TAMPA — Joe Maddon — a reporter’s dream — is game for just about anything in an interview, so I quizzed him whether he could name the seven different relievers who led the Rays in saves in his eight seasons as manager.
He breezed through Fernando Rodney, Rafael Soriano and J.P. Howell, thought a bit and found Kyle Farnsworth and Troy Percival. He then hesitated, looked to the sky and offered Brian Meadows and, nope, Meadows did not lead Tampa in saves in his one season with the organization, 2006, Maddon’s first year on the job.
Told he was missing 2006-07 and — conjuring the bad old days for the franchise — Maddon wondered, “Did we even have saves then?” Finally, he surrendered, and I told him Tyler Walker (remember him, Mets fans?) had led the still “Devil” Rays in 2006, Alberto Reyes in 2007.
This was not designed to make Maddon stroll down memory lane — though he seemed to enjoy it — nor to see if he could win a 2014 Chevy Impala in a bizarre new game show taking place only in my imagination. It was a launch point to talk to the manager of the team that changes closers most — yet stays successful — because you might have heard the Yankees are changing closers this season.
The Rays have won the second-most games in the majors the past six years, trailing just the Yankees, and yet have had five different relievers lead them in saves; only Rodney did twice. Now Grant Balfour succeeds Rodney and Vegas still has Tampa as favorites to win the majors’ toughest division.
Yet, Maddon said, “I don’t think it is easy to find someone who can do it. It might appear easy from the outside, but it is not.”
This is one of the enduring arguments in the game now: The ninth inning comes with a different stress/responsibility level, thus, not just anyone can do it; versus getting three outs before giving up a run or two or three is not nearly that difficult and so most with a good arm given an opportunity will do just fine. The truth is somewhere in between: More can do it than initially thought, but not just anyone can do it.
What is just about universal is no one could do it like Mariano Rivera. Maddon emphasized finer points the Yankees enjoyed with Rivera, notably the ability to set roles elsewhere in the pen because “they had an anchor in the ninth” and how “the sense of confidence he delivered within the group was unique.”
But what was distinct about Rivera was his consistency of brilliance in a role Maddon described as having “high volatility.” Rivera was Bobby Thigpen or Eric Gagne every year for 18 seasons. David Robertson’s chances of being that for the Yankees are about the same as Adam Warren winning the Cy Young. Rivera is irreplaceable in his brew of genius, postseason brilliance and ability to imbue confidence in a whole room for an extended period.
However, as we already saw with Soriano in 2012 — when Rivera went down in early May with a season-ending knee injury — he can be replaced well for a season. The Yankees made the playoffs in 2012 and Soriano was a reason why. Sure, the Yankees would love Robertson to be a long-term solution. But that is for the big picture, particularly because the righty can be a free agent after the season.
The ultimate now team invested half-a-billion dollars in free agency during the offseason and so they need Robertson to be a 2014 solution in the wake of Rivera’s retirement. Yes, the Red Sox and Cardinals turned to Koji Uehara and Trevor Rosenthal as no better than third choices last season and played in the World Series. So maybe the Yankees can do the same, but the road to The Canyon of Heroes is so much simpler if Robertson can handle all that comes with the ninth rather than the Yankees having to replace the man who was to replace Rivera.
“I think [Robertson] is outstanding,” Maddon said. “He has a combo of pitches with his cutter and curve and his pitches really explode through the strike zone. He gets righties and lefties out, so there are no platoon advantages against him [like Rivera, his cutter makes him particularly effective versus lefties].”
But Maddon — like Yankees pitching coach Larry Rothschild — accentuated the inner stuff for determining who can and can’t handle the role — the ability to remain calm as the stress level of the game rises.
“I think [Robertson] is going to be highly successful, no doubt in my mind,” Maddon said. “But the last hurdle is not how he will handle that success, but failure. That is the vital test, bouncing back after blowing two or three in a row.”
The tests are coming. Can David replace Goliath?