Craig Kimbrel 2024

[oriolediehard]

Kimberly should retire!!  He is a washed up old reliever.

[RZNJ]

In April he was throwing 92-93 and his command was probably the best of his career.  He was great.    

[glenn__davis]

1 minute ago, RZNJ said:

In April he was throwing 92-93 and his command was probably the best of his career.  He was great.    

Yeah, he's had a very weird season.  Two periods of incredible dominance and two periods of incredible incompetence.

That screams to me that the end for him isn't quite here yet but is very close.

[LookitsPuck]

2 hours ago, RZNJ said:

In April he was throwing 92-93 and his command was probably the best of his career.  He was great.    

It's interesting. He went into the ASB as an All Star snub, as I (and a lot of folks!) thought that Holmes had no business making it over him.

But since the ASB break? Just command issues like woah. Yeah, the Yankees game before the ASB he was bad, too (the 3 run dinger), but that was at least forgivable considering how good he was prior. 

That said, his velocity has been dipping. Brooks Baseball had him at averaging 93 in March, then that was up to 94 in April, nearly 95 in May, 94.5 in June, 93.5 in July and now barely hitting 93. He's all but abandoned the sweeper and is focusing entirely on FB and his knuckle curve. Which, yeah, I get it...his FB is his best pitch. But if he's not commanding it, it's kind of like Felix when he was struggling with it. He goes entirely to other pitches, but the mix requires a lot of precision and pitches since you don't have much to mix it up with.

Either way, his velocity is definitely down and has been for at least the last few weeks.

[Aristotelian]

15 hours ago, Just Regular said:

Warts and all, we didn't acquire enough pitchers to bring the options better than him up to more than 12 or 13 for October.

Kimbrel and Soto are capable relievers in bad patches, but there's enough season left to keep trying them in hopes of finding better form.

Now is the Arms equivalent of not DFA'ing Ramon Urias or Cedric Mullins.

Sure I'd leave them off the playoff roster if it is 7 more weeks of terrible, but at that point who is the back group of your dozen pitchers?

Kade Strowd, Brandon Young, Keeler Morfe??     Webb, Coulombe and Grayson are all hurt and first rule of hurt pitchers is they tend to stay hurt.

You can cover an ALWC series with half a dozen pitchers if things go well, but an ALDS is likely to require 10 deep, and Hyde chasing matchups might go that far even in a shorter series.

I like the Urias/Mullins analogy and I believe Kimbrel probably has one more dominant stretch left in the tank somewhere. The question is when do we get it and how long does it last. My great fear is that he finds it in the next month or so and then loses it in the most spectacular way in the playoffs. He could be lights out for the next six weeks and I would still be too nervous to deploy him in a one run game in the tournament. Which says to me we should assume it's Seranthony/Cano for the highest leverage matchups.

In the meantime, see if we can work Kimbrel and Soto back to where they can at least be medium leverage 3-batter options.

Would be great if we could add Coulombe back in that mix. Hopefully Grayson comes back and that could allow Suarez to be an option. 

[CharlieC]

He was dropped in my dynasty league today.  No one will probably put a waiver claim in.

[drjohnnyfever1]

He'll be ok if he figures out the command.  He just can't seem to get it where he wants it and then when he has to groove it in, he's getting killed.  We've seen this before.  Flaherty, last year, would look great for 2-3 innings, make a bad pitch and go off the rails.  Kimbrel, now, scares me from his first pitch.  As a vet, he should be able to find something he can do to find his way.  He's a little lost right now.

[Grt 2BA FL Gator]

Kimbrel’s a legend. Fearsome closer when he was peak.

But he looks washed. I mean he’s sitting 92/93 on 4 days rest. The stuff just doesn’t play anymore. Not many can survive nowadays throwing 92 as a righty in the bullpen. I feel bad for him, but really do wonder if we should cut our losses and everyone move on.

I was hoping maybe he could play a role, but tonight broke me.

As I type this, we’d be tied 8-8 if Kimbrel didn’t give up three in the 7th. 

Edited August 17 by Grt 2BA FL Gator

[OsFanSinceThe80s]

 

[Spy Fox]

The walk tonight wasn’t really his fault. But those two HR pitches were just batting practice. 

[lazyjc22]

All my Philly fan friends/family warned me of this.

[Orioles0615]

Get rid of him already

[joelala]

At this point I wouldn’t be surprised if we left him off the ALWC roster. Also wouldn’t be surprised if he finds his form and closes game 7 of the WS. 

[Three Run Homer]

We should call up Matt Bowman and DFA Kimbrel.  If he makes it through waivers (likely), offer him a spot in Norfolk to try to get his act together.  

As long as Kimbrel is on the roster, Hyde has to use him.  

[Can_of_corn]

5 minutes ago, joelala said:

At this point I wouldn’t be surprised if we left him off the ALWC roster. Also wouldn’t be surprised if he finds his form and closes game 7 of the WS. 

Dodgers left him off their playoff roster.