The window to not be bad is limited. Here we are less than two weeks into the season and teams have already made changes to the back end of their bullpens.
When you have a bad day at any other position there are ways for your mates to help you overcome your poor outing. When the closer has a bad day, his team generally loses. How many of these can you stand?
If it happens three times in a week it’s soul crushing, three mostly sure wins gone after several hours of work to get there.
David Bednar and Jordan Romano
Bednar and Romano were both looking to make last year go away, both given a shot to keep the ninth out of the gate.
Bednar had a three year run as good as anyone and then last year he fell apart. The consensus was he was tipping his pitches.
He lost the role to end last season and now it appears he has again. This time however he shockingly finds himself back at Triple-A after six big league seasons.
“We’ve got to get him right. [He’s] going to be a big part of our bullpen. … Right now, it’s about making sure that we get David Bednar back to the status he was before.”
Pirates manager Derek Shelton on the decision to option RHP David Bednar to Triple-A Indianapolis. pic.twitter.com/qYYPpzAoCH
— SportsNet Pittsburgh (@SNPittsburgh) April 1, 2025
Romano’s plight is amazingly similar. He had four elite seasons with the Blue Jay but blew up last year, it ended with athroscopic elbow surgery. The Phils had him checked out and signed him to a one year $8.5 million deal to most likely close.
That’s not looking real good now. He averaged just 93.5 mph last time out, a full three mph down from last year and he’s still getting knocked around.
Reds, Tigers, Marlins Too
The Tigers sent their saves leader from last season, Jason Foley to the minors at the end of camp. The Reds leader from 2024, Alexis Diaz is also at Triple-A rehabbing a hamstring strain. However, it looks as though he won’t close right away when he returns.
The Marlins have already taken the ball from Calvin Faucher and given it to Anthony Bender while Rockies and White Sox can’t take something away that has yet to belong to anyone.
Look What they found
Sometimes it takes some messing around until you find your guy, sometimes you just give someone the ball and hope for the best. That has certainly worked in the short term for the Texas Rangers who have made the most out of Luke Jackson.
The thirty three year old has run up a bunch of saves after Chris Martin’s name was the most mentioned coming out of camp. He once had 18 saves with Atlanta, other than that just one in his career.
Everybody else is fine for now but it won’t take much.
