Detroit Tigers News: The Worst Run Differential in the American League
By Matt Snyder
This edition of Detroit Tigers news notes that the club has the worst run differential in the American League.
The Detroit Tigers enter the weekend in first place in the American League Central and yet they own the worst run differential in the league. The 8-7 Tigers have been outscored by 21 runs — 1.4 runs per game — which puts them in a tie with the 3-12 Toronto Blue Jays at the bottom of the AL.
At the end of the day, the game is about wins and losses, but in order to win you need to consistently score more runs than you allow. Teams with outstanding bullpens seem to have some ability to put up better records than their run differential metrics suggest by being particularly excellent in close games, but that description does not fit the Tigers.
The Tigers are last in the major league in relief pitcher ERA at 6.85. Their bullpen has combined for -0.7 WAR, according to FanGraphs.
Perhaps interestingly, however, the Tigers have a (slightly) better save percentage than MLB average at the moment. They’ve nailed down 64% of their save opportunities while the league average rate is 62%.
What does that mean? Probably not a lot. It might be that the back end of the bullpen is more or less fine. The biggest problem with the bullpen is that they’re thin in the middle with few options to keep them in the game when they’re behind by a run or two and no one to help stem the time if the starter leaves the game early with any sort of deficit.
Those games can get out of hand quickly and end up putting the team deep into the red when it comes to run differential. The Tigers have allowed 10 or more runs in three games this year. In each case the starter failed to complete five innings and the bullpen did nothing to stop the bleeding, allowing 16 runs in 14 innings in those games.
Mostly this means they’re losing a certain percentage of games by a lot when they otherwise would have lost by a little. That can do damage to the run differential line without really affecting the win-loss totals. But it also means their chances of dramatic comeback wins falls dramatically.
Detroit Tigers news from around FanSided
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Next: Detroit Tigers All-Time 25-Man Roster
The Tigers’ bullpen problem really boils down to a lack of depth. They’ve had seven or eight relievers at any time but really Justin Wilson has reliably shut down the opposition. Ausmus can only lean on him so hard before he breaks down from overwork.