Suddenly, Sean Burke has gone from the White Sox starter who most actively had to fight to retain his rotation spot this spring, to the guy who needs to make a stabilizing start to steady the emotions of a team that might have turned in the worst performance out of all 30 MLB clubs on Opening Day.
At least as the Sox were walking off the field from batting practice on Thursday, he seemed in the right headspace for it.
"Last year going into the season, I felt pretty good, but I didn't feel as comfortable throwing everything in the zone as I do right now, and I think that gives you a more versatile attack," Burke said. "We talked so much throughout the offseason and spring training with [pitching coaches Zach] Bove and Bobby [Hearn] about my attack plan to righties and lefties and how to dial that in and what my different options are. The trust in that takes the guesswork out of it, and the feeling of I've got to get this pitch here. I just trust my stuff and feel good with my delivery where everything is on time, and it's just the last second little adjustments with your hand and your sight to get the ball where you want to go."
On the surface, Burke's spring didn't reveal some dramatic changing of the guard. He got middle of the road results (4.58 ERA in 17 ⅔ IP) with middle of the road components (16 K, 6 BB, 3 HR), and by his own description he sat 93-97 mph, "which I'll take for spring training," reasoning that he's a long-levered operation who tends to get more in sync and throw harder as the season wears on.
But he thinks the comfort now extends to the outer reaches of his arsenal, beyond his four-seamer and breaking balls. Burke stipulated that he's including his changeup and even his carefully managed sinker when he talks about trusting everything in the zone, and hints that a new wrinkle in his pitch mix might emerge Saturday in Milwaukee. At times last season, the pitches that Burke felt he could trust against lefties boiled down to him just trying to execute the perfect four-seam/curveball combo over and over again, through long, inefficient innings that limited his outings.
Even if his stuff hasn't actually leveled up from last year, Burke thinks he'll benefit just from his attack being more diversified.
"The games where I'd go four innings and I give them a run or two runs, like, it doesn't look bad, but it's not as efficient, I'm not going as deep in the games, those are kind of the starts I'm trying to avoid," Burke said.
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A similar idea is at work with Grant Taylor spending much of the spring showing not so much his kick change, but a running two-seamer to righties, and re-introducing his mid-90s cutter against lefties. Both pitches aim to give the opposition more to think about as Taylor tries to expand to longer, multi-inning relief outings, and specifically are designed to bore in horizontally on the hands of hitters, in contrast to the north-south attack of his four-seamer and knuckle-curve.
As cool as it sounds, Taylor was nudged away from using his cutter last year as he shifted to more high-leverage relief work, as it tended to generate more contact in situations where he's regularly being brought into games to get swings and misses.
Obviously, that still might happen from time to time, but he wants to eventually grow out of it.
"If you can throw five, six pitches for strikes, even if you're a one-inning guy, I don't think it hurts," Taylor said. "This year, when I come in for the ninth or the eighth or whatever, I'm still gonna fall back on what I'm most successful with, what I'm confident with, but ideally, all five of them are what I'm confident with."
Taylor is coming off a spring that, like last season, didn't produce end results (6.23 ERA, 13 H, 7 K, 4 BB in 8⅔ IP) in line with his awesome stuff and triple-digit velocity. His delivery seemingly has too much extension, too much arm speed to not look violent and difficult to some degree, but Taylor felt he was able to calibrate his command better as Cactus League wore on.
"I walked two guys in a row versus the Dodgers, and then I made an adjustment to get back in the zone and get through the outing," Taylor said. "Next outing, I walked one guy and then was able to make the adjustment. Next few outings, I was making adjustments after one pitch or two pitches, rather than taking me four or five. I think it's just the normal kind of spring training where you might come in a little bit rocky, might come in amazing, but you're going to make mistakes, and it's being able to fix those mistakes and make those adjustments in between pitches, rather than in between at-bats, that's just going to help you during the season."
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Jedixson Páez's major league debut on Thursday certainly resembled someone who had not pitched above A-ball, or done much relief work before being dropped into a bases loaded jam in the seventh. He uncharacteristically walked two of the eight hitters he faced, and the sky-high three-run homer Jake Bauers lifted off a 92 mph fastball was the hardest-hit ball of the game.
But Páez had six-run meltdown inning in spring before recovering to earn a roster spot, and was ideally will be able to similarly adjust.
"Throughout my whole career with the Red Sox I was a starter, and then when I got to spring training, the team, the coaches told me they were going to be using me as a reliever and it would be an adjustment period," Páez said via interpreter. "I took every outing as an opportunity, and even though that outing didn’t go that well, I just kept working and I didn’t lose focus on the things I wanted to do and I was able to do."
There's also the distinct possibility that the current form of Páez's raw stuff is underwhelming, and Thursday's debut demonstrated the limited margin for error he has when his elite control wavers. While he's not ready to compete for a rotation spot, the Sox sound like they want to keep him working multiple innings, where he can use his full arsenal and get in rhythm with his command; at least as much as is possible.
"We have to be mindful of where he's at in his career with how he's being used," said Will Venable. "We know that it'll be multiple innings out of the bullpen for us for now, and so we want to be able to make sure that he keeps that length. That's something that's important. But, breaking it down and kind of thinking about different ways that we can use him right now, I think it's just we're open to anything."
Venable agreed that Páez could be a candidate to serve as an opener at some point, but that it hadn't been discussed with him yet. He'll probably need to get on track first.
"We identified him for a reason, the pitchability," said Chris Getz. "You look at the Rule 5 success we had last year with two players, to replicate that is not the easiest thing in the world. We were fortunate to be able to do it last year, but he's going to get a chance, and he's more than capable of doing it, and we want to make sure to put him in a position to help."
