Oakland Athletics’ Unassigned Setup Man Role Causes Instability In Bullpen
This season, everyone has been talking about how the Oakland Athletics’ relievers do not have set roles in the bullpen due to the absence of Sean Doolittle. When Doolittle is the closer, each relief pitcher is basically assigned to an inning or a specific match-up with an opposing player. Without their closer, instability and chaos ensues within the bullpen. However, Doolittle closing out the game in the ninth inning does not clearly determine all of the roles.
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The A’s do not have a quality eighth inning setup man in their bullpen. They have a bunch of specialists and seventh inning relievers, but no one who really owns the eighth inning. Even if Doolittle was to return right now, the relief pitcher setting up for Doolittle would still be a mystery, which does not exactly help when it comes to defining particular roles for each reliever.
In 2014, the Oakland Athletics had Luke Gregerson to take on the setup man role. In 2013 and 2012, it was mostly Ryan Cook while Grant Balfour was the Athletics’ closer. However, this season, no one reliever has stepped up to take on this role.
At the beginning of the season, Evan Scribner did tackle the setup man position and he did ok. He had a great April and May with a combined 2.13 ERA. But, he slowly imploded throughout June and July. He gave up 15 runs in 19.2 innings and ended up with 6.56 ERA for those two months.
With the Athletics out of contention for this year’s postseason, it would make sense for them to start looking toward 2016 and how they can improve their bullpen. One issue that they need to figure out is if a current Oakland Athletic could take on the eighth inning setup man role or if they should go out and look for a relief pitcher who specializes in being the setup man.
One option from the current A’s bullpen is Drew Pomeranz. Even though he is usually a long reliever, Oakland did consider making Pomeranz for the closer position once Tyler Clippard was traded. Since being bumped from the rotation, he has thrived as a reliever. In the last seven days, he has pitched five innings and accumulated a 1.80 ERA. Additionally, since moving to the bullpen in early June, he has only allowed one home run and has struck out 37 in 29 innings pitched. Lastly, Pomeranz currently has the most Holds out of all of the Oakland relievers with 10.
The Oakland Athletics are probably already starting to think about how to make their team better for 2016. One area that needs help is the bullpen. Besides the return on Doolittle, Oakland must create more defined roles for their relievers, especially when it comes to the eighth inning setup man position. This will immensely help the stability of the bullpen overall.
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