Help from the System: Red Sox Minor League Relievers

grimshaw

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Nice to see Lakins settling in as a reliever. 2 runs in 20 innings since transitioning to the bullpen. I'd like to see him bumped up to Pawtucket. Wonder if he's trade bait.
 

Cuzittt

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Nice to see Lakins settling in as a reliever. 2 runs in 20 innings since transitioning to the bullpen. I'd like to see him bumped up to Pawtucket. Wonder if he's trade bait.
Everybody is potential trade bait. The issue is how does the Red Sox value Lakins vs. any person they may bring in.

What is interesting to me looking at the numbers is that they converted Lakins when it wasn't clear that he was a failed starter. In his six starts this season, he had a 4.76 ERA on a .282/.329/.465 opponent line with a .367 BABip. That's not great... and he only averaged three innings a start. But that wasn't due to high pitch counts... as the six starts ranged from 39-58 pitches. So... I wonder if the Red Sox were thinking of him as a reliever from the get go this season.

But, besides giving up hits (which I am not saying should be devalued), his K and BB percentages are nearly identical. 20 K and 5 BB in 17 innings as a starter as opposed to 22 K and 8 BB as a reliever (20 innings). The difference is completely in his lack of hits given up with only seven hits as a reliever as opposed to 20 as a starter. Oddly, he has hit three batters in relief and did not hit any as a starter.

The two questions I would have is... can he keep batters to a .104 Batting Average (current as a reliever) and if so, can he do it over multiple innings (only twice has he gone more than one inning as a reliever).

I think he is one of the many potential Red Sox bullpen options (for this year) in the pipeline... and yet, I'm not sure how to get him to Pawtucket.
 

Cuzittt

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Furthering the discussion of how to get Lakins (or any of the other Portland relievers) up to Pawtucket is the complication of how the Red Sox are utilizing the PawSox as an actual bullpen for their Boston bullpen.

Currently on the Boston Red Sox roster who served time in Pawtucket this year:

Brandon Workman
Hector Velazquez
Tyler Thornburg
Ryan Brasier
Austin Maddox (60-Day DL)

Currently on the 40-man in Pawtucket:
Called up to Boston at some point:
Jalen Beeks
William Cuevas
Justin Haley
Bobby Poyner
Robby Scott
Marcus Walden (currently on minor league rehab assignment)

Not called-up:
Ty Buttrey
Williams Jerez
Chandler Shepherd

So... that's pretty much the entire PawSox staff absent former major leaguers Fernando Rodriguez and Josh Allen Smith and interesting guy Josh Dwayne Smith.

Absent Shepherd (whom perhaps we should not exclude as he was repositioned back to starting this season after spending almost his entire minor league career in the pen)... let's look at Jerez and Buttrey.

Buttrey is a tall (6'6") right-hander who was a starting prospect up through 2016 where he was transitioned to the bullpen. He's never had great stats which make you think he wasn't just another guy... except this season he has been really stout. 32 relief appearances, 2.25 ERA, 1.136 WHIP, 2.9 BB/9, 13.1 K/9 4.57 K/BB. All of which are the best of his career.

More importantly, he has improved through the season. In his first eight games of the season, he had a 4.50 ERA with a .407 BABIP against and gave up all four of his homers on the season and three of his six doubles.

From May 7th onward (24 games), he has a 1.41 ERA with a .288 BABIP against and an opponent line of .186/.250/.212. He has pitched more than one inning (with a high of 2 1/3 innings on 7/2) in half of his appearances.

Williams Jerez is a 6'4" lefty who has been on and off the Red Sox 40-man roster since transitioning back to pitching from his failed outfield foray. And, he's been a mixed bag with a 3.65 ERA and a 1.338 WHIP over his 31 appearances. On the side of the good, however, is that his 12.0 K/9 is the highest of his career. And, the PawSox have not been keeping him strictly against lefties, with 19 of his 31 appearances going more than one inning (high of 2 2/3 on 7/17 and 7/8).

He has been better against lefties than righties with a batting line of .206/.271/.286 (.308 BABIP) against LHB vs. .242/.338/.411 (.325 BABIP) against righties.
 

Cuzittt

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Besides Lakins in Portland, there are a couple of other relievers of interest.

There is Trevor "Machine Gun" Kelley who is a 6'2" righty who has been the designated floater between AAA and AA this month. In his five games with Pawtucket, he put up a 2.00 ERA in 9 innings with a 1.111 WHIP. In Portland (excluding last night), he has a 4.05 ERA and a 1.275 WHIP in 26 2/3 innings. He doesn't show any remarkable abilities (7.6 K/9 and 3.0 BB/9 this season) EXCEPT he doesn't give up home runs. In his 106 game minor-league career, Trevor has allowed SIX homers. Which is even more interesting in the context that he doesn't appear to be an extreme ground ball pitcher.

Matt Gorst (6'1" RHP) has been nearly perfect this season. Starting the season in Salem, Gorst put up a 1.59 ERA and a 0.953 WHIP over 20 appearances (28 1/3 innings). Since being promoted to Portland, Gorst has given up one UNEARNED run in eight appearances (16 1/3 innings) with an 0.857 WHIP.

His whole season has been about hit suppression (5.6 H/9 over all 28 games) so the question with Gorst is can he keep it up. He is at 9.1 K/9 for the season (but only 6.6 in Portland) and at 2.6 BB/9 (3.3 in Portland). He has only given up one dinger this season after giving up nine last season (none after 7/9). He has gone multiple innings in all but one of his Portland appearances.

And, down below is the intriguing Durbin Feltman
 

Merkle's Boner

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If JoKe moves to the DL, I’d really like to see Buttrey get the call. He has the potential to be a similar power reliever. He’s a former first rounder if I’m not mistaken.
 

Tyrone Biggums

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If JoKe moves to the DL, I’d really like to see Buttrey get the call. He has the potential to be a similar power reliever. He’s a former first rounder if I’m not mistaken.
4th rounder. But he has a good K/9 in Pawtucket so I wouldn’t be surprised if he gets the call in the next couple weeks.
 

grimshaw

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After 4 more scoreless innings in relief today, Matthew Gorst has yet to give up a run in Portland over 20.1 innings since his promotion. Yet another interesting relief arm to keep an eye on.
 

Cuzittt

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After 4 more scoreless innings in relief today, Matthew Gorst has yet to give up a run in Portland over 20.1 innings since his promotion. Yet another interesting relief arm to keep an eye on.
I find Gorst highly interesting. So... I'll share some interesting.

1) The last time Matt gave up an earned run was May 13th while with Salem. Since that time, he has pitched in 17 games (30 2/3 innings) with 9 singles, 2 doubles, 11 walks (1 IBB), and 26 Ks. Opposition are batting .108/.195/.127 with a .145 BABIP against. [For the entire year, the Opposition is batting .175/.237/.216 with a .236 BABIP]

2) His latest outing of four innings was only the second time in his professional career he has gone that long (8/29/16 in Lowell)

3) The 57 pitches thrown last night were the fourth highest of his career (61 on 8/29/16 and 8/27/17, 58 on 5/20/17)

4) He has broken the 50 pitch barrier seven times in his career. He has done it three times in the last four games.

I have no idea what the Red Sox are planning with Gorst (who has never started a game in college or in the pros), but there appears to be an effort to stretch him out. Of his nine outings with Portland, none have been less than an inning, eight have been more than one inning, seven have been at least two innings, and three have been three or more innings. In Salem this season, he had five outings of less than an inning, five of just an inning, and another two of less than two frames.
 

grimshaw

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Based on his scouting report and k-rate it doesn't appear like he is necessarily overpowering either, but he does throw 4 pitches and it does note that he has the herky-jerky thing going on. Even so, you would think as a reliever he would ditch at least one of those.

Players must just have a really hard time seeing it out of his hand.
 

Cuzittt

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They did have two bullpen spots open after the Kinsler trade
[Pedant alert]They technically only had one as Buttrey was on the 7-day DL[/pedant alert]

The Red Sox are/were in a weird position of having a lot of potentially decent pitching solutions but with almost no ability to promote people forward. The trading of Beeks, Jerez, and Buttrey and the release of Martin gives the Red Sox some options to move a number of players forward over the last month of the season. It'll be interesting to see who slides upwards to replace Gorst and Lakins (and to see if Shawaryn finds his way to Pawtucket soon as well.)
 

Drek717

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Is anyone else wondering why Bobby Poyner fell completely off the radar this year? Him making the opening day roster was something of a big deal in Spring Training. He then pitched well, got hurt, was sent down, and is pitching well in AAA with strong peripherals, yet got very little attention as an in-house answer to bullpen depth coming up to the trade deadline.
 

grimshaw

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2 more scoreless innings for Gorst in AAA tonight. He is unscored on in his last 37.2 innings across three different levels. Almost 3 months since his last run allowed. Dude is spitting on Durbin.
 

Cuzittt

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2 more scoreless innings for Gorst in AAA tonight. He is unscored on in his last 37.2 innings across three different levels. Almost 3 months since his last run allowed. Dude is spitting on Durbin.
To be pedantic, he has not allowed an EARNED run since May 13. He has given up three UNEARNED runs since then:

June 25th (second game in Portland) where a fielding error by Jantzen Witte allowed Jon Berti (New Hampshire) to reach second... and then Gorst wild pitched him home.

August 2nd (second game in Pawtucket) where he pitched the 11th and 12th innings, allowing the ghost runner to score in both of them. [The whole placing a runner at second base to start the extra innings leaves very little wiggle room. You give up a hit, a run scores.]

However... in those 37 2/3 innings over 21 games... he has given up 18 hits (15 1B, 3 2B), 12 walks (2 IBB), and hit 1 batter. Opposition is batting .141/.218/.164 over that time. And, as grimshaw notes... that is over three levels (Salem/Portland/Pawtucket). That's pretty good.