Free Agent Relief Pitcher Market

by rglass44 on Nov 1, 2009 9:00 AM EST

RJ, Tommy, Erik, et al have done a good job so far pinpointing a few choice free agent relief pitchers. Today I'm going to take a macro-level look at the free agents and how they fared in a couple of important statistics the last three years: K% and GB%. I did a similar post last year in which I used K/9, but i felt that K% gives you a better look at the true talent-level of the pitcher as far as striking guys out.

After the jump you'll find a table of how all the FA RPs have performed in these two indicators over the last three years.

3-year avg.
Pitcher (Type)	GB%	K%	Quadrant
O. Dotel (A)	34.8%	30.0%	II
B. Wagner (A)	36.1%	29.9%	II
R. Soriano (A)	31.1%	29.4%	II
M. Gonzalez (A)	36.4%	27.9%	II
J. Valverde (A)	38.5%	27.6%	II
J. Putz*	42.4%	25.9%	II
R. Betancourt* (A)	28.4%	24.8%	II
K. Calero (B)	32.5%	24.1%	II
J. Benoit	33.4%	23.8%	II
R. Springer (B)	26.1%	23.5%	II
K. Gregg (A)	36.9%	22.8%	II
F. Rodney (B)	50.1%	22.1%	I
T. Hoffman (A)	35.8%	22.1%	II
S. Eyre (B)	36.6%	20.9%	II
T. Percival	26.9%	20.5%	II
L. Vizcaino*	35.1%	20.3%	II
W. Ohman* (B)	36.7%	19.8%	II
C. Park (B)	47.0%	19.6%	I
B. Howry (B)	33.3%	19.3%	II
D. Oliver (A)	46.5%	19.1%	I
J. Isringhausen	45.9%	19.0%	I
J. Grabow (A)	43.7%	18.6%	I
R. Mahay	43.1%	18.3%	II
B. Donnelly	36.1%	18.3%	II
T. Gordon	46.0%	18.2%	I
A. Embree	39.3%	18.0%	II
J. Rincon	44.8%	17.8%	I
League Average	43.6%	17.6%
G. Mota (B)	41.4%	17.5%	III
C. Vargas	37.4%	17.2%	III
R. Villone	37.9%	17.1%	III
D. Brocail* (B)	42.6%	16.8%	III
B. Tomko	40.5%	16.7%	III
L. Hawkins (A)	51.2%	16.6%	IV
M. Herges	43.5%	16.1%	III
B. Lyon (B)	43.3%	15.9%	III
K. Wells	49.1%	15.8%	IV
B. Shouse* (B)	59.4%	15.3%	IV
L. Ayala	41.7%	15.2%	III
R. Franklin*	45.6%	15.2%	IV
G. Glover	38.6%	15.2%	III
J. Walker	34.7%	15.1%	III
J. Wright	58.7%	15.0%	IV
M. Hendrickson	44.3%	14.8%	IV
M. Batista	45.1%	14.8%	IV
D. Sanchez	40.5%	14.8%	III
J. Beimel (B)	44.8%	14.4%	IV
M. Kobayashi*	50.3%	14.3%	IV
S. Schoeneweis	49.3%	14.2%	IV
J. Weaver	37.5%	14.2%	III
E. Guardado	28.9%	13.4%	III
D. Baez	56.8%	13.1%	IV
J. Fogg	40.5%	12.8%	III
E. Dessens	43.8%	12.2%	IV
G. Majewski	50.8%	12.1%	IV
C. Bradford	62.9%	8.9%	IV

The final column, "Quadrant," refers to the quadrant they place in on the following scatter-plot: The "*" refers to players who have an option for 2010. Type obviously refers to whether the player projects to be a Type A/B free agent.

Rp_post_medium

Ideally, you want a pitcher from quadrant I that gets more strikeouts and grounders than league average. There are a few of those guys, but someone like Fernando Rodney (the clear standout on the graph) will probably fetch more than we should spend because he's got the "proven closer" pedigree. Chan Ho Park really interests me, but he may be playing himself out of contention at this point.

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Comments

I'm assuming this data includes

Park’s numbers as a starter, which — if I recall correctly — were neither great nor a small sample. I think Dave Cameron on Fangraphs mentioned that Park improves markedly as a reliever, but I guess I’m asking, “are his GB% and K% the same as a reliever?” Maybe his number are even better or a little worse?

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by BWoodrum on Nov 1, 2009 9:19 AM EST reply actions