Bottom line we need a real closer.

[calmunderfire]

SO pitchers blow games too chief.

And there are many SO pitchers who are far inferior to Britton as an option to close.

And 160 pound hitters go deep as well. We're talking percentage baseball here.

[vab]

This thread is predictable, knee-jerk garbage. Unless you can somehow get Mariano Rivera from 1998, this is what you have to take. Closers, all closers, all of them blow saves sometimes. I'm glad the players don't sit around and whine when a guy has a bad game. They get to work and you'll see this team come right back tomorrow.

[Pickles]

I bet a SO closer would get the K on a 0-2 count.

Always?

[Reboulet'sStache]

This is going to happen to every closer.

And it's going to happen to every pitcher who pitches in the 9th enough times, whether you want to call him a closer or not.

The guy Ks 7/9 and has an unheard of 80% GB rate. He's our best relief pitcher.

We lost with our best pitcher out there. It happens.

There's no need to change a thing about the back of that pen.

I'd be interested in seeing what the correlation is between SO % and save rate.

[CaptainRedbeard]

Britton has been unreal this season. I would like another reliever to be the closer so that A) Britton doesn't rack up saves and drive up his arbitration rewards and B) We can use Britton as the lights out 8th inning lefty that we don't have.

But that's a luxury, not a necessity. Britton is perfectly capable of being a dominating closer. I'm not worried about him in that role. I'd rather use our trade chips for a SP or 2B.

[MDK02]

Bottom line.. the team is going to bounce back from this.

We should all know our team better than this by now.

The A's are going to be in for a war the next two days, believe that!

[O's84]

I bet a SO closer would get the K on a 0-2 count.

Zach Britton on 0-2 counts this year: .083/.083/.083/.167

[Pickles]

And 160 pound hitters go deep as well. We're talking percentage baseball here.

I guess Guilimet should be closing. He does have our highest K rate, so he must be our best reliever.

[Pickles]

I'd be interested in seeing what the correlation is between SO % and save rate.

Or the correlation between 80% GB rate and save rate.

[calmunderfire]

I guess Guilimet should be closing. He does have our highest K rate, so he must be our best reliever.

I believe SO closers have an advantage over contact closers. If you don't want to admit that then so be it.

[CaptainRedbeard]

Zach Britton on 0-2 counts this year: .083/.083/.083/.167

And a 51.6 K%, 92.9 GB% when they're not striking out. I think he's pretty good with the 0-2 counts.

[sportsfan8703]

Bottom line.. the team is going to bounce back from this.

We should all know our team better than this by now.

The A's are going to be in for a war the next two days, believe that!

Of course they are but this is just too much fun. We actually had a pretty darn good closer in the 2nd half of last year but Buck screwed that up. I like Britton. If he's the closer the rest of the way we are probably ok. But with the AL East being down, Oakland and blown saves are the only two things standing in our way at a legit shot at going to the WS. When you have a chance to do that you have to kind of go for it. And that would be Koji.

[centralpaosfan]

Strikeouts are boring — besides that, they're fascist. Throw some ground balls. More democratic. ~From the movie Bull Durham

[Malike]

SO pitchers blow games too chief.

And there are many SO pitchers who are far inferior to Britton as an option to close.

Kimbrel has a 15 K/9 and is 30/34 in save chances. SO pitchers indeed blow saves.

[Pickles]

I believe SO closers have an advantage over contact closers. If you don't want to admit that then so be it.

Of course that's true in a vacuum, but it doesn't really mean anything.

I believe good pitchers have and advantage of inferior ones.

And Zach Britton's the best pitcher in our bullpen.