Closer Reliability Report-2008 Season-Week 1

The first week was full of both saves and save opportunities. On the surface, most saves came from the teams' announced closers, but from the thirty teams, there were Save Opportunities (SO) from 50 different pitchers! Four announced closers (five if BJ Ryan is included) didn't even have a save opportunity.

Roughly that means that each team used one to two different pitchers in the first week alone to obtain a save. 1.67 to be exact, but 2/3 of a pitcher does not an effective fast ball make!

There were 75 SO in the first week and 51 of those were converted into saves. That is a conversion percentage of greater than two-thirds, or %68.00.

Announced closers were responsible for 47 of the SO and 43 of the saves. Other relief pitchers accounted for 28 other opportunities, but only 8 saves. So while non-closer relief pitchers had 37.33% of the SO, they only converted 28.57% of those (or 15.68% of the total saves). In contrast announced closers converted 91.49% of their SO.

So on the first week there were many opportunities for both closers and non-closers alike. However, the true closers had more opportunities and were more proficient at finishing their games. This make sense, closers' save opportunities generally come in the last inning of the game and they are of a more reliable stock then their relief teammates--hence the reason why they are indeed closers in the first place.

As the weeks go on, and more pitchers are used, more opportunities will come from multiple sources. From a fantasy sense, especially in deeper leagues, it may make more sense to bench RP that you just have on your roster for potential saves, and have more pitchers who can earn you other stats such as W, WHIP, ERA, etc.

Closer Reliability Report-2008 Season-After Opening Day

Opening day has absolutely showed me that a way is needed to project saves from those who aren't closers. The sample size is limited since it only takes into account the first 2 days of the season (or first four days taking into account the two games in the Tokyo Dome)

In those few days there were a total of 16 save opportunities and 7 total saves. Of those opportunities, 8 were from the projected closers. The projected closers however did have 6 of the seven saves.

What does this mean?, absolutely nothing since the sample size is very limited. But as the season progresses trends should start to develop. The next update will be after the first full week of the season.

Closer Reliability Report-2008 Season

This season I will be verifying the validity of a MLB Team's announcement of a particular player as their closer, especially at the beginning of the season. For past years, 20 Save Opportunities or greater is defined as a closer, for the current year, anyone who posts a save will be tallied.

Throughout the year I hope to answer certain questions...Does age or years of service as closer predict reliability?, Do certain statistics such as ERA, K/BB ratio, or dominance predict reliability of a closer?, Do certain types of pitchers (i.e. power, finesse, etc) have greater predicted reliability?, are closers affected by a change in park or league after a trade?, and also what predicts a future closer. Will also evaluate the first season closers, of the 30 projected closers, there are who are six (or 20%) being named for their first full season--so there should be a high amount of volatility.

The average number of season as a closer is 3.4, with the maximum at 13 by Trevor Hoffman.

Table 1.
Opening Day Closers

Name	Team	L	DOB	SaC
Borowski,Joe	CLE	AL	5/4/71	3
Capps,Matt	PIT	NL	9/3/83	1
Cordero,Chad	WAS	NL	3/18/82	3
Cordero,Francisco	CIN	NL	5/11/75	5
Corpas,Manny	COL	NL	12/3/82	1
Gagne,Eric	MIL	NL	1/7/76	3
Gregg,Kevin	FLA	NL	6/20/78	1
Hoffman,Trevor	SD	NL	10/13/67	13
Isringhausen,Jason	STL	NL	9/7/72	8
Jenks, Bobby	CWS	AL	3/14/81	2
Jones, Todd	DET	AL	4/24/68	8
Lidge,Brad	PHI	NL	12/23/76	4
Lyon,Brandon	ARI	NL	8/10/79	0
Nathan, Joe	MIN	AL	11/22/74	4
Papelbon,Jonathan	BOS	AL	11/23/80	2
Percival, Troy	TAM	AL	8/9/69	9
Putz,JJ	SEA	AL	2/22/77	2
Rivera, Mariano	NYY	AL	11/29/69	11
Rodriguez,Francisco	LAA	AL	1/7/82	3
Ryan, BJ	TOR	AL	12/28/75	2
Saito,Takashi	LAD	NL	2/14/70	2
Sherrill, George	BAL	AL	4/19/77	0
Soria, Joakim	KC	AL	5/18/84	1
Soriano,Rafael	ATL	NL	12/19/79	0
Street,Huston	OAK	AL	8/2/83	3
Valverde,Jose	HOU	NL	7/24/79	2
Wagner,Billy	NYM	NL	7/25/71	10
Wilson,Brian	SF	NL	3/16/82	0
Wilson,CJ	TEX	AL	11/18/80	0
Wood,Kerry	CHC	NL	6/16/77	0

Coming Next...Week 1 Results