1. Craig Kimbrel
Craig Kimbrel could not seem to get anyone out in the Division Series of the 2018 postseason, but a small fix made all of the difference.
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It turned out Craig Kimbrel was tipping his pitches during the postseason, so former Los Angeles Dodger Eric Gagne noticed, and texted manager Alex Cora, who then informed his coaching staff.
Alex Cora said Kimbrel was “tipping his pitches for two weeks”, but when Kimbrel found out what he was doing, he immediately fixed it and was back to being the best reliever in baseball.
The point is everybody in baseball wanted to bash him for “choking” in big situations, but it wasn’t because he wasn’t a good pitcher all of a sudden, but because of a minimal technical mistake. Everyone seems to believe that he isn’t the best reliever in the game anymore because of his postseason performance, but again during the regular season he dominated, and after he made the fix he dominated, and is now a World Series champion.
In 2018, he racked up the most amount of saves since his 2014 season in Atlanta (42), with 96 strikeouts, and 19 earned runs in only 62.1 innings.
He made it to his seventh All Star Game, accumulating a 2.74 ERA and giving up just seven home runs.
If you didn’t know, Kimbrel is not signed yet. Dave Dombrowski, the Red Sox’s President of Baseball Operations, said on Wednesday that they are going to be looking for a closer internally. The Red Sox along with every other team do not want to give him a long term deal, so he will have to settle for a shorter deal, possibly with the Braves.
In 2019, he is projected to have a 3.14 ERA with 25 saves, and striking out 85 in 63 innings pitched.
No matter where Kimbrel ends up, he is going to be a great pitcher and deserves to be the best reliever in the game because of not just every reason I have already stated, but the fact that in every clutch stat last year, the opposing batting average was lower than .170.
Tell me what you think of my list, and come back for my last position breakdown of the series, which is the Starting Pitchers.