Minnesota Twins Results Since Joe Nathan Injury Shows Closers Overrated

So far, so good.

Without the great Joe Nathan, the Minnesota Twins are off to a good start and his replacement, Jon Rauch, is four-for-four in save situations.

Now, granted, the sample size is very small and there's a heck of a lot of baseball yet to be played.

Meanwhile, I wasn't being pithy when I said the "great" Joe Nathan—he truly is one of the best closers in the game, no doubt.

But to say that when a team's closer goes down, as Nathan did before the season, the team is lost is just giving far too much credit to the man who pitches the ninth inning in a close game.

Look, I understand that not every pitcher can handle the pressure of the ninth inning.

I recall, for example, former Twin Le Troy Hawkins being forced into the closer role in Chicago a few years back and the fans ran him out of town.

This was a guy who had been and still is, a decent set-up man. Yet in his career, Hawkins has blown more than 50 percent of his save opportunities.   

Even so, the value of the save is diluted and overrated, in my opinion.

Sure, a guy who consistently gets the job done like Nathan is rare. But really, is the save statistic that impressive?

While the rules have changed over the years, a "save" is recorded by a pitcher who meets the following criteria:

• He finishes the game for the winning team

• He is not the winning pitcher

• He records at least one out

And, he satisfies one of the following conditions:

1. He enters the game with a lead of no more than three runs and pitches for at least one inning
2. He enters the game, regardless of the count, with the potential tying run either on base, at bat, or on deck
3. He pitches for at least three innings

Those are some fairly lenient rules. And while Rauch's results may not last all season, there is plenty of evidence over the years showing guys have come out of nowhere to record effective seasons as closers.

Maybe they don't reproduce those results over time, but for one season, a closer can be replaced.

In a study by Dave Smith of Retrosheet, where he researched late-inning leads over 73 seasons, from 1944 to 2003 and an additional 14 seasons prior to that span, Smith  found is that the winning percentage for teams who enter the ninth inning with a lead has remained virtually unchanged over the decades.

Regardless of the pitching strategy, teams entering the ninth inning with a lead win roughly 95 percent of the time.

That was the exact rate in 1901 and that was the rate 100 seasons later. In fact, the rate has varied merely from a high of 96.7 percent in 1909 to a low of 92.5 percent in 1941.

So why do managers go to their closer? Besides the obvious salary implications, consider what Oakland A's GM Billy Beane has to say:

"I'll tell you why, it's the same reason more football coaches don't go for it on fourth-and-1. Because when it doesn't work, 30 of you guys come storming in wondering why the manager didn't go to the closer."

"It's turned into a situation where a lot of emotion is tied to that decision, just as a lot of emotion is tied to the fourth-down decision. Even if you know the odds, it's more comfortable being wrong when you go to the closer or the punter."

If you ever take the time to review closers who have saved at least 20 games, you will find a lot of bad pitchers. For every Mariano Rivera you will find a Kevin Gregg, Heathcliff Slocumb and Brandon Lyon.

This is a good sign for the Twins, to be sure.

And a good reason not to mortgage the farm for an overpriced closer.