We kicked this off with 22 likely "locks" on the Tigers' playoff roster yesterday. (Honestly, I think you could go with 23, but that would cut down on the number of posts I could milk this for so I won't.) This series will continue throughout the week. Today, it continues with a player who was probably a lock the whole time: Ryan Perry
While putting together my list of 22 players who I thought were locks for the post season roster, I ran debated about Daniel Schlereth and Ryan Perry. Honestly, I think both are pretty safe bets to make the roster despite being less than stellar at times. I gave Schlereth a vote of confidence because he's left-handed, and that's going to be pretty important when your likely playofff opponent is Boston. So that left us with Perry up for debate.
The way I see it, there are two positions available in the bullpen for these players to compete for: Perry, Brad Penny, Duane Below, David Pauley and Luis Marte. Penny is doing his best to pitch right out of the conversation. Of the possible right handers, the advantage clearly lies with Perry. That leaves us the question of whether the Tigers will take three left handers and include Below. (Ah, but that's another post.)
But when you look closer at Perry, I'm not sure if you feel a lot of warm fuzzies either. So I guess it made sense that I put him on the bubble.
Reasons to take Perry
- 31% of inherited runners score off him, which might sound bad but is actually fine compared to other Tigers in the pen who are on the bubble.
- 0.3 HR/9 in 2011. Maybe home runs aren't entirely controllable by the pitcher, but I'd rather see a small number than big.
Reasons to leave Perry off the roster
- 5.75 ERA in 2011. 5 walks per nine innings and 6.4 strikeouts this year shows he's not exactly dominating the opposition.
- 5 strikeouts to 3 walks ratio in his past 8 games not exactly stellar. .414 OBP in the past 8 games.
- .762 OPS against by right-handed batters this season doesn't sound real great either, and he's worse against lefthanders.