As far as I can tell, Jon Papelbon came into the 8th inning in 11 games in the 2008 season.  The Red Sox' record in those games:  11-0.

That's no big hurkin' deal.  As James once put it, suppose you had a racehorse that was 15-41, but 14-1 when leading ten yards from the wire.  What does that prove?  :- )

But check Papelbon's career stats on pitches 26-50:

AVG - .148

OBP - .207

SLG - .167

HR - 0

It seems that once Papelbon gets loose, he might as well start Riverdancing between hitters.  The Red Sox should seriously re-consider the James Pattern on use of their star reliever:  1.0 to 2.0 innings when the game is close.

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Q.  Is it worth the risk?  How do you draw up a formula for the ROI on the wins vs. the increased injury risk?

A. Let's back up a minute.  How do you document your claim that would be safer for a closer to pitch his 70 innings in 75 appearances, as opposed getting the same innings in 65 appearances?

When you complain about 4-out saves, you're not complaining about innings as such — you're not saying that 65 innings is fine for a closer but 75 innings invites disaster.  You're saying that the second workout cycle is foolish.

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Q.  Is there a study on it?

A. Not for relievers, that I'm aware of.  But there's an analogous study for SP's:  it's called Pitcher Abuse Points (PAP), and Bill James busted that theory several years ago.

BP, for years, drew up lists of SP's who had thrown a lot of pitches per appearance, and labeled these pitchers high-risk.  James respectfully pointed out that the pitchers on these high-pitch, "high-risk" lists were actually much LOWER-risk than any control group you'd draw up.

In other words, the SP's we thought were highly stressed, actually went on to be the healthier pitchers — they had fewer injuries and lower performance decline.

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BP (Jazayerli and Woolner) then protested, "well, the pitchers on the high-risk lists were good pitchers, and the lists were biased towards noninjury, since their managers judged them able to handle the load."

Fill in your own punch line… :- ) …

D-O-V is sure that any such study would turn out the same way for closers.  You'd go find all the closers who had 1+ IP saves, and it would have Lee Smith and Mariano Rivera and Rollie Fingers and Jeff Reardon, and you'd find they were all super-healthy.

And then you'd go, "well, the guys getting 2-IP saves were the best, and their managers knew they could handle the load."

So apply it to Jon Papelbon, my man.

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If you want extra credit for actually doing a mini-study?

1.  Find 30×2 historical relief pitcher "pairs,"  such as Robb Nen and John Wetteland or what have you … make sure that in years 1-2-3 their IP are comparable as well as their HR/K/BB and preferably their body and arsenal …

2.  Take the guy from each pair who had fewer & longer outings for the same IP, and put him in Group A; put the guy who had more & shorter outings for the same IP, and put him in Group B…

3.  Compare their performances in years 4-5, to see whether Group A or B stayed healthier and pitched better.

I'm sure that it will show (1) no significant difference, or (2) that the guys who had longer outings did a little better going forward.

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Q.  DO managers generally feel that super-closers can handle saves of more than one inning?

A. Here you go.  Check the career saves leaders (who are of course the most durable closers).  Scan through several of them.

You'll find a bunch of guys like Lee Smith, who in their first 10 years threw 80-90 innings in 60-65 games, which is of course more than 1 IP per outing.  Then in their second ten years their managers throttled them back a bit.  (Yes, we know that managers have recently) evolved into their current religious state on the 3-out save.)

Mariano Rivera had 1023 IP in 851 games, and a sterling health record in total, and Jon could have that little dude for brunch with rice pilaf.

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Mo gets mostly 1.0 inning saves, of course, as is the convention.  But the Yankees didn't treat 1.1 IP outings like ptomaine poisoning for him.

In Mo's age-30 year, for example, he had 15 long saves, including several 2's, not counting the playoffs when the Yankees simply use him however they want to.

Papelbon, in 2008, had 11 long saves, if you call 1.1 and 1.2 innings "long."  He pitched fewer than 70 innings.  That's right where the guys like Smith and Rivera stayed, year after year.

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Q.  A lot of those saves leaders were in a different era, when pitchers could throw more.

A. No, they weren't.  6 of the top 13 are active, and most of the rest retired very recently.

A. Anyway, even if starting pitchers cruised in the 1970's and therefore could throw more pitches (I dunno), relievers have always been max-effort guys.  Did you ever see Goose Gossage pitch?   The Terminator, Tom Henke?

The Red Sox are trying to win.  IMHO they're probably not using Papelbon enough.  But only the trainer knows for sure.

Bring on the riverdancing :- )

Cheers,

Dr D