Dodgers of the Decade: Closer
January 8, 2010 at 6:14 am | Posted in Eric Gagne, Jeff Shaw, Jonathan Broxton, Takashi Saito, Yhency Brazoban | 17 Comments1%! Paul Quantrill edges out Guillermo Mota by 1%! That’s just three votes.
Dodgers of the Decade team:
C: Russell Martin (68%)
1B: James Loney (62%)
2B: Jeff Kent (88%)
3B: Adrian Beltre (80%)
SS: Rafael Furcal (87%)
LF: Gary Sheffield (62%)
CF: Matt Kemp (94%)
RF: Shawn Green (79%)
LH starter: Clayton Kershaw (56%)
RH starter: Kevin Brown (42%)
LH reliever: Hong-Chih Kuo (57%)
RH reliever: Paul Quantrill (33%)
Well, here’s where the real fun begins, as we choose the last player for our All-Decade team. The Dodgers have had four outstanding closers in the 2000s, and the latter three are in some ways historically good. How can you even choose? Also, Yhency Brazoban!
Did you know that 28 different pitchers recorded a save for the Dodgers in the last ten years? With apologies to Alan Mills, Jesse Orosco, and Steve Schmoll, here’s the five guys who managed at least 20 total saves.
Closer
Eric Gagne (293 games, 2000-06)
Dodger stats: 24-20, 161 saves, 3.34 ERA, 121 ERA+, .650 OPS against
WAR: 10.6
Takashi Saito (180 games, 2006-08)
Dodger stats: 12-7, 81 saves, 1.95 ERA, 226 ERA+, .511 OPS against
WAR: 8.2
Jonathan Broxton (133 games, 2005-09)
Dodger stats: 19-12, 55 saves, 2.92 ERA, 146 ERA+, .591 OPS against
WAR: 6.1
Jeff Shaw (117 games, 2000-01)
Dodger stats: 6-9, 70 saves, 3.89 ERA, 106 ERA+, .710 OPS against
WAR: 1.5
Yhency Brazoban (116 games, 2004-08)
Dodger stats: 10-12, 21 saves, 4.70 ERA, 88 ERA+, .778 OPS against
WAR: -0.8
Top three seasons
4.3 WAR Gagne, 2003
3.7 WAR Saito, 2007
3.2 WAR Gagne, 2002
Now that’s a tough choice. Gagne obviously had what may have been the most dominating stretch by a closer in history, but we also are pretty sure how exactly he was able to pull that off. Saito came out of nowhere and only lasted just more than two years as the closer, but it’s hard to ignore how dominating he was. And Broxton currently holds the Dodger record in K/9. Imagine if Gagne had been healthy in 2006? You could have had all three of them in the same bullpen.
Chew on this one through the weekend, friends, as MSTI is out of town.
With the game on the line, who’s your man of the decade?
17 Comments »
RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URI
Leave a Reply
How Many McCourt Sins?
MSTI on the web
MSTI Library
Blog at WordPress.com. | Theme: Pool by Borja Fernandez.
Entries and comments feeds.
I have to go with Brox or Saito. Gagne was great but I can’t get over the fact that most of his awesomeness was derived from the juice. He wasn’t the same pitcher when the difference between his fastball or change-up evaporated (pre-juice as a starter or post-juice after testing). Plus I remember actually buying into his personal trainer, hockey workout garbage.
Comment by Steve Dimig— January 8, 2010 #
Can’t vote for the cheater, Broxton hasn’t been doing the job long enough. For 2 years, Saito was as automatic as a closer has ever been.
Comment by Babe Herman— January 8, 2010 #
I hate cheaters too, but it has to be Gagne. C’mon, ‘Game Over’? As a lifelong Dodger fan, when that flashed on the screen, it was the most exciting moment at the Ravine since Gibson and Hersheiser, or Koufax and Drysdale.
Also, Jeff Shaw totally sucked. He made me sad for letting John Wetteland go.
Comment by Mike Sharperson Lives!— January 8, 2010 #
poll not working?
Comment by Oh Cey Can You See— January 8, 2010 #
just kidding.
Comment by Oh Cey Can You See— January 8, 2010 #
I can’t help but think that if Jonathan Broxton had played on another team this decade (aside from the Yankees, Angels, and perhaps Red Sox) he would win this poll in a landslide, and yet he’s probably going to finish a distant third here. And to think I was worried about the Dodgers finding another closer back in 2002 after Jeff Shaw retired.
Comment by Nofatmike— January 8, 2010 #
It has to be Gagne. Saito was a badass, though. Wish he was still in the fold.
Comment by Casey— January 8, 2010 #
I don’t understand. If someone had played well part-time at 3rd base and part-time at first base, they would have been in both first and third base polls. Same for left and right fielders.
Broxton may meet the criterion (number of saves) for Closer poll, but he played far more innings as a set-up RH Reliever. Why was he not also in the RH Reliever poll? Surely he would have won hands down. This way, he won’t appear at all in the winners list.
I’d like to request that the RH Relievers (I suppose LH too) poll be re-run to include also those relievers, like Broxton, who may have qualified for the Closer position but *also* qualify for the general (non-closer) Reliever positions by number of innings for which they weren’t closers (i.e. total non-starter innings pitched, less saves and blown saves).
Comment by berkowit28— January 8, 2010 #
I agree, Broxton should have been in the RH Reliever poll based on this quote from the poll for 2B, “When players have seen time at more than one position, I’ve been trying to include them only at their top spot, like only having Shawn Green be an outfielder, not a first baseman.”
Broxton’s top spot prior to this year, was RH Reliever.
Comment by Gibby's Limp— January 8, 2010 #
Wouldn’t be better to use Gagne’s stats when he was a closer? His stats from 2000 and 2001 are from when he was starting.
Comment by Mr. LA Sports Fan— January 8, 2010 #
I agree that at least the RH reliever vote be redone, if for no other reason than Quantrill doesn’t deserve to win, but actually Brox should have been a choice.
Comment by Logan— January 8, 2010 #
Who cares that Gagne was juiced? They’re all juiced!! But if I had two votes, I’d do one for Jeff Shaw purely for old time’s sake and totally agree with Nofatmike re: worries about closer situation when Shaw retired.
Comment by Greg— January 8, 2010 #
Re-posting from the Voting box… didn’t know you could comment somewhere else. My bad.
I loved watching Gags do his thing. He had the most dominating stretch in all of baseball and we likely won’t see any thing like that again (in LA or otherwise). However, it seems to be that it was primarily fueled by LoDuca… Not saying that I think he should not win because of Roids, but just that it was there.
Saito, on the other hand, was an older guy from Japan whom nothing was expected of. He did not even make the team out of Spring Training! He wound up playing for the Blue as an underpaid guy (based on his numbers and skill level) and became one of the best closers in the game. It may be the fanatic in me talking, but I would have bet everything on Saito. The only person at the time who I think I would possibly want instead was Mariano Rivera… and I would have still gone with Saito. That and Dude was funny as hell.
So although Gags was awesome and I loved every moment of it, the rocket emergence from a nearly dead Japanese Veteran (who didn’t do it based on deception, trickery, and oddness as much as other Japanese pitchers, but on stuff, control and smarts) makes me choose Saito… Oh and please don’t call him Sammy… That is just stupid! Learn Takashi’s damn name! It isn’t that hard to pronounce and there are a lot of Japanese in So Cal… Dumb ass Penny and Kent…
Comment by TheStig— January 9, 2010 #
My vote goes to Gagne. I don’t care about the steroids. I never have. There were a lot of guys using at the time. Anyways, I don’t want to rant about steroid use. I’ll echo what a few others have said. I’m giving my vote to Eric Gagne because he didn’t just put up some amazing numbers. He brought a level of excitement to Dodger Stadium that we hadn’t seen in a long time.
Comment by Penos Cabell— January 9, 2010 #
[...] Kevin Brown (42%) LH reliever: Hong-Chih Kuo (57%) RH reliever: Paul Quantrill (33%) Closer: Eric Gagne [...]
Pingback by Dodgers of the Decade: General Manager « Mike Scioscia’s tragic illness— January 11, 2010 #
[...] Kevin Brown (42%) LH reliever: Hong-Chih Kuo (57%) RH reliever: Paul Quantrill (33%) Closer: Eric Gagne (71%) General Manager: Dan Evans (35%)/Ned Colletti [...]
Pingback by Dodgers of the Decade: Manager « Mike Scioscia’s tragic illness— January 13, 2010 #
[...] Kevin Brown (42%) LH reliever: Hong-Chih Kuo (57%) RH reliever: Paul Quantrill (33%) Closer: Eric Gagne (71%) General Manager: Dan Evans (35%)/Ned Colletti (34%) Manager: Joe Torre [...]
Pingback by Your Dodgers of the Decade Team « Mike Scioscia’s tragic illness— January 14, 2010 #