Blue Jays Bullpen

About a week ago, Todd wanted to know who I liked better as Frank Francisco's back up in Toronto: Jon Rauch or Octavio Dotel.

Let the record show that I incorrectly guessed Dotel. My supposition was primarily based on multiple rumors that John Farrell was leaning toward sticking Dotel in the role if he decided to make a change. Farrell did decide to make a change, but it turns out that he wants to go back to Rauch for a second go round in the 9th inning.

Some of my guesswork also revolved around the assumption that Rauch hasn't been very good this year. However, I didn't realize how bad Rauch had been until I peeked over at the Blue Jays team pages over at Fangraphs and Baseball Reference.

Pitcher	FG WAR	BR WAR	IP	ERA	xFIP	SV
Casey Janssen	0.6	0.6	27 2/3	2.93	3.12	1
Marc Rzepczynski	0.3	0.8	36	3.00	3.44	0
Shawn Camp	0.2	-0.2	38 2/3	4.42	3.83	1
Jason Frasor	0.2	0.8	37	3.16	4.01	0
Zach Stewart	0.1	0.2	16 2/3	4.86	4.03	0
Luis Perez	0.0	0.5	31 2/3	3.69	3.04	0
Octavio Dotel	-0.1	0.4	25 2/3	3.51	4.14	1
Frank Francisco	-0.1	-0.2	24 1/3	5.92	3.50	10
Jon Rauch	-0.2	0.4	37 1/3	4.34	4.37	7

According to the WAR, the best relievers in this pen are the ones who aren't hearing about in the save conversations. Fangraphs' tool likes the injured Casey Janssen best, while Baseball Reference says that Rzepczynski and Frasor are having the best seasons.

What jumps out at me to an even greater degree, though, is that none of these guys is very good. Twenty-four other Major League bullpens have at least one reliever with a 0.7 WAR or higher (per the Fangraphs metric); there isn't a standout here who is being robbed of an opportunity to close.

It's no crime to chase saves if the price is right, so tossing a low FAAB bid on one of these guys or throwing a low farm pick or a so-so farm player or marginal freeze at someone for a chance at some saves in the Blue Jays bullpen is fine.

Otherwise, I would stay away from this pen. Francisco is a mess, Rauch hasn't done well, and there's no reason that Farrell might not suddenly alter course and decide that Frasor or Rzepczynski shouldn't close for a couple of weeks either. While these kinds of experiments might be intriguing for Blue Jays fans, they're a fantasy disaster, and the kind of scenarios that winning owners typically avoid.