Baseball Musings: The Once and Future Closer

March 22, 2007

The Once and Future Closer

My Baseball Bias rounds up the stories on Jonathan Papelbon moving back to the bullpen. I'm a bit surprised since during the winter all Papelbon talked about was wanting to start. I'm even more surprised that the fifth starter is going to be Julien Tavarez. While there's no doubt Jon is the best option for closer, I'd rather see the Red Sox fill the fifth spot in the rotation with someone younger. They don't have enough off days at the start of the season to go with a four man rotation.

Posted by David Pinto at 05:04 PM | Pitchers | TrackBack (0)

Comments

I hope that they consider giving Kyle Snyder or Kason Gabbard a shot at the 5 spot in the rotation. I don't think Lester is ready yet and I hope he can contribute later in the year.

I am very torn on this move as a Res Sox fan. Papelbon looked so great in the role last year, but I was excited to see him in the rotation.

Do you think Sports Illustrated is ticked off they already published their baseball preview issue with a huge part the Red Sox preview devoted to the power arms in their starting rotation?

Posted by: Tom Moriarty at March 22, 2007 06:54 PM

This sets up the Clemens drama perfectly. It won't be long before ESPN starts their half hour updates on the subject...

Posted by: David Cohen at March 22, 2007 08:28 PM

The annoying thing about hearing people talk about this is twofold. First, they vastly overrate the importance of the closer role. And second, they look at it as the Sox losing a 4th or 5th starter and gaining a lights out closer. Problem being, Papelbon has the best projections for 2007 of any of the Sox starters. So they're really losing their ace in favor of getting an ace closer. When you think about it that way, it certainly seems like a much worse tradeoff.

Posted by: Mike L at March 22, 2007 08:28 PM

I'm not sure which projections you're looking at Mike, but a lot of them were projecting his ERA as a reliever or some combination of starting and relieving, so you can't directly compare those numbers to the other starters' projections. Of the free projections, it looks like Bill James is the only one that projects him purely as a starter (of course BJ gives him 2.98 ERA, totalling contradicting my point).

Posted by: amos at March 22, 2007 09:39 PM

I don't think the closer position is overrated, as was so obviously proven by the 2003 DISASTROUS closer by committee experiment by the Red Sox. They knew they couldn't go into this season, spending so much money on free agents, without a lights out closer. Look, this way, their whole team looks much stronger. Without Paps, the Sox still have a pretty decent rotation. Tavarez is sure getting the first shot at fifth starter, but trust me he won't be long for it. He's only getting it based on his strong finish last year. But I personally think the fifth starter will be a floating position betwee Tavarez, Hansack, Snyder and Gabbar, until Lester is ready to return to the bigs sometime later in the summer. The Sox do have options for their fifth starter role. But they really didn't for the closer. Pinieiro, Donnelly, Hansen, no one really grabbed the job with two hands this spring. And Timlin is starting the season in DL. So, if Papelbon is really healthy, I'm glad to see him back in the rotation. No one's asking him to repeat his 0.92 era trick from last year, but we can certainly hope and expect an ERA around 2.00 and 30+ saves every year from him. Provided he stays healthy, of course.

Posted by: Yamen at March 23, 2007 01:29 AM

Nobody in their right mind would argue that Papelbon has anything short of front-line starter potential; even if he's not there yet, he's probably pretty damn close. Is Boston better this year with a lights out closer and a gigantic hole in the rotation? I sure don't think so...but I suppose it's a matter for debate. I'm more upset about the fact that they seem to be resigning themselves to using Papelbon as a closer for as long as they have him...and that seems completely retarded, given that he undoubtedly has No. 1 starter potential. His comments indicate that he'd rather close then start...but who really knows? I would imagine he'd have little trouble convincing himself he was better off starting if that's what they were forcing him to do.

Posted by: the other josh at March 23, 2007 01:44 AM

realistically how far away is lester from pitching at all again?

Posted by: Tim at March 23, 2007 02:44 PM

Seems to me we were 5 outs away from the World Series in the year of the disasterous "closer-by-committee" season and we finished in 3rd place last year with one of the top closers in the league.

I would rather have our best pitchers (and I count Papelbon in that category) pitching the most innings. I think it is a waste of his talent to not at least give him the opportunity to start. After all, aren't most of the elite closers still just guys who weren't good enough to start for one reason or another?

Posted by: nomars_girl at March 23, 2007 02:55 PM

the impact of moving Papelbon to the closer slot depends a lot on the performance of the other starters. If Schilling, Beckett, and Matsuzaka can all be No. 1 -No. 2 starters, and Wakefield has a full season of solid and healthy production, I think the move is great. Then we're looking at a league-average No. 5 starter - maybe better if Lester comes back strong - and a vastly improved bullpen. Paps in the pen makes everybody in the relief corps better, and we could be looking at a 6-inning game where the Red Sox are effectively able to shut the door on teams in late inning situations. That's a big plus. The dominant closer is more psychologically important than sabermetrically important, but if a team can afford it, it makes them better.

On the other hand, I'm a little concerned that the Red Sox have sacrificed a lot of depth in the starting rotation. I don't want to see a repeat of the rotation the Sox threw out there at the end of last season.

Posted by: Josh at March 23, 2007 02:57 PM

The thing is Boston actually never had a "closer-by -committee" in 2003. That's a misnomer from sloppy writers who can't wrap their brains around small concepts (I'm talking about professional baseball writers, not the people here, btw). What Boston tried in '03 was a leveraged approach to the bullpen that used specific pitchers in the positions they were best suited for. In other words, their lefty specialist would start the 9th against a lefty, a groundball specialist would start the 9th against a bunch of slow hackers, a flamethrower would start the ninth against a bunch of banjo hitters, etc. The approach was matchup-based, and not, as most of the writers assumed, based on who had the "hot hand." Of course, the approach was unsuccessful, but I really think the idea could be successful if the pitchers involved were better than the ones on the 2003 Red Sox.

Posted by: david at March 24, 2007 01:10 AM

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