The only major league pitcher to make 90 appearances in a season is Mike Marshall, who did it twice: 92 in 1973 and 106 in 1974.
Replicating Marshall’s workload share in the pro game might be about impossible – it would certainly be pushing into uncharted territory this century. But given the number of off days during a college season, those additional periods of rest mean top relief pitchers ought to be able to appear in a greater share of games, and absorb a greater share of innings.
Josh Hejka is a Driveline researcher and a minor league pitcher in the Rangers organization. As a former pitcher at Johns Hopkins, he believes the beauty of optimizing bullpens is it would help most schools at the college level – not just the elites.
Ideally, Hejka said a high-leverage reliever ought to be utilized more frequently and not pigeonholed into a set role, such as only pitching the ninth inning in a safe situation. This would allow for more appearances, and a greater share of high-leverage performance.
While Berg appeared in 77% of games during UCLA’s 2013 season, typically a high-end Division I reliever appears in 35-50% of games, according to a ChatGPT analysis of Division I stats.
“I do think the best reliever probably should be utilized more in a way like the Andrew Miller prototype rather than the closer prototype,” Hejka said.
It should be possible for a top fireman, pitching in shorter-duration outings, to appear at least three times a week in games. That would push appearances up to a Berg-like range.
But there’s a need for a second relief ace archetype, one who can take on a greater volume of innings per appearance.
Hejka, also a submarine-style arm, also pitched a high volume of innings for Johns Hopkins. He pitched in a regular, high-volume role. He once tossed 150 pitches in a Division III College World Series game in 2019, and recorded a save two games after that appearance.
“I would come in during the fifth inning and finish the game, if it was a close game,” Hejka said. “I think there’s room to use your best relievers in that way because of the built-in rest time. You can throw them for more innings.
“Maybe there’s room for a shorter-appearance guy that can pitch every single day, every Friday, Saturday, and even Sunday if he needs to. Two innings max in an outing. And then you have a guy that can come into a game on a Saturday and pitch the fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth and ninth, and then be good again on Tuesday to go three or four more. That’s really, really powerful. It’s basically guaranteeing you a win in a close game.
“You’re maximizing the value of that arm.”
Consider that most Division I teams allocate about 40-50% of innings to their weekend starting pitchers. The secondary starters pitching midweek games and/or covering for injury will account for another 15-20% of innings. Let’s call it 60% of innings allotted to starting pitchers.
That leaves 40% of innings to be picked up by relievers, but too often those innings are not allocated in an optimal manner.
Driveline’s Max Engelbrekt is a former Oregon State pitcher, who also believes many programs are far from employing optimized staffs.
Instead of so much fragmentation within the remaining 40% of innings, Engelbrekt said if a team could concentrate half of that into its best relief arms, it would enjoy a great advantage. While there’s often talk about a shortage of arms in the pro game, college staffs are stretched to a much greater, relative degree.
“The level of depth on MLB teams is much narrower in talent density than with top-end starters in college,” Engelbrekt said. “So it just becomes that much more important to make sure you’re throwing your leverage arms as much as they effectively can.”
Building a pair of ace relievers requires greater but different workloads. But it is possible with proper planning and training to build such arms. And with PULSE and workload units we can do just that – college baseball doesn’t have to be searching in the dark.