The Royals' bullpen ERA was 4.08 in the first half, 8th best in the American League, and just a tick worse than the league average of 4.00.
The days, however brief they were, of the Royals having a competent bullpen that strikes people out, appear to be over. 2007 and 2008 were fun, but they are gone now. Like last year, the bullpen doesn't strike many guys out (6.82 K/9, 10th in the AL) and other than Soria just hasn't been, on the whole, very reliable. On the other hand, the bullpen improved when Tejeda turned his season around and the Farnsworth implosion never came.
Gigantic chart after the jump:
Behold:
| ERA | G | IP | R | H/9 | HR/9 | BB/9 | SO/9 | SO/BB | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Joakim Soria | 2.31 | 35 | 35.0 | 9 | 8.0 | 1.0 | 2.3 | 11.1 | 4.78 |
| Rob Tejeda | 3.35 | 35 | 40.1 | 16 | 7.1 | 0.2 | 4.9 | 8.5 | 1.73 |
| Kyle Farnsworth | 2.41 | 30 | 37.1 | 10 | 7.7 | 0.5 | 2.4 | 7.2 | 3.00 |
| Dusty Hughes* | 3.99 | 34 | 29.1 | 15 | 9.8 | 0.9 | 3.7 | 5.5 | 1.50 |
| Blake Wood | 3.96 | 25 | 25.0 | 11 | 8.6 | 0.7 | 3.6 | 2.9 | 0.80 |
| ERA | G | IP | R | H/9 | HR/9 | BB/9 | SO/9 | SO/BB | |
| Victor Marte | 5.56 | 16 | 22.2 | 14 | 7.9 | 2.4 | 4.0 | 5.2 | 1.30 |
| Brad Thompson | 6.41 | 16 | 19.2 | 16 | 11.4 | 1.8 | 1.8 | 4.6 | 2.50 |
| Kanekoa Texeira | 2.00 | 11 | 18.0 | 4 | 9.0 | 0.5 | 2.0 | 5.0 | 2.50 |
| Josh Rupe | 5.59 | 11 | 9.2 | 6 | 13.0 | 0.9 | 6.5 | 7.4 | 1.14 |
| John Parrish* | 3.00 | 9 | 6.0 | 2 | 6.0 | 3.0 | 7.5 | 6.0 | 0.80 |
| Juan Cruz | 3.38 | 5 | 5.1 | 2 | 15.2 | 0.0 | 6.8 | 11.8 | 1.75 |
| Luis Mendoza | 22.50 | 4 | 4.0 | 10 | 22.5 | 9.0 | 6.8 | 2.3 | 0.33 |
| Bryan Bullington | 12.00 | 3 | 3.0 | 4 | 21.0 | 3.0 | 15.0 | 6.0 | 0.40 |
| Roman Colon | 18.00 | 5 | 2.0 | 4 | 22.5 | 0.0 | 9.0 | 4.5 | 0.50 |
| ERA | G | IP | R | H/9 | HR/9 | BB/9 | SO/9 | SO/BB |
Are we all building our bomb shelters in preparation for Blake Wood's luck running out?
The important thing to remember about some of these bullpen guys is that the innings pitched totals are just so low. The bottom of that table, everyone from Marte down, pitched just 88 innings total in the first half. In that vein, seeing Soria with just 35 innings pitched makes me sad. It'll be interesting to see if he can match last season's total of 53.