Brandon Pfaadt Impressive in Spring Debut
Brandon Pfaadt was feeling a bit nervous before today's game. It was his first game with the big league team and his adrenaline was running a little high. He said he was "a little antsy in the first inning, but once the second inning came in the defense made a few plays for me and I kind of settled in."
That was an apt synopsis of his outing. He fell behind 2-0 to Nico Hoerner before getting back in the count. Horner flew out to the track on a deep fly to left. Dansby Swanson drew a walk, but Pfaadt induce Eric Hosmer to hit into a 4-6-3 double play started by Ketel Marte.
In the second inning David Bote lead off with a single, but was gunned down trying to steal second thanks to a perfect throw from Carson Kelly. After that Pfaadt recorded two strikeouts, both swinging to end the inning and his outing.
Pfaadt threw 23 pitches, just 13 for strikes, yet he seemed in command. He averaged 94 on his fastball, topping out at 96. He showed very good movement and his spin rates on his fastball, slider, and curve were very high.
Brandon Pfaadt Fastball/Slider/Curveball Spin Rates
The MLB averages for fastballs are 2276, sliders, 2,430, and curveballs 2,517. Spin correlates to movement and his pitches have sharper than usual break and that combination of break, command and 94-95 fastball velocity allows him to get a lot of swing and miss. Last year he led all minor leaguers with 218 strikeouts.
For today though he said it was all about having fun and enjoying the opportunity to compete against major league quality competition. Asked if he pays attention to the various tracking metrics he said "not as much as probably the normal here. I'm not an analytical guy. I just go out there and try to pitch and try to get better every day."
Pfaadt is in contention for the 5th starters spot in the rotation but he's not focused on that. "I just tell myself to control what I can control and go out there and pitch the best I can, whatever happens happens, we'll see at the end of spring training"
Torey Luvollo was impressed and said "he can throw any pitch at any time and have any mixture of pitches and land them. That's what I read about him and that's what I saw today."
The rest of the pitching staff was nearly perfect today. Joe Mantiply, Scott McGough, Corbin Martin, and Justin Martinez each pitched a scoreless inning and Bryce Jarvis had two scoreless frames. Martinez was particularly impressive, logging four fastballs over 100 MPH, and two others at 99. Jarvis, who is also having a good camp, topped out at 97 and Martin was at 96. The relievers combined to throw 7 innings and gave up just one hit and one walk while striking out five. The quest to add power to the bullpen seems to be taking shape.
The Cubs pitching staff held the D-backs scoreless for eight innings. But after two runners reached base in the 9th inning, Emmanuel Rivera got a slider up and hit a no doubter home run to deep left, scoring the only runs of the game. He said he was just trying to put the ball in play, but he put it beyond reach as it traveled 421 feet more than half way up the left field bern.
The defense was on point today. Other than Kelly's strike down to second base a few other plays stood out. Ketel Marte ranged to the shortstop side of the bag and threw across his body to nab the speedy Nico Hoerner. Christian Walker made a fabulous scoop on throw in the dirt from Josh Rojas who was on the run coming up the line. Dominic Canzone had a nice sliding catch on a ball in front of him.
Thanks to the pitch clock the game took just 2:04 to complete. There was a strange situation in the third inning when Joe Mantiply came in to pitch. Due to Carson Kelly being a tad late getting out to catch, Mantiply went over the time limit to complete his warmups. The batter in turn stepped in the box late. Mantiply was penalized a ball and the batter a strike before the pitch was even thrown. You can listen Lovullo's post game comments below. Be sure to check out the manager's detailed explanation of what happened, and Pfaadts post game comments as well.
