What a weird season Fernando Rodney is having.. and all of the fans by association. Early in the season, I found myself imagining a much better team without Rodney as closer. Then from May 31st through July 1st I watched, astonished, as he pitched 10.2 hit-less innings with 16 strikeouts and only 4 walks. Rodney has pitched a total of 50 innings this season, 35 of which he has completed without allowing a hit. That is 70% of his outings that have been hit-less. That’s better than Knebel (47%), Jansen (55%), and Kimbrel (56%).
That sounds dominant so why does Rodney have one of the worst ERAs of all “closers” - only three other players with at least 10 saves have a worse ERA.