About six weeks in the past, Eric Longenhagen revealed his Dodgers Prime Prospects listing. It ran 51 gamers deep, and was headlined by a number of the trendiest names in prospect circles: Roki Sasaki, Dalton Dashing, Zyhir Hope. Down at no. 24, headlining the 40 FV group, was a blurb that began with the next phrase: “Low Leverage Ben.”
Ben Casparius is a bulk reliever. He’s now what the fifth starter in a four-man rotation was 40 years in the past. Most baseball followers know him because the rookie who obtained referred to as on to make a spot begin in Sport 4 of final 12 months’s World Collection. He’s the man you name on when Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Jack Flaherty, and Walker Buehler have all taken their turns within the rotation, and Clayton Kershaw is damage. And so is Tyler Glasnow. And Tony Gonsolin. And Bobby Miller. And River Ryan. And Gavin Stone. And Emmet Sheehan. And (sarcastically) Kyle Harm. And Shohei Ohtani, or half of him, anyway.
I assume while you’re within the double digits on the Dodgers’ beginning pitcher pecking order, getting “Low Leverage” as a nickname is an occupational hazard. However I don’t prefer it. Largely as a result of it’s one in need of the three-beat alliteration that made “Late Evening LaMonte” roll off the tongue so felicitously. (My condolences to LaMonte Wade Jr. on his current DFA.)
But additionally as a result of it’s not true.
Earlier than Wednesday’s video games, there have been 187 certified relievers in main league baseball. Casparius is 129th in pLI (common leverage index), however 74th in gmLI (leverage index when getting into the sport). All due respect, that’s medium leverage. And regardless of having a brief persist with push with, Casparius is sixteenth amongst relievers in WPA, two spots forward of Ryan Helsley.
That’s as a result of Casparius has been actually good this 12 months. Out of these 187 certified relievers, he’s twenty ninth in Ok-BB%, third in FIP, and second — SECOND — in WAR. WAR is available in such small increments that it doesn’t all the time (and even all that often) paint a complete image of reliever efficiency. However the prime of this 12 months’s leaderboard is a listing of closers and elite one-inning setup males having nice years. Plus the Dodgers’ no. 12 beginning pitcher.
Main League Reliever WAR Leaders
Stats up to date by way of June 3
If I wanted three outs within the ninth inning of a World Collection sport, I don’t know that Casparius would present up close to Muñoz or Hader or Suarez on my listing of men to name. However in 39 innings this 12 months, Casparius has struck out 44 batters and walked simply seven. He’s allowed an opponent batting common of .193 and only a solitary house run. His ERA (2.54) is correct in keeping with his xERA (2.53) and truly virtually a run worse than his FIP (1.69).
I gained’t bore you with a granular rundown of Casparius’ superior numbers — you all know tips on how to discover Baseball Savant — however he’s lacking bats, he’s getting opponents to chase, he’s avoiding exhausting contact… I don’t know what extra you’d need from a reliever. I really feel fairly comfy saying he’s greater than bullpen filler.
Other than Casparius’ unexpectedly good statistical report, two issues about him are of curiosity to me: First, how he’s doing it. Second, how the Dodgers are utilizing him.
Casparius throws from a excessive three-quarters arm slot, with a downward arm stab that retains the ball behind his physique. With no person on base, he additionally takes a giant step towards first base and drags his foot all the best way throughout the rubber over the course of his windup. It’s an odd movement that provides him the sense of pitching in 3/4. I’ll present you what I imply right here.
If I couldn’t present you that video, I might’ve stated that Casparius’ pitching movement is one half Tommy Hanson and two components Viennese waltz. (Be at liberty to disagree on that comparability; I solely watched one season of So You Assume You Can Dance.)
In spite of everything that rigmarole come 4 pitches: a four-seamer, a cutter, a sweeper, and a curveball. Each breaking balls have above-average motion in each instructions; righties see extra of the sweeper than all different pitches mixed, whereas lefties see a mixture of all 4 of Casparius’ choices, with extra curveballs than sweepers.
The sweeper is devastatingly efficient, and it’s helped Casparius maintain same-handed hitters to a .145/.163/.205 batting line this 12 months. I used to be intrigued that Casparius can get lefties out with out a changeup or a splitter — or perhaps a sinker, or any pitch with important arm-side motion — and if there’s a weak spot for Casparius, that’s it. Nonetheless, left-handed hitters are hitting .262/.318/.344 towards the righty, so it’s not a deadly weak spot but.
Pretty much as good because the sweeper is, Casparius is eating out on his two-fastball pairing. He’s one among solely three pitchers in baseball who has thrown two fastball sorts 100 or extra instances this 12 months, with an opponent wOBA underneath .250 for each.
That’s as a result of every pitch is somewhat bizarre. The four-seamer has top-of-the-scale rise, however virtually no arm-side run. The cutter, in the meantime, has poor vertical motion however 4 additional inches of glove-side motion in comparison with cutters of comparable velocity. In different phrases, when a hitter faces Casparius, the cutter goes proper when it’s purported to go up, and the four-seamer goes up when it’s purported to go left.
It looks as if the obvious factor on the earth for somebody within the Dodgers group to indicate Casparius tips on how to throw a changeup, and stretch him out right into a starter. He’s on tempo to throw about 100 innings this 12 months, with a FIP of 1.73. If he might do this over 180 innings, he’d win the Cy Younger Award.
As a substitute, Casparius has made only one begin this 12 months, along with his different 36 2/3 innings coming throughout 19 aid appearances. Solely A’s righty Mitch Spence has thrown extra innings out of the bullpen this 12 months; solely Spence has extra aid appearances of 4 or extra outs, and solely Spence and White Sox righty Mike Vasil have extra aid appearances of not less than six outs.
The Dodgers want the innings. They at the moment have seven beginning pitchers and eight relievers on the IL, together with six starters on the 60-day IL. That doesn’t depend Ohtani, who’s working on the market bashing dingers each night time from the DH spot however hasn’t thrown a pitch in knowledgeable sport since August 2023.
Ohtani was already injured when he joined the Dodgers, so you possibly can’t blame his absence on an organizational profligacy with the connective tissue of the arm. However the different guys… yeah, the Dodgers have a repute for struggling to maintain their guys wholesome.
Are you able to title the pitcher who led the Dodgers in innings final 12 months? Or right here’s a greater approach to put it: What number of guesses would you’ve wanted to get to Stone?
Final 12 months’s Dodgers had simply two pitchers — Stone and Glasnow — throw 100 or extra innings, the fewest ever for a pennant-winning workforce in a non-COVID-shortened season. (Each pennant winners in 1981 had 4 such pitchers; each World Collection contestants in 1995 had 5.) They have been the third World Collection-winning workforce that didn’t have a single pitcher qualify for the ERA title, and the one one which didn’t get a pitcher to 90% of the innings threshold.
Fortuitously (I assume), the Dodgers know this can be a downside, and compensate. Even with a complete rotation-and-a-half within the infirmary, the Dodgers nonetheless don’t actually need to make use of Casparius within the rotation. Within the bullpen, nevertheless: Kirby Yates, Blake Treinen, Brusdar Graterol, Luis García, Michael Kopech, and Evan Phillips are all on the IL, and Tanner Scott has been terrible. That’s not simply seven names — all of them with a current historical past of high-leverage efficiency — it’s one thing like $50 million in wage. Even the Dodgers want bulk to make up for that.
So how do you get that form of bulk out of 1 man? You throw him a couple of inning at a time, and never essentially on the finish of the sport. Casparius has made 19 aid appearances this 12 months so far; he’s entered the sport after the sixth inning simply 5 instances, and after the seventh inning simply twice. And in 15 of these 19 events, the Dodgers have been both main or trailing by two or fewer runs when Casparius took the mound. Casparius entered one other sport to steer off the underside of the sixth with the Dodgers forward three runs, and one other with a runner on first and two outs within the sixth with the Dodgers up 4. So solely twice in 20 appearances (together with that lone begin) has Casparius are available in to pitch with the result already determined.
This reliever utilization sample is one among a thousand issues I’ve been enthusiastic about since I obtained Invoice James’ New Historic Baseball Summary for Christmas after I was in center college. Therein, James wrote an essay criticizing the one-inning nearer function as an inefficient use of a aid ace; such a pitcher would give a workforce extra bang for its buck if used extra often at any level within the second half of the sport, when the rating was shut in both course — not simply to guard a lead.
Sabermetric orthodoxy rapidly solidified round one thing like this concept, culminating in Terry Francona’s bullpen utilization within the 2016 playoffs: with Cody Allen as a conventional three-out nearer, and Andrew Miller as an all-purpose multi-inning stopper in excessive leverage. School closers are additionally anticipated to go a number of innings and seem in high-leverage moments earlier within the sport, however that utilization is less complicated to navigate while you play 4 or 5 instances every week and never six.
Clearly, that’s a pair notches richer than how Dave Roberts has been utilizing Casparius. However this multi-inning medium-leverage mid-game aid function is one I’m delighted to see in actual life, as a result of each time I’ve gotten right into a baseball online game, I’ve remoted a reliever to make use of on this style. I discussed this final summer time after I wrote about 2003 All-Star Lance Carter, my 23-game winner in MVP Baseball 2005 for GameCube. (I additionally had an OOTP save years in the past the place Wilmer Font went 31-0 in a 130-inning aid season.)
A pitcher who’s used like Casparius (at the moment 4-0) might rack up tons of wins. In 2023, Mike Baumann was the Orioles’ designated down-one-run-after-five-or-six man and ended up going 10-1 with some fairly unremarkable price stats in nowhere close to the amount Casparius is on monitor for.
Casparius is at the moment on tempo for 95 aid innings, which might be probably the most for a reliever since… Ryan Yarbrough final 12 months. Largely for the Dodgers. I confess I hoped for a extra spectacular and/or obscure title there.
A strict two-innings-every-three-games regiment would get Casparius over 100 aid innings; a feat that’s solely been achieved seven instances within the twenty first Century by six completely different pitchers, three of whom have been named Scot or Scott: Scott Sullivan, who did it twice, Scot Shields, and Scott Proctor. (Yarbrough can be on this listing, in his capability as the unique bulk reliever behind the opener for the Rays in 2018.)
I believe that is going to be the subsequent stylish factor in aid pitcher utilization: the two-inning man for the center third of shut video games. It makes an excessive amount of sense; starters don’t go deep in video games anymore, and one-inning guys will be unreliable. There’s a necessity for a bridge pitcher, and that function will get probably the most out of men like Casparius, who may lack the zip required to shut however would additionally battle to show over a lineup greater than as soon as. A era in the past, that form of pitcher might make a residing as a spot starter, however not anymore.
I suppose that is what the spot starter appears like in 2025. And the Dodgers have a very good one.