A thought occurred to me in the wee hours of the morning as I drifted off to sleep while counting Angels rounding the bases:
Would Joe Borowski even have a job if he weren't a "closer"?
This seems an odd question to ask of The 2007 American League Leader In Saves And Don't You Forget It, but seriously... if he weren't set up as the glorified collector of such a misleading and meaningless statistic, would Joe Borowski be in the position to force good people to watch baseball through their fingers?
Last year, Borowski had a 5.07 ERA and a WHIP (walks/hits per inning pitched) of 1.43. Those numbers are bad. Awful. Horrible. Maybe not Guillermo Mota awful or Jose Jimenez horrible, but pathetic nonetheless. In 2006, Fernando Cabrera put up similar numbers (5.19 / 1.40) and was run out of town midway through the next season. In 2004, Rick White posted 5.29 / 1.49 and the Indians braintrust personally drove him to the airport so he could catch the next plane to Anywhere But Here.
Ah, but they didn't have the glorious Saves. The save may be the most over-hyped, watered-down, and back-assword stat in all of baseball. Don't get me wrong-- there are some intense saves. Facing the heart of the Yankee lineup in the Bronx while clinging to a one-run lead...that can be heart-pounding stuff. But that's not what most saves are. Most saves involve the manager handing the closer the ball with a 2-3 run lead, facing the bottom of the order, and, well, if the closer doesn't screw up too horrendously, he gets a tidy little Save to add to his salary-demand file.
The rules of pitching no longer apply. It doesn't matter if you can throw strikes, or keep runners off the bases, or get people out effectively. As long as you can get three outs before whatever lead you've been given has been erased, you're a success. After all, as we've heard time and time again, "It doesn't have to be pretty as long as the job gets done." By that logic, closers are allowed to drive home drunk as long as they don't kill anybody.
Middle relievers are held to a higher standard of pitching performance. If you look at the success of the 2007 Indians, it was due in large part because of the brilliant pitching of Rafael Betancourt (1.47 / 0.76), Rafael Perez (1.78 / 0.92), and Jensen Lewis (2.15 / 1.23). This trio held the line in tie games, protected tight leads, and worked out of jams left for them by tiring starters. They had the most difficult roles in the bullpen and they excelled.
Since the advent of the save statistic, a curious trend developed whereby managers managed to the stat. "Closers" are now almost exclusively used in "save situations." It has been suggested by many baseball thinkers that this actually squanders the effectiveness of your best reliever, assuming the closer is in fact the best reliever on most teams. There are many crucial junctures that may happen before an official "save situation" that may in fact be tougher than the save situation itself.
The 2007 Indians became the poster boys to that line of thinking. By tabbing one of their worst relievers to be the closer, the Indians let the talented trio of Betancourt, Perez, and Lewis do the heavy lifting. Then it was Borowski's job to not fuck it up too badly in the 9th.
Let's look at Borowski's numbers last year, broken down by situation. These are broken down by one-run lead, two-run lead, 3-run lead or more, or tie ballgames. I didn't bother to look at mop-up duty in lost ballgames, as those numbers are irrelevant.
One-run leads
When entrusted with a one-run lead, Borowski pitched surprisingly well, but didn't necessarily get results. In 19 games, he had an ERA of 2.37 and a WHIP of 1.21. He converted 68% (13 of 19) of these save opportunities. The win expectancy of a team leading by one run at the start of the final inning is approximately 87%, so JoBo had a few blown saves too many.
Two-run leads
It takes a lot of suck to blow a 2-run lead in the final inning, and Borowski delivered suckage in not-quite-lethal dosages. When protecting a 2-run lead, Borowski posted a 5.51 ERA but still saved 15 of 17 two-run leads, which is an 88% success rate. Then again, the win expectancy for a team leading by two runs at the start of the final inning is approximately 95%, so JoBo had one blown save too many.
Three-run leads or more
While closers can get credit for 3-run "saves", sometimes closers are entrusted with even larger leads that are so preposterous that they can't even be counted as save opportunities. I have lumped all of these together. In the situation were Borowski was asked to close out a lead of 3 or more runs, Borowski was exceptionally sucky, but almost perfect. JoBo posted a 5.63 ERA and a staggering WHIP of 1.53. In save situations, he was 17-for-17, which is good because the win expectancy in such situations is 99%.
But let's not forget his meltdown in the Bronx, where be blew a 4-run ninth inning lead. In 21 total games with a lead of 3+ runs, he closed out 20 of 21, for 95%. So that's another blown "save" too many, even though it didn't count as a blown save.
Tie games
There are times when there is no save situation to be had, so the closer is called upon to put up a goose egg in extra innings to give his team a chance to win. Borowski was horrible in these situations. In seven appearances, he posted an 8.53 ERA and a 2.21 WHIP, losing three of those seven games. Looking at it another way, he converted just four of those seven opportunities, for a conversion rate of 57%.
One-run leads PLUS tie games = "close encounters"
Not counting the "gimme" saves, the closer's most crucial roles are the games in which he is called upon to put up a goose-egg. So to me, it seems fair to lump those tie-game extra inning appearances with the one-run save situations as "close encounters." After all, the goal is the same. No runs. So if we add all those up, Borowski posted a 3.91 ERA and a 1.46 WHIP. He converted 17 of 26 "close encounters", for an unimpressive conversion rate of 65%.
Put Borowski in a close encounter, and he'll blow the game one out of three times.
Set-up men and middle relievers are afforded no such luxury.
To paraphrase Hillary, when the bullpen phone rings in the 7th inning and there are two runners on with one out, who do you want warming up with Luis Isaac?
If Borowski didn't have the institutionalized advantage of collecting 32 over-glorified saves when the win probability was already in the 95th percentile or greater, he would surely be out of a job.
Further proof that the save is one of the dumbest stats in all of baseball.