Welcome back to Relievers to Stream for Wins and Saves! This will bring you up-to-date bullpen depth charts every morning for the day’s games and makes for an excellent tool for those of you looking to stream saves or wins. This series runs seven days a week, so be sure to check in every morning to get your daily bullpen fix!
Notes
Schedule Notes
- More than half the league is inactive on Monday with just seven games. The teams with games include: TEX, BOS, ARI, PIT, CHW, TOR, NYY, ATL, COL, CHC, KCR, HOU, SEA, and OAK.
- Both games in the northeast (NYY vs. MIN and BOS vs. TEX) were postponed, so those bullpens were not used. Boston and Texas will make up that game on Monday afternoon, so set your lineups early.
- With so few games, there are few good opportunities for win vultures, but Oakland is probably your best choice. Paul Blackburn was limited to 75 pitches last time out and has a good home matchup against Seattle. Andrew Chafin seems to have a solid chance of being used in a good situation here.
Transaction and Injury Notes
- The Tampa Bay Rays designated David Hess for assignment to make room for the return of Chris Archer. Pete Fairbanks also started a rehab assignment and is expected to rejoin the team after just an appearance or two.
- The Washington Nationals activated Kyle McGowin and Austin Voth while designating Javy Guerra for assignment.
- Aaron Ashby is back with the Milwaukee Brewers as a reliever. This is a deep bullpen, but he could still play an important role.
Yesterday’s Performances
- Will Smith recorded a save for the second straight day and now has 28 on the year. This one was a little cleaner with no runs allowed and two strikeouts. Four holds were also handed out in this one as the Orioles were extra generous. Atlanta has some really tough matchups with their next four series being NYY, SF, @LAD, @COL. Smith has already been struggling this month with most of their games against Washington, Miami, and Baltimore, so the next two weeks look a little scary.
- Jorge López appeared out of the bullpen for the first time this year and worked a scoreless inning striking out two. He didn’t abandon any of his pitches like you sometimes see when starters move to the bullpen, although that’s often a good thing as they focus on their best offerings. Nobody in the fantasy community really needs to pay attention to López right now.
- Gregory Soto earned his sixth win of the season in relief working two innings for the second time in three days while Joe Jiménez picked up his first save of the season. For the second time in the series, Soto was able to hold down the powerful Blue Jays offense in the late innings long enough for the offense to take advantage. Besides a massive blowup against the Angels on Tuesday, Soto has been really good since the All-Star Break and seems to be the Tigers’ most trusted reliever. Expect him to get a couple days off, though, after throwing 70 pitches over the weekend.
- With Jordan Romano unavailable after having pitched both Friday and Saturday, Toronto tried to cobble together a save with Adam Cimber and Tayler Saucedo, but it wasn’t to be. The latter, Saucedo, did his job perfectly enticing a routine grounder to second, but the play was botched allowing the tying run to score. This blown save is not on the bullpen. Allowing two runs in the top of the 11th? Well, that’s a different story. A real team effort by the Jays in this one.
- Chicago was sent home limping in this one as nothing really seemed to go right for them. All three relievers, usually quite reliable, gave up runs and the game got out of hand.
- It was a bullpen game for the Rays and a spectacular one at that. Shawn Armstrong was first out of the pen and earned the win with two scoreless innings in relief while Josh Fleming got the ole blowout save by securing the final nine outs. It seems like everyone in the Rays bullpen can fill any role and be good at it. Oh, by the way, they have both Pete Fairbanks and Nick Anderson likely within a week of returning to the major league roster.
- Miami didn’t need much from their bullpen and only asked for an inning from Anthony Bass. With no work on Saturday either and a day off Monday, Miami will need to either get a lead or give some maintenance innings to the back end of their bullpen early next week.
- Michael Lorenzen picked up a save for the second straight day, his third of the year. Lucas Sims earned his fourth hold. The pair of Lorenzen and Mychal Givens has been completely dominant, but we should expect them to continue to share closer duties.
- Seattle needed just about every big arm they had to pull out the win on Sunday. Paul Sewald picked up the win, his eighth of the year, and Yohan Ramirez earned his first save of the year. Sewald worked out of a bases-loaded no-out jam in the bottom of the 10th. He and Drew Steckenrider seem to be sharing closing duties for now in the absence of Diego Castillo, but Sewald was used in the higher-leverage situation today.
- It was a rough day for the Astros bullpen as Kendall Graveman gave up a run in the eighth and Ryan Pressly blew the save in the ninth on a homer from Ty France. Ryne Stanek later came unraveled in the 11th to blow the game. It was just Pressly’s second blown save of the year and Graveman’s fifth earned run of the year.
- Washington got some much-needed reinforcements in its bullpen with the return of Kyle McGowin and Austin Voth. They need to try something new as the bullpen combined to walk eight batters in four innings on Sunday.
- Aaron Ashby appeared out of the bullpen for the Brewers for the first time this year. He delivered two scoreless innings with four strikeouts. He generated nine swinging strikes on 41 pitches in that short time. This is a deep bullpen, but even so, Ashby could provide some good value in leagues that count both holds and wins. Josh Hader also recorded his 26th save of the year recording the final out on five pitches. It was the second straight day that the Brewers pitched themselves into a save situation after entering the ninth with a big lead.
- Please let David Bednar close, Pirates. It will be great for everyone, I promise.
- Is it really an Alex Reyes save if he doesn’t walk guys or give up singles until the tying run comes to the plate? He keeps making it work, though, and he now has 28 saves on the year with just two blown saves.
- Joel Payamps made his second appearance as a Royal since coming over from the Blue Jays who decided to DFA him when they believed they had too many lefties. Given how successful Payamps was and continues to be and how much the Blue Jays are now struggling to find quality from their middle relief, I’d bet they regret that decision now.
- Rowan Wick continues to work back from injury and try to claim a high leverage role in the Cubs pen, but it didn’t quite work out for him on Sunday. His fastball sat at just 93.6 and he got tagged for two runs on two hits and a walk. This is not the Rowan Wick you were hoping was a deep saves stash.
- Tyler Clippard worked the ninth for Arizona, but it was a non-save situation as the team was up five runs. Save situations will likely be few and far between for Arizona, but Clippard will likely get the small handful of opportunities that come up.
- Please don’t roster anyone but Daniel Bard from the Rockies bullpen. Think of the children.
- Hector Neris came on to clean up a low-leverage mess in the ninth and he eventually did so, but not before allowing a three-run double. None of the runs were his, but it can’t help his standing in the bullpen hierarchy.
- It was a bullpen game for San Diego with Ryan Weathers and Miguel Diaz coming on as bulk guys and it was a rare rough day for the Padres’ pen. They didn’t use any of their top arms, though, except arguably Craig Stammen.
- San Francisco’s ability to stay in games is just uncanny and relies on a very good bullpen. Dominic Leone earned the win in relief while Jake McGee picked up his 28th save. The Giants just keep winning close games and McGee will continue to benefit from that.
- Oakland’s bullpen was absolutely taxed for this game, so they brought on youngster A.J. Puk to face a lefty-heavy portion of the Giants order in the 8th. Well, the Giants simply used their righty-heavy bench as pinch hitters and did damage. Puk, who had looked so lost at AAA at times this year, seemed to have found a groove before this outing. Let’s hope it doesn’t spook him.
- The Mets used their top arms to close out the Dodgers even though it was a five-run game by the time the bottom of the ninth rolled around. Can you blame them? You never know when the Dodgers are out of it nowadays. The game was close enough in the seventh and eighth for Jeurys Familia and Trevor May to pick up holds, but Edwin Díaz was not credited with a save due to the five-run margin.
- The Dodgers took the opportunity of the rare game they were trailing to test out a couple of lottery tickets they picked up. Neftalí Feliz pitched a scoreless inning while Shane Greene allowed a pair of runs. Even if one or both of these lottery tickets pay off, it’s unlikely they’d get themselves anywhere beyond medium-leverage middle-inning work due to the Dodgers’ stable of quality arms at the back end of their bullpen.
- Austin Warren has been pretty impressive since getting called up on July 28th. His fastball did work again in this one with four whiffs and two called strikes in ten pitches. I could see him getting holds in more higher leverage situations.
- Good news and bad news for Cleveland. Emmanuel Clase locked down his 18th save of the season in relatively easy fashion. If you’re looking at Statcast, don’t worry about that 3.2 mph dip in velocity. This game was in Williamsport and the pitch tracking was a little off and mixed some of his sliders in with his cutters. The bad news, James Karinchak couldn’t find the strike zone again. After an extremely rough July, he’s at least been back to decent in August, but he was very lucky that Bryan Shaw cleaned up his mess so effectively this time and left him with no earned runs.
Bullpen Depth Charts