method.

The IBWAA was established July 4, 2009 to organize and promote the growing online baseball media, and to serve as a digital alternative to the Baseball Writers’ Association of America (BBWAA). Voting for full season awards takes place in September of each year, with selections being announced in November. The IBWAA also holds a Hall of Fame election in December of each year, with results being announced the following January.

The relief pitcher awards were established in 2010.

Among approximately 400 others, IBWAA members include Jim Bowden, Jim Caple, David Schoenfield and Mark A. Simon of ESPN.com; Tim Brown, Yahoo! Sports; Craig Calcaterra, NBC Sports Hardball Talk; Bill Chuck, GammonsDaily.com; Derrick Goold, St. Louis Post-Dispatch; King Kaufman, Bleacher Report; Kevin Kennedy; Kostya Kennedy, Sports Illustrated; Will Leitch, Sports on Earth; Bruce Markusen, Hardball Times; Ross Newhan; Dayn Perry and Matt Snyder, CBSSports.com; Mark Purdy, San Jose Mercury News; Tom Hoffarth and J.P. Hoornstra Los Angeles Daily News; Pedro Moura, Orange County Register; Tracy Ringolsby, MLB.com; Ken Rosenthal, FoxSports.com; Eno Sarris, FanGraphs; Dan Schlossberg, USA Today; Jesse Spector, Sporting News and Wendy Thurm.

Association membership is open to any and all Internet baseball writers, with a yearly fee of $20, or $35 lifetime. Discounts for groups and scholarships are available. Members must be 18 years of age to apply.

For more information please visit www.ibwaa.com.

Contact:



Howard Cole
Founding Director, IBWAA
baseballsavvy@aol.com

Recap: Royals 6, Yankees 0

Chris Capuano surrendered four earned runs in three-plus innings and the Royals easily beat the Yankees, 6-0, on Sunday afternoon at Kauffman Stadium.

Capuano Struggles: The veteran's 2015 debut started out well -- the Royals scored just one run on two hits in the first three frames -- but the bottom of the fourth was another story. Indeed, Kansas City plated three more in that at-bat to build a 4-0 advantage -- one the floundering Yankees' offense couldn't overcome.

Wet Newspapers: That's basically what the Yankees' bats looked like in this one, with the team not even recording a baserunner until the top of the fourth. In all, the Yanks logged just six hits on the day -- three of which came during Edinson Volquez's seven scoreless innings.

Don't Wanna Do That: The Yankees loaded the bases against the Royals' Wade Davis in the eighth, but failed to cross home after Alex Rodriguez struck out and Garrett Jones grounded to first. New York's average with men in scoring position this year is now .249, including a .295 line on this road trip.

A Painful Tex Message: Mark Teixeira took a fastball off the foot in the fourth, removing him from the contest and forcing the Yankees to bring in Jones. X-Rays on Teixeira were negative, though, so the infielder shouldn't miss more than a game or two.

What's Happening to These Guys?: The Yankees have had a rough time scoring this week, being held to two runs or less in five of their last six. That adds up to 11 runs since Tuesday -- the same total they reached in Monday's win in Tampa.

Next Up: The Yankees will look to bounce back from this 2-5 stretch on Tuesday when they visit the Nationals in DC, beginning at 7:05 p.m. ET and airing live on MLB Network. Nathan Eovaldi (3-1, 4.14 ERA) will start for the Yankees hoping to rebound from a tough loss in St. Petersburg, facing inconsistent Nats lefty Gio Gonzalez (3-2, 4.25 ERA).

Juan Perez & the Oscar Taveras Link

We all learned late Sunday evening that St. Louis Cardinals centerfielder Oscar Taveras died in a car accident in his native Dominican Republic and it sent shockwaves throughout Major League Baseball. I found it interesting reading USA Today yesterday morning about the Juan Perez and Taveras link and how Perez may have used the news to get the biggest hit of his career.

Set the stage, it’s the fifth inning and the Giants hitting coach Hensley Meulens went into the clubhouse to find Perez crying. Perez was a friend and former teammate of Taveras in the Dominican Winter League and was so upset by the news he threw his phone away when the news was confirmed. Three innings later Perez used this emotion to get a two run double off the untouchable Wade Davis en route to a 5-0 victory for San Francisco.

Perez was noticeably upset and overwhelmed by the news when speaking to reporters after the game and was quoted as saying: 

"I put it out of my mind. By the time I was in the game, I put it away,'' he said, stopping to compose himself. "You never know what may happen. That young man was here two weeks ago and now he has just died in an accident. It's so sad. I still can't believe it happened.''

Perez batted just .170 in 100 at bats this season and had just one hit in 18 at bats with runners in scoring position this season and came up against a Royals pitcher in Davis that had been virtually untouchable this offseason making the deep double even more unlikely. Perez dedicated that double to Taveras as he posted a picture of himself and Taveras giving a high-10 during an Aguilas game with the English and Spanish caption “that double was for you, my brother! My soul misses you. Go with God. I love you. My condolences to the Tavares family.”

Pineda Throws Gem, But Offensive Problems Doom Yankees in Opening Loss to Royals

Michael Pineda gave up no earned runs in 7 innings and the Dellin Betances/David Robertson duo followed him with a pair of scoreless at-bats, but since the offense simply didn't show up again the Yankees uglily lost to the Royals tonight, 1-0, in the series opener in the Bronx. 

For the Yanks, in spite of the fact that yesterday's game ended with a walk-off homer, the contest was the second consecutive one in which they didn't give Pineda any support, something especially frustrating considering the way Kansas City scored in the top of the third.

Facing Pineda with one out and nobody on in that frame, Alcides Escobar hit a hard grounder right at Chase Headley, a play the latter usually makes in his sleep.

Nonetheless, for some reason Headley let the ball skip over his glove, an error that put Escobar at second to eventually set up a go-ahead single by Nori Aoki.

In other words, the guy who was the hero yesterday suddenly became the villain this evening, a misfortune that definitely helped out Royals' Starter James Shields, who impressively shutout the Yanks for 8 1/3 innings before Wade Davis closed things out in the ninth.

Best Rotation in the AL East?

Leading the charge in 2012

I read an article from Yahoo! Sports stating that, going into the 2012 season, the Tampa Bay Rays have the best rotation in the AL East. At first I wasn't really surprised to see that, but after reading the article and seeing that they only went over the top 3 in the Rays rotation, and then saw the rest of it almost as an afterthought, I decided to see how the Rays rotation stacked up against the Yankees rotation.

I chose Baseball Reference's version of WAR to compare all the pitchers. I'll admit that I don't quite understand how either B-R or Fangraphs do their WAR calculations, but I know they're different. So I took a shot and choose B-R. Hey, I had a 50/50 shot at which is better.

Here is the proposed 2012 rotation for the Rays, with their 2011 bWAR as well as some notes afterwards on whether we can expect an increase or decrease in that stat -

James Shields - 6.1 His career average bWAR in a season is 2.95, and being 30 years old I really don't think he can keep up that career high bWAR from last season. So I expect to see a drop.

Jeremy Hellickson - 4.2 Hellickson had a pretty low strikeout rate of 5.6, and coming into his 3rd season in MLB, I fully expect is bWAR to drop. I really think a bWAR of around 3.0 sounds about right.

David Price - 3.7 David's bWAR in 2010 was a 5.3, and generally a rookie pitcher does very well due to the "surprise factor". I mean, it's hard to prepare for a pitcher you've never seen before. But even though I don't see him being a 5.3 pitcher again, I think getting up to around 4.5 is reasonable.

Jeff Niemann - 1.1 After 3+ seasons in MLB I believe we've seen him strikeout as many as he ever will, even though his strikeout rate has gone up in each of the last three years. Coupling that with the fact he had the same bWAR in 2011, I don't see any change happening here.

Wade Davis - .2 Wade had a bWAR of 1.8 in 2010, and in 2011 his strikeout rate dropped for the 3rd straight season. Although I'm not totally convinced he'll have a higher bWAR in 2012, I'll go ahead and assume he will to be on the safe side.

Let me point out that there's a good chance that Matt Moore could be in the rotation for the majority of the season for the Rays. He did throw 164.1 innings last year (combined majors + minors), so theoretically he could throw around 200. However, I read the chat transcript over at MLBTR where Tim Dierkes implied that Matt wouldn't have a full workload for Tampa Bay. Seeing his innings go up from 123 in 2009 to 144 in 2010, I can see where the Rays may limit him a bit.

So what about the New York Yankees projected rotation in 2012?

CC Sabathia - 6.9 CC has had an average bWAR of 5.4 with the Yankees, and that 6.9 is his career high. So a reduction is to be expected. Although judging by his three-year average I don't see it going down by much.

Hiroki Kuroda - 3.7 Hiro's bWAR in 2010 was 2.5, and coupled with the fact he's moving to a much tougher league/division, I don't think I'm alone in expecting his bWAR to go down a bit in 2012.

Ivan Nova - 3.6 So far in MLB Ivan's strikeout rate has been 5.4, and that bothers me a bit. Not to the point that I'd like to see the Yankees shop him in a trade or something, but I don't see how he continues where he left off from last season.

Michael Pineda - 2.8 Although Robinson Cano's friend is moving to a tougher division, he was still in the American League, his strikeout rate is pretty high, and it's hard not to see a 23 year-old improving.

Phil Hughes/Freddy Garcia - 0.0/3.4 I'm going to go ahead and use their average bWAR as a guess as to what either one will do in 2012, because I see Freddy's going down while Phil's would go up. So a 1.7 sounds about right.

Notice that I'm assuming AJ Burnett is not going to be on the team, and therefore would not affect things. Call it wishful thinking or what-have-you, but I'm leaving AJ out of it.

Above I lined up the pitchers based on their 2011 bWARs, and I'm going to keep it that way in the head-to-head part here. The winner of each battle is in bold.

CC Sabathia vs. James Shields

Hiroki Kuroda vs. James Hellickson

Ivan Nova vs. David Price

Michael Pineda vs. Jeff Niemann

Phil Hughes/Freddy Garcia vs. Wade Davis

The second match-up was no mistake, as I can see both men being equal to one another. So at this point it looks like the New York Yankees have the better rotation going into 2012. However, we have to remember that Matt Moore could be around for 175 or so innings, and if we use him instead of Wade Davis I'd have to give the edge to the Rays pitcher.

So in conclusion, I believe that the Rays and Yankees 2012 projected pitching rotations are even. Perhaps that's not the conclusion Yankee fans were looking for but keep this in mind... the Bombers scored 160 more runs than the Rays last season, and I don't see that changing.