Closers: Most Overpaid Profession in the History of Time

What is it you say ya do here? This off-season, closers have been a hot commodity. Whether it was through trade, like Sergio Santos or Huston Street, or through Free Agency, like Jonathan Papelbon or Ryan Madson. My only question is – why? First, let’s take a common sense approach. If you told an economist, accountant, or anyone who works with numbers, that an organization is paying the same salary to someone who has efficiently worked three hours compared to someone who has worked nine hours, they would look at you and laugh. An average “closer” pitches around 65-70 innings. That means they get 210 outs in a season. Given that there are 27 outs in a game and 162 games a year, there are a minimum of 4,374 outs in a season. So if we take 210 and divide it by 4,374 – we get .05%. That’s right. Closers are responsible for 5% of a team’s outs. This is what drives me absolutely crazy about certain General Managers. Jonathan Papelbon had some of t...