Call it the Frankenstein Plan for building a reliever. A failed starter with great curveball spin, perhaps. A waived reliever who might have relied too much on a flat sinker. The analysts will find these guys, and go about the work of reconstructing a modern-day reliever.
Just look at the histories of most of the best bullpen arms in baseball. Josh Hader: a 19th-round pick of the Baltimore Orioles, twice traded. Kirby Yates: undrafted out of college following Tommy John surgery, bounced around four organizations. Nick Anderson: an independent ball alum, after he was a 32nd-round pick.
Rays general manager Erik Neander says that the most valuable commodity that every organization has is opportunity -- innings and plate appearances in the big leagues (and no team has been better in recent years at reliever construction). Last year, Tampa Bay provided analytically driven insight and innings to the likes of Chaz Roe, who was acquired from the Braves for $1, and Oliver Drake, who pitched for so many different teams in 2018 that the Hall of Fame asked him for hats, and the Rays led the majors in bullpen ERA.
The success of the Frankenstein Plan is probably part of the reason, in an offseason flush with free-spending teams, that only three free-agent relievers were signed to a multiyear deal -- the Braves' Will Smith, who got $39 million over three years; and Jake Diekman and Joe Smith, who signed two-year deals.
The next highest: Blake Treinen, who signed a one-year, $10 million deal with the Dodgers ... who plan to try to resurrect his performance. He and Edwin Diaz were arguably the two best relievers in 2018, and in 2019 they struggled.
So while the list of top-10 starting pitchers is generally consistent from year to year, there is volatility here -- and perhaps never more than now, with the strange, sporadic preparation that all relievers have had in 2020.
The rankings are built with the input from folks all over the industry.
1. Josh Hader, Milwaukee Brewers
Unpredictable relief performance is probably why the Brewers have been willing to take offers on Hader, who is the best bullpen weapon in the majors despite some problems with the long ball last season. In 2019, Hader generated the highest rate of swings and misses, compiling 138 strikeouts in 75⅔ innings. By a margin of a full strikeout, he had more strikeouts per nine innings (16.41) than any pitcher in the majors. Hitters had a contact rate on pitches in the strike zone of 65.3%, by far the lowest in the majors.
Hader will be second-time eligible for arbitration next winter, meaning not only is he great, he's also cheap. But relievers are like the best NFL running backs: At their best, they can have enormous impact and you really can't win without good ones -- but they aren't at their best for very long.
2. Kirby Yates, San Diego Padres
He is 33 and, typically, when closers are that age and pitching for a struggling team, the club will look to cash in on value. But Yates has been so good for the Padres they have come to see him as an important element in the climb they'll try to make this summer.
Yates bounced around from team to team, from the Rays to the Yankees to the Angels, before he reached the Padres, and everything clicked for him in the second half of 2017. In 179⅓ innings with San Diego, he has an incredible 278 strikeouts. His adjusted ERA+ for 2019 was an unbelievable 358, higher than all but one of Mariano Rivera's seasons in the majors.
3. Aroldis Chapman, New York Yankees
He has built such a long history of relief excellence he's become an outlier. Over 10 years in the majors, he has 550 appearances, 273 saves in the regular season and 14.8 strikeouts per nine innings. Chapman doesn't register three digits on the radar gun as he did in his first eight or nine years, but he has learned to use his slider more effectively and still overpower hitters -- he had 85 strikeouts in 57 innings last season, allowing only three homers.
4. Nick Anderson, Tampa Bay Rays
The Rays almost never pay sticker price for anything, but they deviated from their usual course of action by spending a chunk of resources with rates at their highest when they made their midseason acquisition of Anderson from the Marlins last summer. This should tell you just how good Anderson is.
Anderson was a 32nd-round pick of the Brewers in 2011, bounced around independent ball before developing a killer curveball. He was good for the Marlins in the first half of the season, enough to be a trade target, but he was even better with some help from the Rays' staff: He struck out more than half of the batters he faced for Tampa Bay last year, 41 of 78 -- and he issued only two walks.
5. Liam Hendriks, Oakland A's
He basically ditched his sinker, focused on four-seamers and sliders, and voila, he evolved from a good reliever into one of baseball's best. With his fastball velocity spiking from 94.4 mph to 96.5 and his slider dangerously effective, Hendriks increased his strikeouts from 8.25 per nine innings in 2018 to 13.13 last season. Perth's finest became a closer and an All-Star.
6. Ken Giles, Toronto Blue Jays
If he had been healthy throughout last season, the Jays would've fetched a pretty good return for Giles. But now that Toronto is trying to climb the AL East standings, with newly signed Hyun-Jin Ryu and Tanner Roark at the front of the rotation, manager Charlie Montoyo will have the luxury of one of the game's most established and best closers. Last year, his fastball hit 100 mph again, setting up a tight slider that was responsible for a lot of his production. He's 29, and eligible for free agency after this season, so unless the Blue Jays really shock the world and contend for a playoff spot, Giles could be a sell-high candidate for a trade before the Aug. 31 deadline.
7. Ryan Pressly, Houston Astros
The Astros' right-hander had the highest rate of swings outside the zone, which speaks to the quality of his stuff, and few pitchers had a lower rate of contact when throwing the ball in the zone. He had a 1.36 ERA at the All-Star break and deservedly made the American League team.
8. Zack Britton, New York Yankees
His command is not always perfect, but the bottom line is Britton gives opponents almost nothing to hit, with his sinker usually diving hard underneath swings. Last year, hitters batted only .182 against him, with a woeful .254 slugging percentage.
9. Seth Lugo, New York Mets
Lugo has made no secret of the fact that he prefers to start, but the Mets continue to round out their rotation with other guys largely because Lugo is so valuable in what has been a beleaguered bullpen. Only Hendriks, Yates and Hader produced more fWAR among relievers than Lugo, and only Hader and the Braves' Luke Jackson had more strikeouts than Lugo among NL relievers.
10. Will Smith, Atlanta Braves
The Braves jumped on the former Giant quickly this offseason, and with good reason. His slider generated the most value of any lefty reliever's slider in 2019, and adding his experience in the Atlanta bullpen should settle the Braves' late-inning situations. ESPN's win probability formula pegged Smith as the top pitcher of the 2019 season -- among starters and relievers -- generating 5.5 WPA.
Best of the rest
Brandon Workman, Boston Red Sox: Because the Red Sox were generally a disappointment last year, failing to reach the playoffs after winning the 2018 World Series, some individual development didn't get a lot of attention -- and first and foremost was that of Workman, who threw curveball after curveball after curveball and was promoted into the role of closer. In Workman's last 26 appearances of 2019, he held opponents to a .165 slugging percentage -- think about that for a moment -- while whiffing 40 in 26 innings.
Diego Castillo, Tampa Bay Rays: A day after the Astros survived their division series with Tampa Bay, Houston's George Springer raved about the quality of the Rays' bullpen, how well Kevin Cash ran it. His greatest praise was for Castillo, a right-hander with an explosive fastball, and he mentioned how relieved the Astros were when Castillo departed Game 5 and could no longer be a weapon. His overall numbers are solid, but don't really reflect the quality of the pure stuff he showed at year's end.
Emilio Pagan, Tampa Bay Rays: A typical Tampa Bay reliever -- in 70 innings, he struck out 96, and became the Rays' closer, collecting 20 saves.
Tommy Kahnle, New York Yankees: The new three-batter rule would have zero effect on him because of his superb changeup -- right-handed batters hit .191 against the right-hander last year, and left-handers hit .209.
Edwin Diaz, New York Mets: Unless he truly is unnerved pitching in New York, Diaz would be the most obvious bounce-back candidate in the big leagues, because the analytics underneath his rough performance were still really good. Only four pitchers mustered a better swing-and-miss rate. His problems of last year obscured just how incredible he was for the Mariners -- but not so much that the Mets were moved to dump him. New manager Luis Rojas has spoken enthusiastically about what he sees in Diaz, and for good reason.
Giovanny Gallegos, St. Louis Cardinals: Gallegos was a little-known piece in the Cardinals' Luke Voit trade, and last season his results for manager Mike Shildt were outstanding -- just 44 hits allowed in 74 innings. In a three-month span from May 14 to Aug. 16, he allowed only 17 hits in 41 innings, with an 0.88 ERA and an opponents' average of .125. And as Paul Hembekides notes, Gallegos inherited 44 baserunners and allowed only seven of them to score. He fought fires all season.
Taylor Rogers, Minnesota Twins: Rogers issued only 11 walks and struck out 90 in 60 appearances, and in his first significant run as a closer, he helped the Twins win the AL Central.
Daniel Hudson, Washington Nationals: The classic journey of a reliever in 2019 -- he was signed and released by the Angels in spring training; signed by the Blue Jays, and then traded; and then he threw the last pitch of the 2019 World Series, a vicious slider under the bat of Michael Brantley.