Normally, such late-inning affairs fall in favor of the Yankees. However, in an occurrence as rare as finding a unicorn, the Yankees bullpen was outpitched on Tuesday. Oakland’s relievers combined for 5 1/3 innings and only allowed one baserunner — a Chase Headley single in the ninth — but New York couldn’t push across the winning run.

Then in the 11th, with Johnny Barbato one strike away from sending the Yankees up to bat, Mark Canha drove in the game-winning run and the A’s held on to win 3-2 in New York’s first extra inning game of the season.

The Play — Mark Canha’s game-winning single (.336 WPA)

Johnny Barbato hadn’t given up a run all season before tonight, but in the 11th inning he ran into trouble. As Jed Lowrie stood on third with two outs, Mark Canha lined an 0-2 pitch off Didi Gregorius’s glove and into left field. Lowrie would ultimately score the winning run after Ryan Madson came in to shut the door for Oakland in the bottom of the 11th.

Top Performers

Athletics — Jed Lowrie, 4-for-5, 2B, RBI

Yankees — Alex Rodriguez, 2-for-5, RBI

Notes

— Michael Pineda started the game for the Yankees and pitched well, allowing two runs over six innings on 97 pitches. His day could have been better though, as the second run came on a triple that glanced off Brett Gardner’s glove in the sixth. Still, it’s a positive start for Pineda and hopefully he can continue the momentum into his next start and find some consistency.

— Starlin Castro batted in the No. 2 hole for the first time this season and went 1-for-5. Castro has had severe home/road splits so far this season, hitting much better in the hitter-friendly Yankee Stadium.

Starlin Castro likes Yankee Stadium.

In six home games: .480 (12-25), 2 HR, 8 RBIs.

In five road games: .118 AVG (2-17).

— Bryan Hoch (@BryanHoch) April 19, 2016

— Carlos Beltran got another hit tonight, going 1-for-4 with an RBI and run scored. The veteran outfielder is now hitting .333/.340/.600 on the young season.

— In the ninth inning, after Didi Gregorius failed to lay down a bunt, pinch-runner and would-be-winning-run Jacoby Ellsbury was caught stealing second off a perfect throw from A’s catcher Steven Vogt. On primary day, most Yankees fans probably “Vogt-ed” for a mulligan. His defense earlier in the game probably saved the Yankees however, making a really nice backhand and throw right after Pineda exited.

That's some Gregorgeous defense by the Yankee shortstop. #Golden pic.twitter.com/TPfFbnZFZI

— Yankeesource (@YankeeSource) April 20, 2016

— Andrew Miller’s dominance out of the bullpen continued, although his consecutive strikeout streak ended. Miller had struck out eight straight batters before Marcus Seimen grounded out in the ninth.

The Highlight — Betances strikes out Khris Davis

Savage. pic.twitter.com/erIGKKwiAg

— Matthew Stucko (@MatthewStucko) April 20, 2016

Dellin Betances had a surprisingly rough outing tonight, but with the go-ahead run on second base he blew a fastball by Khris Davis and got through the 8th inning unscathed.

Next up

The Yankees continue their series against Oakland tomorrow night at 7:05 p.m. Kendall Graveman (0-1, 2.38 ERA) will face Nathan Eovaldi (0-1, 6.94) on the mound. Graveman went 6 innings and allowed only one run on four hits in his last start, while Eovaldi gave up fo runs on seven hits in 6.2 innings, but struck out eight.

Tanaka lasted 5 2/3 innings, allowing two runs on four hits and striking out four, but he was once again out-dueled by Astros lefthander Dallas Keuchel, who ended New York’s 2015 season last October in the wild card game. Keuchel’s seven frames of two-run ball carried Houston to a 5-3 victory.

Much like that game, the air in the Bronx was as frozen as the Yankees offense. Starlin Castro looked good, doubling home two runs in his first Yankees at-bat and adding some solid play at second base, but the offense as a whole managed just four hits.

• PREGAME NOTES: Bryan Mitchell out at least four months

Aside from Tanaka and Castro, Chasen Shreve also looked to be repaired after his wobbly walk to the finish line last year. He threw 1 1/3 near-perfect innings with two strikeouts. Those few bright spots were overshadowed by an eighth-inning controversy that turned the game.

The Play: Betances’s error in the eighth (-.207 WPA)

With one out and a runner on in the top of the eighth, Dellin Betances threw a slow Carlos Correa roller over Mark Teixeira’s head into right field, allowing Houston to take the lead for good.

What followed was a lengthy on-field appeal from manager Joe Girardi, who argued that Correa was in the baseline at the time of the play. Correa clearly ran inside the first base line, as most players are taught to do. This cut off Betances from Teixeira, and he was forced to try a touch throw over Correa, which ended miserably.

​

Not many pitchers in the big leagues have the wherewithal to know they should intentionally peg a player in the back, but that’s exactly what Betances should have done in this situation. Girardi said so, Mark Teixeira said so and heck, even crew chief Dana DeMuth said so:

Betances said he will be trying to hit the runner in the back in future scenarios, not out of malice but out of necessity.

“Next time, that’s what I’ll try to do,” he said. “If that’s what’s going to have to happen, to make them call him out, then that’s what I have to do.”

The Yankees played the rest of the game under protest, and crumbled after the play. Correa stole second, Betances walked Rasmus, and Luis Valbuena singled both runners in to break the game open.

Top Performers

Yankees: Starlin Castro (1/3, 2B, 2 RBI, 4 Assists)

Astros: Dallas Keuchel (7 IP, 2 ER, 3 H, 4 BB, 4 K)

The Quote(s)

• “I’ve never read a rule book. I don’t know anything about rules.” - Alex Rodriguez
• “Do it. Throw it into the runner’s back. Because then what’s happening? He is impeding.” – Crew chief Dana DeMuth

Notes

– The Yankees have now lost five straight on Opening Day.

– Houston was 3-for-3 in stolen base attempts against Brian McCann.

– Johnny Barbato made his major league debut and he looked good, tossing 1 1/3 immaculate innings with three strikeouts. He hit 95-96 with his fastball, and missed bats with his slider.

– Didi Gregorius hit the Yankees’ first home run of the season.

– Dellin Betances’s new intro song is “All the Way Up (ft. French Montana)” by Fat Joe and Remy Ma. Aaron Hicks has chosen Jay Z’s “Public Service Announcement” as his at-bat music.

– Correa took Tanaka deep on a well-thrown 86 mph splitter in the seventh.  All game, Tanaka hid his fastball from the phenom:

At-bat 1

Called strike – Sinker at 90

Ball – Split at 86

Swinging strike – Slider at 83

Foul – Sinker at 91

Strike three swinging – Split at 84

At-bat 2

Ball – Sinker at 90

RBI groundout – Split at 84

At-bat 3

Swinging strike – Sinker at 90

Home Run – Split at 86

The Highlight: Alex Rodriguez steals second

​

Next Up

The Yankees will host Houston on Wednesday night at 7:05 p.m. ET. Michael Pineda goes against righty Collin McHugh. That should mean Brett Gardner makes his debut in the starting lineup.

Lead photo: Anthony Gruppuso / USA Today Sports

An often overlooked part of a bullpen is the “bridge” from the starting pitchers to the elite relievers. After all, it doesn’t matter how good a closer is if the team is losing once he enters. Last year, the team was in relatively good shape in the middle innings, due to contributions from Adam Warren, Justin Wilson, and Chasen Shreve. Unfortunately, two of these pitchers are no longer with the organization, and the third, Shreve, is a big question mark going into this season following a second-half collapse in 2015. The Yankees will have to rebuild the bridge for next season, and that’s not an easy task.

The good news for the Yankees is that they won’t be forced to put as much pressure on the bridge, as Chapman’s addition theoretically removes an inning between the starters and the setup men/closer. This is hugely important, given two thirds of last year’s middle relievers are gone, and the other is hard to trust. Still, Yankees starters averaged just over five innings last season, so there will be a gap between them and the elite trio. The Yankees will have to build this vital bridge, and it won’t be easy. At the least, there will need to be two or three dependable pitchers to get from the fifth to the seventh.

The most obvious name for this bridge is the aforementioned Shreve, who was one of the team’s best middle relievers for much of the season. A lot of Shreve’s value came from his ability to fortify the middle innings. He totaled 21 innings in the seventh, which was 11 more innings than any other frame. His 2.02 ERA in the first half of the season was huge for the team, but following the All-Star Break, Shreve’s ERA ballooned to 4.76. I detailed the reasons behind Shreve’s collapse right here, but despite knowing what happened, it’s very hard to predict if Shreve can bounce back. At this point, the Yankees will have to hope he can rebound, but they can’t expect another 2.02 ERA. That said, any ERA around three is fine, and it wouldn’t be surprising to see Shreve put up numbers around there.

Finding the second and third relief pitcher isn’t as easy. There are plenty of talented arms, but none of them have a track record of big-league success. The Yankees have six young relievers who could all conceivably make an impact next season: Bryan Mitchell, Branden Pinder, Nick Rumbelow, Jacob Lindgren, Nick Goody, and James Pazos. These players are listed in order of career innings: Mitchell has the most at a mere 40 2/3 innings, so we’ll start there.

Mitchell, 24, has started for the team in the minor leagues, and had a 3.12 ERA in 15 starts at Triple-A last year. He could be a third or fourth starter, but the Yankees gave him a chance as a relief pitcher last season. He totaled 24 innings, to the tune of a disappointing 6.00 ERA. But, it’s important to mention that Mitchell missed time after being hit in the face by a line drive. Luckily, Mitchell was ultimately okay and wasn’t out for very long, but he wasn’t the same pitcher after returning. Before the injury, Mitchell had a 4.03 ERA. Afterwards, his ERA was 12.46. That makes his 6.00 ERA understandable, but also worrisome. While it shows that he’s a better pitcher than what last year’s numbers showed, there’s the concern that Mitchell will have trouble bouncing back from his scary injury. Last season was rough for the young pitcher, but he’s still a very talented player. Beat writers have noted that Mitchell is a popular ask in trade talks, and he could be a decent option in the middle innings next year.

Next up is Branden Pinder, the owner of 27 2/3 major-league innings, all recorded last year. There’s good news and bad news with Pinder. The good news is his 2.93 ERA last season, and the bad news is a 4.72 FIP and 4.55 BB/9 to go along with the shiny ERA. A high walk rate and low groundball rate are what fueled Pinder’s frightening FIP, and he’ll have to get both under control if he wants to experience prolonged success. Pinder’s minor-league numbers don’t suggest an issue with control, so the biggest X-Factor will be his ability to induce groundballs. If the 26-year-old can cut down on the walks and keep the ball on the ground more, he could have an impact in 2016.

Despite struggling in Triple-A last season (4.27 ERA), Nick Rumbelow received a cup of coffee last year, throwing 15 2/3 innings of 4.02 ERA ball. Rumbelow may have more upside than Pinder, but he’s less likely to find immediate big-league success, as he’s struggled to put up anything better than average numbers in the minors recently. Rumbelow will be on the roster fringe, and may need a good performance in Spring Training to make the 25-man roster for Opening Day. He’s not a pitcher that the Yankees will expect to handle important innings early on, and has a better chance to contribute later this season and in 2017.

Now we get to the big name, Jacob Lindgren. The Yankees took Lindgren with their first draft pick (55th overall) in 2014, and he’s absolutely dominated in the minor leagues. Lindgren, when healthy, is possibly the best relief prospect in the minors, and has yet to have a K/9 in the single digits at any level of professional baseball. The issue, though, is health. Lindgren underwent surgery to remove bone spurs in his elbow, knocking out his 2015 season after just 29 innings. If Lindgren can cut down on the walks, his elite strikeout rates gives him closer upside, and the 22-year-old could easily separate himself from all the other young relievers.

If Lindgren is the king of ridiculous strikeout numbers in the minors, then Nick Goody is the king of a ridiculous ERA. Last season, Goody posted a 1.73 ERA in Double-A and a 1.31 ERA  in Triple-A, along with a double-digit K/9 and reasonable walk rate. Goody wasn’t exactly dominant in the majors, with a four runs allowed in 5 2/3 innings, but that’s a very limited sample size. Goody’s raw talent isn’t anything special, but the 24-year-old’s eye-popping stats are sure to get him a look in the Spring.

Speaking of eye-popping stats, James Pazos posted a 1.09 ERA in Triple-A last year. Pazos, the only lefty in the mix, has elite velocity (for a left-hander) but doesn’t have any special secondaries. Still, he was utterly dominant in the minor leagues, and the Yankees are in love with him. When asked who was untouchable at the trade deadline, Hal Steinbrenner said Luis Severino, Greg Bird, Aaron Judge, Gary Sanchez…and James Pazos. The fact that he was mentioned in the same breath as the team’s best prospects says a lot about the 24-year-old, and the team already has confidence in him as a pitcher. Despite throwing just five major-league innings, the majority of his innings came in the ninth—a rare thing to see with pitchers merely receiving a cup of coffee.

All of these arms are very intriguing and could be late-inning relief pitchers in the future. But, what matters to the Yankees is present performance, and not all of these relievers are ready to be difference makers next season. Of all of the pitchers, Mitchell is the most likely to make the team out of spring training, along with Pinder. If Lindgren is healthy and back to old levels, there’s a good chance he makes the team as well. Pazos, Goody, and Rumbelow have a chance at making the bullpen, but it will take successful spring training performances. It’s challenging to choose one or two of these pitchers to join Shreve as the “bridge,” given their lack of track record, but for now Mitchell seems to be the most likely to get that role. If Lindgren is 100 percent, he absolutely deserves the role, but it’s hard to tell how he will look at this point.

The issue with the Yankees bullpen isn’t their lack of depth overall, but their lack of proven options. They have plenty of talented arms, all of whom I’ve mentioned above, and while they are likely major-league ready, that doesn’t mean they are ready to form a successful bridge to the elite relievers. Out of these pitchers, at least one or two should be up to the task, but it may take time for the team to find those pitchers and consistency could be hard to come by. Spring training will be a major determinant in who forms the bridge, but if I had to choose one now, Mitchell and Lindgren, along with Shreve, would be the best options in the middle innings.

Lead photo courtesy Gregory Fisher-USA TODAY Sports

Having an incredible bullpen will obviously help the Yankees. Besides thwarting comeback attempts and controlling close games, the Betances-Miller-Chapman trio will partially compensate for New York’s underwhelming rotation by lessening the starters’ pressure to pitch deep into games.

That said, it’s not clear that trading for Chapman was the best baseball move for the Yankees given their needs, farm system, and payroll situation (leaving aside the hazy moral implications of the trade).

For one thing, this move won’t dramatically improve the Yankees’ eighth or ninth-inning situations—Chapman over Miller in the ninth and Miller over Betances in the eighth are slight upgrades if upgrades at all. The real boost comes in the sixth and seventh innings, where Betances will be considerably better than anyone else Girardi could send to the mound. The question with this trade, therefore, is whether improving the middle innings is worth the money and prospects the Yankees gave up for Chapman.

The cost for the hard-throwing lefty wasn’t absurd, in part thanks to the domestic violence charge hanging over his head. The Yankees parted with four prospects, only two of whom ranked among the team’s top 30, according to Baseball America. They’ll pay Chapman somewhere around $13 million after arbitration, a reasonable cost for a player of his caliber.

In the old days of King George Steinbrenner, when no cost was too great for the Evil Empire, this would have been no problem. The Yankees would slot Chapman in the bullpen and go spend big on a starting pitcher or maybe right fielder. But the team’s new reality includes financial prudence, which means assets spent on Chapman can’t be spent elsewhere. And if the Yankees fail to improve their starting rotation because they don’t have the money or prospects to bring in an upgrade, or if they end up a starting pitcher or infielder short one day because Rookie Davis and Eric Jagielo are gone and ownership won’t spend more to fill the holes, the Chapman trade will be a failure. Because when you’re balling on a budget, as the Yankees are, you don’t buy a Lamborghini when a Honda will do, especially if you still need to save up rent money.

Instead of filling a hole, the Yankees built on a strength. This is a fine strategy when there’s room for excess—signing a fourth elite starting pitcher when you already have three makes sense because all of them fit in a rotation—but not so much when there’s a playing-time crunch. And though Betances, Miller, and Chapman will all contribute to the 2016 Yankees, each of their respective values is diminished by the presence of the others. In a traditional bullpen, the second-best reliever doesn’t pitch as often as the best, and the third-best doesn’t pitch as often as the second-best. While Chapman, Miller, and Betances are all capable of throwing 210 combined innings in a season, there likely won’t be opportunity for all three to do so. More likely, the trio will combine for something like 180 frames. So because Chapman will take innings away from Betances and Miller, he’s not really adding 70 innings of elite relief, but something more like 40. An elite reliever is most valuable in an otherwise empty bullpen in which he’s stealing innings from replacement level bums, not in a stacked ’pen where he’s taking opportunities from All-Stars. The more top relievers you add, the more the returns inherently diminish.

There’s another reason most teams don’t have Dellin Betances-level relievers pitch the seventh inning (besides the fact that Betances-level relievers barely exist): It’s not that hard to find guys capable of handling 50-60 innings of medium-leverage work. Last offseason the Yankees got Justin Wilson for a backup catcher. In other years Girardi has found productive innings from non-prospects or cheap castoffs like Shawn Kelly, Boone Logan, Clay Rapada, Luis Ayala, and Alfredo Aceves. Dave Robertson wasn’t a highly touted prospect. Betances himself was a failed starter. A shrewd team will create valuable relievers from nothing, not spend big to acquire them.

Instead of trading for Chapman to push Betances to the seventh inning, the Yankees could have signed someone like Mark Lowe, Steve Cishek, or John Axford on the cheap or used Bryan Mitchell or Ivan Nova in middle relief. Heck, they could have kept Wilson for a fraction of Chapman’s price. Or they could have held onto Adam Warren and instead used half of the package that got them Chapman to acquire Starlin Castro. Any of these options would have moderately hurt the Yankees in the sixth and seventh inning but saved the team millions of dollars, several prospects and some potential headaches if Betances or Miller ends up dissatisfied with a diminished role (not to mention the moral and practical pitfalls that come with the domestic violence allegation).

Deep, menacing bullpens are baseball’s latest fad, ushered in by the two-year success of the Kansas City Royals. And sure, it’s cool to have three shutdown arms that can end a game in the sixth inning. But an optimal allocation of the Yankees’ resources would distribute the money and prospects spent on Chapman toward a starter, an outfielder, or next year’s trade deadline. Chapman will be fun, but for a team that’s increasingly thrifty, he wasn’t the right allocation of resources.

Lead photo courtesy of David Kohl-USA TODAY Sports

New York traded four prospects to the Cincinnati Reds in exchange for left-handed relief ace Aroldis Chapman on Monday, continuing what’s been a stealthily sound offseason. He joins incumbent closer Andrew Miller and set-up man Dellin Betances in the back-end of a suddenly terrifying bullpen.

Chapman was on his way to the Dodgers in early December before news of an ugly domestic violence incident surfaced, prompting a league investigation and throwing a wrench into the trade. The 27-year-old was not arrested or charged, but is facing a potential suspension. He’s due to become a free agent next winter, but would not hit the market until 2017 if he is held out at least 40 games.

In the trade, the Yankees sent away third baseman Eric Jagielo, their No. 8 prospect according to Baseball Prospectus, along with infielder Tony Renda and relievers Caleb Cotham and Rookie Davis. Cotham is the only one who has experience at the major-league level.

Who the Yankees Get

Put bluntly, the Yankees acquired one of the best relief pitchers in all of baseball for a cheap price—there is no question that Chapman is an elite arm.

There are questions, however regarding what kind of individual he is. Chapman allegedly choked his girlfriend during an argument in October, and admitted to police that he fired eight rounds from his gun. From a baseball standpoint, there were never any red flags prior to the news regarding Chapman’s attitude or character, though it remains to be seen how this will affect his presence in the clubhouse.

Chapman is the hardest thrower in MLB history. Last season he threw the 62 fastest pitches in baseball, according to MLB’s Statcast, maxing out at league-high 103.92 mph. He averaged 99.96 mph on his fastball, which, predictably, also led the league.

His career Deserved Run Average, Baseball Prospectus’ fairly new-and-shiny statistic that factors in ballparks, fielding, and other variables, is a sparkling 2.17. He’s ‘struggled’ just once in his career, in 2011, when he earned a 2.73 DRA and a 92 cFIP, which pegged him as only ‘Above Average.’

PECOTA projects Chapman to shine once again in 2016 with a 1.91 ERA and 2.9 WARP, and continue his dominance well into his thirties.

The only thing that may slow down the four-time All-Star is pastries; he once ate 18 prior to a game, surrendered two home runs, and blew the save.

What It Means

After trading away relievers Adam Warren and Justin Wilson to begin December, the Yankees were left with no clear-cut No. 3 option in the bullpen behind Miller and Betances. Chasen Shreve and Bryan Mitchell had both regressed towards the end of last season, and 22-year-old Jacob Lindgren, a.k.a. Big Chunk, a.k.a. Chunky saw just seven innings of action last season.

Now, the Yankees have all the flexibility in the world with three incredibly solid relievers at the back of their bullpen. Betances can pitch multiple innings at a time, and any one of the top-three can seamlessly transition into the closer role. This will allow Lindgren to be eased into more high-leverage work, and keep Shreve, who perhaps just dealt with fatigue last August, fresh.

This also means that there are theoretically just six innings to worry about. The rotation, which includes a youngster (Luis Severino) and recently-injured pitchers (Nathan Eovaldi, Masahiro Tanaka, Michael Pineda, Ivan Nova, CC Sabathia), can be deployed in a more conservative manner by Joe Girardi.

It also means Greg Bird will need to order a larger supply of bats this season:

What Happens Next

General manager Brian Cashman said on his post-transaction conference call that he was not going to be dealing away Miller to make room for Chapman, and that the plan is to keep this potentially legendary trio of relievers together. This puts to bed the notion that the Yankees would flip Miller for more organizational depth.

He also noted that he’s not going to be trading for another starting pitcher, calling his rotation “full.” One of last year’s six starting pitchers will have to slide into the 4-5 slot in the bullpen. It could be Nova, or it could be Sabathia; it could even be Severino. The bullpen should be sufficiently stocked, though they may want to consider adding one more arm.

There’s a realistic chance that Chapman, who will turn 28 before Opening Day, could be a part of the organization’s on-the-fly rebuild. If he is barred from baseball for 40 or more games, he will hit arbitration one season later, making him a free agent in 2017. While Cashman has been reluctant to hand out long-term deals to players entering their thirties, he might see a four or five year deal for Chapman as smart and plausible. If our PECOTA projections hold up, he’d certainly be worth big money. And, as is known around the globe, the Yankees will be able to afford him.

Lead photo courtesy of Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports

Trading Adam Warren for Starlin Castro made sense. Castro is young, he plays second base, and he’s got a lot of upside. He’ll be around for a while, too. That’s worth three years of a capable swingman. As good as Warren can be in short bursts, Castro fits a dire need. No harm, no foul.

That’s where the Justin Wilson trade comes in. Wilson was a 1.4 WARP reliever, and a valuable lefty that could tackle both right-handed and left-handed hitters. Though he went through periods of wildness, Wilson was a valuable part of the late-inning success of the Yankees. He was shipped to Detroit this week for minor league pitchers Luis Cessa and Chad Green. Cessa and Green, while they have their share of warts, could turn into somewhat useful big league pitchers. That’s all fine and dandy.

However, the Yankee bullpen is now Miller, Betances and… stuff. Chasen Shreve will return, but his famous self-immolation down the stretch was quite scary. Ideally he’ll be able to stand up to Joe Girardi-levels of use in 2016, but there are no guarantees. Bryan Mitchell may take up the super-swingman role from Adam Warren. Jacob Lindgren’s elbow should be bone chip-fee and ready to doll out the strikeouts. Of the three, Lindgren is the most likely to step into Wilson’s role.

But is that good enough? The rest of the relief corps will likely be made up of some of the Nick Rumbelow-Branden Pinder-James Pazos group, and as good as some of them (particularly Pazos) could be, they leave much to be desired in terms of experience.

Brian Cashman has picked an odd time to trade away his two best middle relievers. The free agent market offered very little in terms of talent, and what was there has been quickly snatched up. Darren O’Day is returning to Baltimore, Mark Lowe will be teammates with Wilson in Detroit, and the Nationals will get a taste of The Shawn Kelley Experience that Yankees fans are all too familiar with. The best reliever left out there might just be the repurposed Joe Blanton, and Yankee Stadium isn’t exactly the place to discover that Blanton has fallen back into his homer-surrendering ways.

Therefore the trade market may prove to be the most appealing place to find help. Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News claims that the Rangers are willing to talk turkey on their relievers, and both Keone Kela and Shawn Tolleson are remarkably attractive pieces. Kela struck out 10.1 batters per nine innings and may be the true prize here. DRA is much more fond of him (2.98) than it is of Tolleson (3.78). Tolleson also handled closing duties for Texas and his saves may make him more expensive.

Kela is controllable for five more seasons and is exactly the kind of young high-leverage arm that the Yankees should be targeting. He won’t be cheap, but he’ll come much cheaper than a splashier move like a reunion with Mark Melancon. To preserve the admirable minor league depth that they’ve built up, the Yankees will need to be thrifty and savvy to fill the holes on the roster. The starting rotation is a higher priority but Cashman undoubtedly has many irons in the fire. It would simply be a shame to watch the Yankees morph into the Tigers and give away games due to a shaky bullpen. There’s little point in having an elite closer and an elite setup man if the game never reaches them. Leads can quickly evaporate in a hail of dingers. It’s up to the bullpen to not surrender them.

(Photo: Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports)

It’s very unlikely that you’ve had a moment at your job that feels the way hitting a home run to win the World Series feels. Joe Carter’s career highlight is better than yours. It might not be as meaningful, as he was just playing a child’s game for people’s entertainment while you might have figured out a way to use jellyfish cells to cure bronchitis, but it was better. A lot of times bronchitis isn’t even that bad anyway.

The big moments aren’t the only aspect of playing professional baseball that are difficult for the layman to conceptualize. Merely standing in against the average pitcher pumping low 90’s heat would be a pretty scary experience for a lot of people. Trying to chase down a fly ball in the gap is well beyond the skill set of the vast, vast majority of the population; even those who love watching the game on TV. Most human beings would be hilariously out of their depth if they were inserted into a major league lineup for just one day.

Fans are well aware of this and for this reason they enjoy watching MLB players when they are out of their depth and seem more human. Everyone loves watching Bartolo Colon hit. Any position player that comes in to pitch can expect a massive ovation from the home crowd even if their team is being blown out. People like to see these superstar athletes be brought down to their level. It sounds malicious, but really it’s all in good fun.

The most common way for major leaguers to appear out of their element is when they are asked to appear in positions that they aren’t suited to like in the examples above. However, another way for this to happen is when they are simply dominated by a superior opponent. Usually this takes the form of a pitcher, as pitchers have the ability to make hitters look not just bad at their jobs, but downright silly.

As it happens the New York Yankees have a pitcher who is pretty good at doing just that by the name of Dellin Betances. Betances is the kind of player who makes excellent hitters look like accountants recruited off the street before the game. Not only does he have impressive stuff, but he is an imposing figure. Keeping in mind that I’m neither telepathic nor a trained psychologist the following image is my understanding of what hitters see when Betances takes the mound.

Not to be dehumanizing or anything, but he is a terrifying monster with an insatiable hunger for outs. His stature is both a psychological weapon and it gives hitters a different look with a higher release point. If Betances were shorter he would not be the same pitcher, and considering that the pitcher he is right now is unbelievable that wouldn’t be for the best.

Last season Betances allowed hitters a dismal .157/.266/.244 line in 332 plate appearances, good for a .512 OPS against. The worst OPS posted by any qualified hitter in 2015 was .587. Betances makes people worse than the worst of the worst.

Does that mean he’s unhittable? Of course not, anyone can be beaten and back in June I took a stab at a how-to guide on how to get to him. However, it does mean that you might need to think outside the box a little bit. How do you defeat a leviathan that you can’t overpower? You use stealth and speed, as demonstrated by the utterly forgettable bug-like monster from the most recent Godzilla movie.

It’s important to note that it is both illegal and a logistical nightmare to try and fly up behind a pitcher in the middle of a major league baseball game and stab them with your razor-sharp talons. However, there is an equivalent to this action in baseball known as the stolen base.

As it turns out Betances is very vulnerable to the running game, largely because his pitching motion requires him to uncoil all 18 of his massive limbs.

While he has good velocity, he’d have to be throwing 150 mph to compensate for his slow delivery. Last season he was the easiest reliever in baseball to steal off of and it wasn’t particularly close.

While he did pitch more innings than his bullpen colleagues, he was still the easiest to run on here on a per-inning basis and he allowed fewer base runners as well.

Combining this information with what we already know the conclusion is clear. There is no excuse for not running on Betances. Hits are scarce, bases are valuable, and running is easy. Not only have base thieves accumulated many steals against the tall right-hander, they’ve done so very efficiently only being caught 19 percent of the time in his career.

Getting on base against Betances is a blessing, and if you reach first there’s a good chance luck was on your side whether it was a weakly-hit ball falling in or a favorable call or two from the umpire. In life we are often told that we shouldn’t push our luck, but when facing the Yankees’ bullpen ace the opposite is true. Opponents needs to seize the day and push their luck as far as possible because by doing so they are exploiting the only real weakness Betances has.

You have to take any victory you can get when you know more often than not it ends like this:

(Photo: Adam Hunger-USA Today Sports)

Since the All-Star break, Yankee relievers have pitched to a 3.86 ERA. In the last month, the group has a 4.85 ERA and 4.76 FIP. A hefty portion of the relief work has been done by pitchers that spent the year in the minor leagues and it shows. What was once a strength is now largely a group of inexperienced rookies and tired mainstays. The act of starting up the bullpen has been a roll of the dice for Joe Girardi, especially with his starting pitchers not working deep into games. He now gets to do that with the season on the line, and then against the Royals. He’s got his work cut out for him to say the least.

We know for sure that Betances, Warren, Justin Wilson and Andrew Miller will get spots. These are the rest of the candidates:

• Chasen Shreve
• Chris Capuano
• Ivan Nova
• Bryan Mitchell
• Andrew Bailey
• Nick Rumbelow
• Nick Goody
• Branden Pinder
• Caleb Cotham
• James Pazos
• Chris Martin

There’s a chance that Nathan Eovaldi could become healthy enough to be activated at some point, but the Yankees likely won’t want to risk the chance that he won’t be ready for important outings. That means these are the guys from which Girardi must select. I won’t pretend to have inside knowledge to Girardi’s thought process and most of these pitchers have been inside and outside of his fabled Circle of Trust at various times.

The most obvious choice seems to be Rumbelow. When Rumbelow is right, his stuff is electric. In 15.2 innings with the big club, Rumbelow has struck out 22.1 percent of the batters he’s faced, but he’s also walked five and given up two homers. This is a rather small sample, of course, but Rumbelow isn’t the worst option to eat an inning or two if the Yankees have a comfortable lead. That’s five of the spots filled. The recipients of the other two spots will likely not matter very much, as if the last man in the bullpen has to get into a playoff game, the game is likely over or deep into extra innings. The Royals showed us last year that due to the rest days built into the playoff schedule, it’s a bit easier to run the big guns out every time they’re needed.

That won’t matter if the Yankees don’t escape the showdown with the Astros. In the very real scenario in which Masahiro Tanaka serves up a few home runs to the powerful Astros and the Yankees have to get into their bullpen early, how do they piece together the necessary innings? CC Sabathia will probably be available in relief, but Sabathia has allowed a humongous .370 wOBA to right-handed hitters this year. The Astros are made up largely of righty power hitters like Carlos Correa, Evan Gattis and George Springer. Is Luis Severino capable of pitching effectively on short rest? With Dallas Kuechel on the mound for Houston, the Yankees don’t want to have to find out.

(Photos: Adam Hunger-USA Today Sports) 

On the surface his success is easy to understand. He throws hard, he misses bats and he’s durable. Right now he’s the closest thing to the 100 IP fireman reliever that we have in the game today.

This season, in most ways, he’s performed as expected. He came out of the gate with a slightly less intimidating fastball than he showed in 2014, but he quickly gained his velocity back and has been dominating pretty much ever since. Here’s his ERA by month:

Sure, he hit a snag in June, but it’s been smooth sailing since. That’s what those numbers tell you. The thing is those numbers are idiots. At least in this case. ERA is a statistic with major flaws, especially when looking at relievers, and while Betances looks like he’s been cruising his recent performances are somewhat disconcerting.

Since the All-Star Break, the right-hander has been worse in pretty much every measurable way.

Betances hasn’t gone from superhero to compost heap, but he’s been significantly worse. It’s more like he’s gone from Superman to Aquaman. He can still talk to fish, and that ability is probably a little underrated, but he’s not the guy he was.

The problem is that ERA says he is. His first-half ERA (1.57) is actually higher than his second-half number (1.07). This is a function of timing. Earlier in the season Betances stranded a relatively normal 82.5 percent of runners on base, since the All-Star game he’s running a cool 100 percent.

To be fair to all parties involved likely realize this. Betances has had some strange outings and he knows he can be better; and regardless of how statistically-inclined fans are they are likely to notice he hasn’t quite been the same in recent outings. September has been especially problematic as he’s walked 11 batters in 13.1 innings and posted a 4.94 FIP.

Diagnosing the cause of the problem is a little trickier. Whenever an especially tall pitcher has trouble with the strike zone we are likely to hear mechanical issues are at fault, and that’s what Betances seems to believe. That being said, this is always a convenient explanation for players and fans alike to gravitate to as it implies there a switch waiting to be flipped around the next corner that will make everything better.

An uglier reason that Betances could be scuffling is old-fashioned overuse. This would be a strong accusation to throw at Joe Girardi, and understandably he has not taken kindly to the notion. Again, it’s very hard to prove or disprove this idea, but while the innings have piled up Betances is still throwing as hard as ever and his workload was heavier last year.

One interesting trend for the big right-hander has been the fact his fastball, while retaining it’s velocity, has been generating fewer and fewer whiffs as the season has gone on, both in general…

… and on a per-swing basis.

Given that the velocity, and both horizontal and vertical movement, is relatively stable, location is the most likely culprit here. He did elevate his fastball a little more consistently in the first half, but the difference isn’t massive.

It’s not entirely clear what’s going on, but Betances is scuffling. At least so far as his standards are concerned. Plenty of pitchers would be happy to be second-half Betances, most even.

On the other hand most people would be happy to be Aquaman, for all his flaws. But when the New York Yankees almost certainly play one game that determines the fate of the season they’re not going to need Aquaman, they’re going to need Superman.

(Photo: Peter Llewellyn-USA Today Sports)

The Yankees right-hander has thrown the second most innings (64) out of the bullpen of anyone in baseball, and among pitchers with at least 40 innings on the season, he ranks second in ERA (1.13), first in FIP (1.67), second in xFIP (2.16), third in ERA+ (349), second in ERA- (27), second in WHIP (0.83), first in batting average against (.124), second in strikeout percentage (42 percent) and first in K/BB perctange (30.6).

Roll all of that together, and Betances unsurprising leads all relievers in fWAR (2.7), bWAR (3.3) and WARP (3.07). Baseball-Reference’s WAR formula has him as not only this season’s best relief pitcher in baseball but also the 13th best pitcher in all of baseball and fifth best in the AL. No bullpen arm has been better in 2015.

Now that that’s settled, let’s take on a broader, more existential question: Is Dellin Betances the best reliever in baseball?

(Some people might argue that being the best this year makes you the best overall, but most of us would agree that, 2015 results aside, Andrew McCutchen is better than A.J. Pollock and David Price is better than Dallas Keuchel. The most recent results matter — in fact, they matter most — but they’re not everything.)

Looking at leaderboards, Betances seems to have two primary competitors for the title: Aroldis Chapman and Wade Davis, the only relievers to approach Betances’ numbers both this season and last. Let’s compare the trio’s stats since the start of 2014, when Betances first landed a fulltime gig in the bullpen.

Going by rate stats only, you might be tempted to pick someone other than Betances. Chapman and his absurd strikeout rates does best by fielding-independent stats, whereas Davis looks like the answer according to runs-based measures.

Betances, however, holds a decisive advantage in counting stats, thanks in large part to his relatively huge workload. The 27-year-old leads baseball in innings pitched for relievers over the past two seasons, and it’s not close. The Mets’ Carlos Torres (139 innings pitched) and Jeurys Familia (135.2) are the only relievers within 20 innings of Betances’ total.

Chapman and Davis, meanwhile, trail distantly. Chapman missed about a month to injury in 2014, which likely cost him 10-15 innings pitched, but the real innings-pitched difference comes from how these three pitchers are used. Whereas Chapman is a traditional closer for a losing team and Davis is set-up man under a manager who adheres to strict bullpen roles, Betances is the closest we have to a modern-day Goose Gossage-style fireman.

This chart examines at the nature of Betances, Chapman and Davis’ 2015 appearances and explains why the Yankees’ hurler throws so many more innings than the other two.

First thought on this chart: Huge props to Joe Girardi for being relatively flexible in how he uses his best reliever. The Yankees’ manager isn’t afraid to use Betances earlier than his allotted eighth inning and doesn’t shy away from letting the big right-hander throw more than one inning at a time.

But the other, more pertinent takeway is that Betances is an absolute beast. He’s being used in a way few high-leverage relievers are, and he’s excelling at it. Even if Betances’ numbers came in a traditional one-inning-at-a-time role, he would have a case for the title of Best Reliever in Baseball. The fact that he puts up his stats despite a job with a higher degree of difficulty is even more impressive.

So we’ve established that Betances is the best reliever in baseball in 2015, and it seems safe to say (partly thanks to his inning totals) he’s been the best reliever in baseball over the past two years.

The only way to take the Best Reliever in Baseball title from Betances is to expand the timeframe. This is somewhat unfair to Betances since he spent most of 2013 in the minor leagues, but let’s give it a try.

Here’s the list of top relievers by Fangraphs WAR between 2013 and 2015:

1. Aroldis Chapman – 6.5
2. Dellin Betances – 5.9
3. Kenly Jansen – 5.9
4. Greg Holland – 5.7
5. Craig Kimbrel – 5.7

That’s right, even if you expand the timeframe to include a season in which Betances barely pitched in the major leagues, he still trails only one other reliever.

So if you require you Best Reliever in Baseball to have proven himself over three or more seasons, maybe you take Chapman. Otherwise, there’s only one choice: Dellin Betances.

(Photo: Charles LeClaire- USA Today Sports)