Clay Holmes is a Good Closer

by EJ Fagan

August 7, 2024

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NOTE: The following comes from EJ Fagan's substack page and is shared with permission. This was published a few days ago so the stats don't include the last few games.

Please check out EJ's substack page for more great articles.

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I see a lot of discontent out there about Clay Holmes. That’s understandable: Holmes has a 4.43 ERA since June 1st, losing the tie or lead in 6 of 20 appearances during that time.

But I think that’s wrong. Holmes has been mostly fine during this time and is the victim of bad luck.

We’ve seen Bad Holmes before. He has gone through long stretches where he can’t throw a strike. Batters just take the sinker, forcing him to either throw a meatball or walk everyone. But that’s not the Holmes we’ve seen in June and July; he has walked 2.2 batters per 9 innings during that time.

Instead, we’ve seen Holmes allow a lot of ground ball hits. They’ve come in big enough bunches, along with a few real hard hit balls, that a bunch of runners have scored. A lot of smart Yankee fans are defining the problem as Clay Holmes not really being very good, because you need to strike out a lot of batters to be good. A pitcher like Holmes, they argue, is just going to allow runs.

I think that argument is misguided. It’s true: Holmes is going to put balls in play more than most closers, and it’s better to strike batters out. His blown saves will mostly be of the thousand cuts variety, instead of allowing a handful of damaging extra base hits.

But, we don’t need to have this argument in the abstract. We have statistics! Statcast’s xERA is the perfect tool to understand the uncertainty in Holmes’ batted ball outcomes. And Statcast thinks that he’s great!

Holmes has the best ground ball rate in the league, an average strikeout rate, and good control. That all adds up to a 2.82 xERA, good for the league’s 91st percentile. He’s the 16th best relief pitcher in baseball with more than 40 innings pitched by xERA. Only seven closers are better. If we go by fWAR, he’s 11th best among all relief pitchers and 4th best among closers.

Let’s compare Holmes to the other AL playoff closers:

• Baltimore: Craig Kimbrel, 3.53 xERA

• Boston: Kenley Jansen, 3.47 xERA

• Seattle: Andres Munoz, 2.77 xERA

• Cleveland: Emmanuel Clase, 2.61 xERA

• Houston: Josh Hader, 2.84 xERA

• Minnesota: Jhoan Duran, 3.16 xERA

• Kansas City: Lucas Erceg, 3.71 xERA

Holmes is right up there with the best in the league. Would I love to have Mason Miller, Jeff Hoffman or Emmanuel Clase? Of course! But having Holmes is a big advantage for the Yankees. It’s going to be real tough to replace him when earns a big fat contract in free agency.