It's not easy being Green

Closer has been more good than bad, but warning signs are there

- GREGOR CHISHOLM

Throughout most of this season, veteran Chad Green had been one of the only consistently reliable relievers in the Blue Jays bullpen.

Aside from a six-week stint on the injured list, Green has performed exactly as advertised. He was effective and efficient in a setup role, then just as successful at closer after Jordan Romano went down with an elbow injury.

Chad Green has been charged with seven runs in his last 2 2⁄3 innings, giving up two homers and blowing three saves.

There were, however, warning signs throughout much of that run. Among 16 saves, Green would often get away with a deep fly ball or two that fell just short of the wall. There were several home runs that weren’t consequential enough to cost the Jays a win.

At the end of August, Green owned a 1.61 ERA and had yet to blow a save chance. Finding fault with those results would been nitpicky and yet his fielding independent pitching — a metric that is similar to ERA but focuses on things the pitcher has control over, such as strikeouts, walks and home runs — was 4.45.

There was also the issue of opponents’ average exit velocity, where Green ranked in MLB’s first percentile. His hard-hit ball percentage of 48 ranked in the second percentile. Few pitchers were consistently giving up as much solid contact as Green, and it figured to be only a matter of time before his luck changed.