Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate,
I am the captain of my soul.— “Invictus“, William Ernest Henley
Most middle relievers burn out; few of them last long enough to fade away. As wonderful as their careers were, for so many, the end comes inevitably and as unremarked as the guttering of a candle at the end of the evening. The seventh-inning man is both necessary and fungible, a needed bridge to the back of the bullpen and as inherently replaceable as any player on the club. No fourth outfielder could inspire half as much angst.
The Tolstoyan transactions page for Jesse Chavez barely tells half the tale. Many news reports have referred to him as perhaps the most-traded player in baseball history, and we played a major part in that, as we twice traded for him and twice traded him away; we also signed him as a free agent six times (including thrice this season).
But being called the most-traded player is to praise with a faint damn. So many teams wanted him; just as many teams wanted someone else. I’d prefer to focus more on his longevity and less on his peripatetics. Since the year 2000, only four relievers have twirled 1000 innings: Joaquin Benoit, Darren Oliver, Braden Looper, and Jesse Chavez.
And that’s a recent phenomenon. If you spin the dial back a decade, 18 relievers managed 1000 innings between 1990 and 2015. The pitcher attrition epidemic has reached near-apocalyptic proportions, and Jesse Chavez is one of the last survivors.
And… how the hell’d he do it, anyway? It sure wasn’t with velocity! He was something of a power pitcher in his early days. But, frankly, he didn’t become an effective pitcher until his gas began to evaporate. Mac hated him when we first got him in 2010:
Proof that the Braves think even less of spring training stats than I do, as even I take notice when a guy puts up a 14 ERA (15 RA) and walks six versus four strikeouts in nine innings of exhibition work… the Braves’ line was that they liked Chavez a lot when they traded for him and that he was being judged on his prior performance and their scouting and not what he did in the peculiar circumstances of spring training. In theory, I understand and approve of this. In reality, I have to wonder what they see in Chavez, as there’s nothing in his major league stats or in what I’ve actually seen him do on the mound, and little in his minor league stats, to make me think he’s any good. Ultimately, it looks like the Braves are letting the radar gun make their call here.
A bit like Charlie Morton, another former Pirate, he didn’t really find himself as a major leaguer until near his 30th birthday, when he landed in Oakland, who put him in the starting rotation and for whom he incredibly transformed into a league-average starter for a couple years, with an ERA+ of 99.
His first really effective work in the majors came in 2018, his eleventh season, when he was 34 years of age, after he had re-signed with the Rangers, who had originally drafted him. They put him back in the bullpen to stay and he rewarded them by pitching so well that they traded him to the Cubs at the deadline, and he rewarded the Cubs by allowing a minuscule five earned runs in 39 innings down the stretch on their way to a 95-win season and a Wild Card berth.
He threw 95 1/3 innings that year, exclusively out of the pen, and that’s another thing that hardly happens any more. It’s one of only five seasons since 2015 in which a reliever threw at least 90 innings out of the pen. (The others: Ryan Yarbrough last year with the Dodgers and Rays, Derek Law last year with the Nats, Sam Gaviglio in 2019 with the Jays, and Yusmeiro Petit in 2018 with the A’s.)
Chavez never had another year that good; in fact, in 2019 and 2020 he was scarcely adequate, and the Rangers let him go in the offseason, whereupon the Angels picked him up for a month, and when they let him go, we picked him up. He was much different than the fireballing Pirate of a decade previous. At this point, Jesse Chavez was 37, with 933 major league innings under his belt, on his ninth different team.
But somehow, it clicked. As I wrote in Januuary:
Since his debut with the Pirates in 2008, he has thrown 1134 innings across parts of 17 seasons with nine different teams. And here’s how his results break down:
Atlanta Braves: 186 G (6 GS), 221.1 IP, 3.09 ERA, 3.52 FIP, 3.2 K/BB, 3.7 WAR
All other teams: 467 G (79 GS), 912.2 IP, 4.52 ERA, 4.37 FIP, 2.8 K/BB, 3.2 WARWith them, he’s just another guy. With us, he’s a valuable middle reliever.
A year ago, he hinted that he might retire after the season. He hasn’t said anything publicly since then that I’m aware of, but it wouldn’t be a shock to any of us if he followed through on that. It would be a fine year to go out on, and he’s been one of the most fun players I’ve ever rooted for.
Jesse Chavez is the kind of player — a 98 career ERA+, a 51-66 career record with nine total saves — who doesn’t typically receive a valedictory upon retirement. He wasn’t ever, at any point in his career, a leaguewide star. He was a glue guy, and those guys are typically appreciated more than they’re adored. But Jesse was more than that: as he aged into local stardom, he became a kind of mascot. One man’s waiver claim is another man’s treasure. The guy who isn’t good anywhere else who’s great for us. There’s something inspiring about that!
He happens to be retiring during the middle of the most depressing summer in Atlanta since 2008, but he’d be coming in for the same level of appreciation even if we were in the middle of a nailbiting pennant campaign. O’Ventbrel were three of the most memorable Braves on our teams a decade ago; for better and worse, Jesse Chavez is one of the faces of this particular team. We may not want to remember much about this year, but we will always fondly remember him.
And, other than when he got hit with that comebacker a few years ago, he was durable and ready to take the ball.
Durability, as we have learned around here the last couple of years, is a valuable asset.
Hail Jesse… always a damn-good Brave
Whenever I play Immacuate Grid and I can’t think of a player who played for both Team A and Team B I use Edwin Jackson on the grounds that he played for 14 franchises, so I have about a 25% chance of being right for any two teams at random. The thing about Jesse is that he was as peripatetic as Jackson, but he “only” played for 9 different franchises. So unlike Jackson, who anyone would take a flier on, he was an acquired taste.
I’m not quite the Chavez fan you are, Alex. Even granting the absolute necessity to find guys like Chavez on any team, the fact that whenever you used them you were nervous (or had already given up) detracts from their appeal. When I think of thse sort of guy every team needs but will never amount to a star I think of guys like Matt Diaz, another guy who sucked for everybody but us. You were actually optimistic when he came to the plate.
That said, Jesse did achieve a measure of folk-hero status, well deserved.
Yeah, Jonathan, I would say he was a folk hero. And for a guy that could have been easily forgotten based on, to your point, an easily forgotten career, I think folk-hero status is the pinnacle of his legacy.
For some reason I’m thinking the betting line doesn’t favor an Atlanta win tonight. Maybe it has some kind of connection to Eovaldi vs Wentz
You say that but the game will be decided by the bullpens.
Recapped