Playoffs MLB 2021: a revolution in the bullpen?

While leading the Kansas City Royals to two consecutive trips to the World Series in 2014 and 2015, Ned Yost seemed to have figured out the perfect plan for October: have his starters work five or six innings and then turn the game over to three or four dominant relief pitchers.

In 2014, it was Kelvin Herrera, Wade Davis and Greg Holland. In 2015, it was Luke Hochevar, Ryan Madson, Herrera and Davis. All were righties, which made Yost’s job even easier. He didn’t have to worry about matchups, where the opposing team was in the order, or waiting for his starter to get into trouble. The Royals had a 22-9 record in the two postseasons, including a title in 2015, and those five relievers combined for a 9-0 record with 11 saves and 1.18 ERA, and the Royals’ starters had a 4.56 ERA.

With relievers impacting the game more than ever and the days of Bob Gibson and Sandy Koufax pitching complete games in the World Series long ago, this was going to be the formula for the future. After all, it was certainly easier in theory to find three or four superior relievers than four starters who could go deep into a game through multiple playoff series.

Except a funny thing happened on the way to Copycat Land: it hasn’t.

The last four World Series champions relied on starting pitchers coming out of the bullpen throughout their playoff careers, and the last four postseasons have seen more pitchers opening and relieving than ever before.

It started with the Astros in 2017, though not by design. A.J. Hinch had to improvise when his top two relievers, Ken Giles and Chris Devenski, both struggled in the postseason. By the middle of the American League Championship Series against the Yankees, Hinch had lost confidence in Giles. In Game 7, Charlie Morton started and pitched five shutout innings while Lance McCullers Jr, who had started Game 4, pitched the final four innings, closing out the 4-0 victory with 24 consecutive curves.

After Giles blew a save in Game 2 of the World Series against the Dodgers, the Astros used only two pitchers in a 5-3 victory in Game 3: McCullers for 5.1 innings and Brad Peacock, who had been the starter in the divisional series, for 3.2 episodes. In Game 7, McCullers opened and pitched 2.1 innings, Peacock pitched two and Morton pitched the final four.

Morton even batted in the ninth inning of that game with the Astros leading 5-1.

“The way he was pitching I wasn’t going to get him out,” Hinch said after the game, even though Morton was pitching on three days’ rest after completing 6.1 innings in Game 4. His message to Morton: “Whatever you’re going to do, don’t swing. Let every pitch go. You’re going to finish the game.”

With the Red Sox in 2018, Alex Cora had a calculated plan to use his starters as relievers. Rick Porcello and Chris Sale earned holds in the eighth inning in the American League Divisional Series against the Yankees. In the SCLA, Porcello and Nathan Eovaldi started and pitched in relief. In the World Series, it was Sale, not closer Craig Kimbrel, who got the final three outs. Throughout the postseason, all five Red Sox starters would start and relieve.

In 2019, Nationals manager Dave Martinez had four stellar starters in Max Scherzer, Stephen Strasburg, Patrick Corbin and Anibal Sanchez, but only two reliable relievers in Daniel Hudson and Sean Doolittle. Scherzer and Strasburg made relief appearances, while Corbin would end up making three starts and five relief appearances, including three shutout innings to earn the win in Game 7 of the World Series.

Dave Roberts did a little bit of everything with the Dodgers in 2020, including bullpen games. Julio Urias, Dustin May and Tony Gonsolin appeared as starters and relievers. Roberts would handle the hot hand as Hinch did in 2017, as it was Urias who pitched the final nine outs of Game 7 of the National League Championship Series and the final seven outs of the decisive Game 6 of the World Series.

Of course, using starters as relievers is not a new strategy; just think of Randy Johnson coming out of the bullpen for both the Mariners and Diamondbacks, but those were more often emergency, life-or-death situations as with Johnson, or Madison Bumgarner in 2014. Joe Torre, who could rely on Mariano Rivera, rarely did with the Yankees. Bobby Cox rarely did it with the Braves; Tom Glavine never appeared as a reliever in a playoff game, and Greg Maddux and John Smoltz (when he was a starter) did it only twice.