Early Draft Closer Strategy
Developing a strategy for drafting closers in 2025 early drafts
There seem to be enough of you early drafters out there to benefit from this kind of content. But this one is largely for myself.
We’re doing draft-and-hold leagues right now, which means you’re stuck with what you draft today for the entire 2025 season. It sounds completely insane to even do a draft like this, but this is 2024 Western civilization. We have way too much material and comfort to not entertain ourselves every single hour of the year. It’s not like we have to be outside tending to the land.
So I’m here to figure out the closer landscape. In a normal league with in-season moves, things change dramatically. There are so many saves to be had on waivers during the course of a season, and that pushes closers way back in the draft, and most of the time it makes sense to let your leaguemates be the aggressors on relievers. But that’s not the case in a roto draft-and-hold. If you end up 10th out of 12 in saves at the end of the year, you’re probably not winning the league.
Let’s start at the top.
Tier 1
I don’t want to be overly granular here, so I’m going to do this in large tiers. We have a clear top 11 closers, but I can probably split it into two parts.
Emmanuel Clase
Josh Hader
Devin Williams
Edwin Diaz
Mason Miller
Ryan Helsley
Felix Bautista
Raisel Iglesias
Jhoan Duran
Andres Munoz
Robert Suarez
These are all undisputed closers, or at least very close to it. I could see those last three (Duran, Munoz, Suarez) losing their job if they struggle early on because of the other great options their teams have. So I’d draw an inner-tier break after #8.
It is foolish to not get one of these 11 names in a draft-and-hold. Don’t be the team that comes out of the draft without one of these (relatively) safe bets.
Tier 2
It’s December as I write this, so there is a ton of uncertainty. Things will get more clear and easier as we move forward, but for now, it’s ugly. I am picking out three names here:
Lucas Erceg
Ryan Walker
Luke Weaver
They’re all on non-awful teams and finished their seasons on very high notes.
Erceg came to the Royals at the deadline and did this:
25 IP, 2.88 ERA, 0.84 WHIP, 32% K%, 3.1% BB%, 31 SO, 3 BB, 0 HR, 11 SV
That’s certainly enough to make the closer at the beginning of next year. There’s a little bit of a question about his abilities, at least in my mind. If we look at 2023-2024, it’s just a 16.5% K-BB% (27% K%, 11% BB%). That’s fine, and the K% came up to 28.5% last season, but he’s not one of these guys who has been dominating hitters for several years.
Walker took over for Doval late in the season and was insanely good. He allowed all of two earned runs in 24.1 innings after July 30th, recording 10 saves along the way. He finished the year with a 32% K% and a 5.8% BB%, keeping his ERA under two across 80 innings. Extremely impressive stuff.
Weaver really showed up in the playoffs and earned himself the first shot at saves in 2025. The Yankees should win their share of games in 2025, even if they do lose Soto. Weaver’s 31% K% across 84 innings is pretty convincing, and he posted a very impressive 0.93 WHIP.
If, for some reason, I can’t get any of the top 11 closers, I’m absolutely prioritizing one of these guys, and I’ll reach as high as I have to to get them. I also like the idea of waiting until the back of tier two and then quickly firing two bullets, adding on one of these guys. Something like a Duran + Walker combo to establish myself.
Paywall time. Below, I go through two more tiers and then talk about speculation picks and the league’s best backups before giving my ideal closer draft strategy. Subscribe today to get the rest of this post and everything else I’m doing here.