A Year to Forget: Relievers Who'll Rebound in 2021

JB evaluates four relief pitchers (RP) and part-time closers who struggled last season but could rebound in 2021 for fantasy baseball. These relievers could be undervalued draft targets.

The 2020 season was so weird, unprecedented, awkward, and chaotic, it might be wise to toss out most of the stats when prepping for your 2021 fantasy drafts. But we are also human, and sometimes getting that bad taste a down season leaves in your mouth can be nearly impossible no matter the circumstances.

These four relief pitchers all suffered from "down" seasons despite all recording saves. I will examine what might have caused the disappointing shortened-seasons, and why I expect them to reward fantasy managers who choose to use metaphorical mouthwash.

Let's find which closers could bounce back strong in 2021.

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Taylor Rogers, MIN

(2020: 20 IP, 2 W, 9 SV, 24 K, 4.05 ERA, 1.50 WHIP)

I will admit I was very high on Taylor Rogers heading into the 2020 season after a breakout 2019 performance. Despite the nine saves, I was left rather disappointed. The good news is the ERA was certainly inflated due to a career-high .400 BABIP and career-low 60.3 LOB%. His 2.84 FIP was actually one point lower than in 2019. He also limited the free passes with a lowly 4.4 BB%. The small COVID-led sample size also produced a fluke Away game split where he allowed seven of his nine ER after posting a 1.25 ERA on the road in 2019. In fact, you can point to one single road trip where he surrendered four runs in just two games in early August which contributed to almost 50% of his earned runs on the season.

The bad news was his pitch mix was just NOT working for him. Despite mirroring his SwStr% from 2019, his K% dropped down below his career average, while his GB% hit a career-low and his Barrel% saw a career-high. That's not a great combination. What I loved about the breakout season and the future forecast was how often he was throwing the slider, but I think Rogers got a little carried away with the pitch in 2020. The 21.5% slider rate from 2019 was a personal high, and then he went and practically DOUBLED that rate to 40.9% last season. He threw the slider 155 times in 2020 (shortened season) compared to 223 times in all of 2019. In order to accommodate, he all but eliminated his curveball (28.4% to 3.7%).

Rogers recently agreed to a $6 million deal to avoid arbitration, while teammate Tyler Duffey signed a $2.2 million deal. With Trevor May now a New York Met, it appears the roles atop the Minnesota bullpen will remain the same at least to begin the 2021 season. I fully expect the pitch mix to return close to what we saw in 2019, and coupled with the incoming positive ERA regression, will lead to a nice bounce-back campaign for the southpaw closer. His current NFBC ADP is at 139, which while still too rich for my blood, strongly reflects that the industry agrees.

Ryan Pressly, HOU 

(21 IP, 1 W, 12 SV, 29 K, 3.43 ERA, 1.33 WHIP)

Ryan Pressly was hands down my favorite set-up man heading into 2020, as he had been nothing short of dominant since being traded to the Astros in 2018. When Roberto Osuna was placed on the Injured List and was slated to have Tommy John Surgery, I expected a top-five relief pitcher season from Pressly. But it turned out there was going to be a little adjustment period needed in the new role. Only Daniel Hudson had more blown saves than Pressly in 2020, as he blew four opportunities and finished with a 75% conversion rate. But eerily similar to the previously mentioned Taylor Rogers, Pressly suffered from some bad COVID-season luck. He also experienced a career-high BABIP in the small-sample season, but boasted a shiny 2.81 FIP. He also uncharacteristically struggled on the road where he surrendered six of his eight ER along with a .344 BAA. Also like Rogers, you can highlight two early appearances (his first two of the season actually) where he gave up three runs without recording three outs.

The good news is Pressly went on to surrender only five ER over his next 20 IP, and his O-Swing%, Contact%, and SwStr% were all right on par with 2019. In fact, his 17.4 SwStr% was still top-10 among relief pitchers. The bad news is his fastball velocity was down in the 94 mph range for the first time since 2014 and he mightily struggled locating his curveball, which is a key to his dominance against left-handed batters. Here is a Fangraphs heatmap of his curveball location versus LHB in 2019.

Now here is the same map for 2020.

The early curveball struggles led to a lower usage (down 14% from 2019), which led to a career-high slider usage (also like Rogers) and frankly a different pitcher than we had seen in previous seasons. With the closer-adjustment period behind him and a (hopefully) normal offseason ahead of him, I am confident the 2020 issues will be looked at as an awkward-season blip in future years. As Roberto Osuna was recently released, Ryan Pressly should be firmly entrenched as the Stros closers and we will see plenty of door-slam celebrations in 2021.

Hector Neris, PHI 

(21.2 IP, 2 W, 5 SV, 27 K, 4.57 ERA, 1.71 WHIP)

I have never personally been a fan of owning Hector Neris in fantasy, but there is no denying the guy was very good in 2019 when he stepped up for the Phillies to replace injured David Robertson. But that success absolutely did not carry over into 2020. In fact, it got so bad that the Phillies traded for Brandon Workman and that went exactly as we all expected.

But was Neris really as bad as the numbers show? Obviously not since he's in this article. As the trend continues, Neris suffered from some terrible luck to include a career-high BABIP and career-low LOB% in his 2020 sample-season. In fact, his 2.50 FIP was the lowest he's ever posted. ONCE AGAIN, two games in August did most of his season's damage, when he gave up SIX runs in 1.1 IP. Aside from those two eyesores, Neris only gave up five ER in his remaining 20.1 IP.

The good news is he is still throwing his lovely splitter at around a 50% rate, and he replicated his 2019 SwStr%. The bad news is he struggled to throw strikes, similar to Ryan Pressly with his curve. A career-high 12.6 BB% is bad enough, but a 23.1 BB% (!) to left-handed batters is just brutal. Neris utilized the nasty splitter to hold LHB to just a .259 wOBA in 2019. In 2020 it rose to .334, accompanied by a .442 OBP. Here is the Fangraphs heatmap for his splitter location against lefties in 2019.

Here is the same map for 2020.

The Phillies declined their $7 million 2021 club option on Neris, unsurprisingly. But based on their current bullpen situation and Neris being arbitration-eligible, I expect for a deal to be made between the two before the season. The Phils could very well decide to snag one of the top-tier relievers in free agency, but until that happens I will assume Hector Neris closes again for the Phillies in 2021. In order for the bounce-back I anticipate, he has to regain the feel for the splitter against lefties, but based on what we've seen throughout his career the walks should regress towards his career average and I see a lot of potential value in his current 311 ADP.

Craig Kimbrel, CHC

(15.1 IP, 2 SV, 28 K, 5.28 ERA, 1.43 WHIP)

I was the conductor aboard the Avoid-Kimbrel-at-all-Costs Train heading into 2019 AND 2020. I watched every outing of his for the Red Sox in the second half of 2018. Something was very wrong and it continued to get worse as the team marched through the playoffs. So I knew the disastrous 2019 season was no fluke, and even predicted Jeremy Jeffress would be the Cubs closer by mid-season in my Preseason Bold Predictions (Rowan Wick has no business closing). Based on the stats you see next to his name, obviously Kimbrel didn't prove me wrong. But based on the fact that he's in this article, you know there's some hope for 2021!

So what went wrong... again? The theory of tipping pitches came out after the 2018 World Series. They came out again in 2020 after Kimbrel walked four and hit a batter while recording only one out in his first appearance against Cincy. While the theory sounds a little crazy to me when a pitcher only has two pitches to start with, it would certainly explain some of his more recent struggles, the first being career-worst barrel and hard-hit rates. But that can happen to any pitcher who has lost his "edge."

The more specific struggle is the swing rates against his curveball. Kimbrel only generated a 27.4 Swing% with the curve in 2020. That is 17 points lower than in 2019 and 12 points lower than his career average. The pitch may have lost a bit of movement over the years, but it still carried a 51.9 K% and .143 SLG even in this down year. How can such a pitch only bait a swing a quarter of the time if the hitter doesn't know it's coming? Hmmmm, interesting. It is also worth noting that the pitches Zone% was less than three points away from its career average. Regardless of tipping or losing its bite, hitters were able to avoid it and sit on the cheese to the tune of an .812 OPS.

So we don't know exactly what caused the troubles the past few seasons for Kimbrel, but I do know 2020 ended strongly trending in the right direction. His K% was it's highest since 2017 and the GB% increased for the second straight season. It's not quite back up to the 40s like it was from 2011-2015, but baby steps. The velocity was also back up over 97 after a worrisome dip in 2019. He ended the shortened campaign on a torrid run with 7.1  scoreless innings, 13 strikeouts, and ZERO walks. That's something he hasn't done since 2017.

I never expect prime Kimbrel to be back, but 2020 showed me that he is still capable of figuring it out, and considering Jeffress is a FA and Kimbrel is owed $16 million this season, I have a strong feeling the Cubs are willing to let him.

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