We’re Still Looking For The New Goose Gossage

We’ve spent this season using a new statistic, the goose egg, in search of old-school relief pitchers. Specifically, we’ve been looking for pitchers that replicate some of the success of Hall of Famer Goose Gossage, for whom the goose egg is named. The “firemen” of Gossage’s day didn’t care as much about recording saves. Instead, they pitched in as many high-leverage situations as they could get their hands on: for instance, in tied games, or in the seventh or eighth innings when the situation demanded it. Pitchers like these provided a lot more value to their teams than modern closers who are often used exclusively in save situations. (The goose egg credits pitchers for clutch, scoreless relief innings, whether or not they’re save situations.)

From the standpoint of overall bullpen usage patterns, there have been signs of progress around baseball. Major-league teams are placing less emphasis on the save and instead using their best relief pitchers in smarter ways.

But no individual pitchers have come close to replicating the workload and value of Gossage, who accumulated a record 82 goose eggs — in 141.2 innings pitched — in 1975. In fact, no pitcher has yet earned even 40 goose eggs so far this season.

The major-league leaders are the Dodgers’ Kenley Jansen and the Brewers’ Corey Knebel, who each had 38 goose eggs through Thursday night. Seattle’s Edwin Diaz leads the American League with 33 goose eggs, having helped lead the Mariners to a 25-13 record in one-run games.

Knebel has had an outstanding season by any measure, but it’s been a fairly conventional one. The Brewers have dabbled with using him in Gossage-like situations — he’s made seven multi-inning appearances, for instance — but haven’t done so all that consistently.

The Dodgers have gone a little further down the goose-feathered road with Jansen, who has 12 multi-inning appearances. The team has also avoided using Jansen with leads of three runs or more, which are usually a waste of an elite reliever’s talents. (A three-run lead is a save situation but not a goose situation.) And Jansen has been remarkably efficient, having converted all 38 of his goose opportunities. Still, Jansen is on pace for only 70 innings — typical for a modern closer, but only about half as many as Gossage threw at his peak.

And some pitchers who were handling heavier workloads earlier in the season have seen their teams let up on the gas pedal — or have gotten themselves hurt. An early goose-egg favorite, the Astros’ Chris Devenski, has settled into a more conventional usage pattern as the season has worn on instead of routinely pitching two or more innings at a time. The Indians’ Andrew Miller has been on the DL twice in the past month.

So the opportunity to see a truly Gossage-like season won’t happen for at least one more year. In the meantime, you can find complete goose stats for all pitchers this year in the table below.