Fiers smoking at opportune time
After making adjustment in arm angle, righthander thriving with curveball
Even the most modest changes can drastically alter a pitcher’s season. That was the case for Mike Fiers, who in the span of two weeks went from jettisoned to the Astros’ bullpen to a pivotal member of a decimated rotation.
Fiers, who will start Friday night’s series opener against the Boston Red Sox, has turned his season around by refining one pitch: his curveball. Traditionally, the looping breaking ball playing off his elevated fastball was his calling card. But for the better part of a year until recently, the 32-year-old righthander had lost his way with his most-used secondary pitch.
It’s returned over his last three starts, a span coinciding with his May 27 removal from the Astros’ rotation and May 28 reinsertion when Charlie Morton went on the disabled list. The over-the-top throwing Fiers dropped his arm angle ever so slightly and began throwing his curveball about 2 mph harder.
It has proved the difference
between his 5.21 ERA and 18 home runs allowed in his first nine starts and a 1.96 ERA and zero long balls in his last three.
“I think I’ve always thrown the curveball from way over top, and I’ve had success,” he said. “But in this game your body changes, things change, so you have to make adjustments.”
As the pitch has resurfaced, Fiers has increased its usage. He threw roughly 30 percent curveballs, a season high, in his last start, a dominant outing against the Los Angeles Angels in which he allowed only an unearned run in 71⁄3 innings. He also has increased his changeup usage while all but shelving his cutter, which was hit hard earlier in the season.
Fiers, whose fastball sits at just 89-90 mph but is masked by his motion, now throws his curveball in the 74-75 mph range, as opposed to 72-73. Dropping down has allowed for more of a “free and easy” feeling in his delivery. He was “beating himself mentally” with his curveball for probably a year, he said.
“Coming over the top, coming over extreme, I think really messed with me mentally,” he said. “I was trying to do too much or trying to make it break too much. Whereas if I just throw it and drop my arm angle, it’s got pretty much the same break, and I have better control, and I throw it a couple miles an hour harder.”
It took Fiers’ trying out the adjustment and studying video to see he wasn’t tipping the pitch to make the change.
“People say it all the time: This game’s mental. And it really is,” he said.
His upcoming performances carry added importance as the major league-leading Astros attempt to weather the storm after recent injuries to top starters Dallas Keuchel, Lance McCullers Jr. and Charlie Morton.
When he was struggling, Fiers elicited the help of two rotation mates: the 23-year-old McCullers, who throws arguably the best curveball in the game, and the 33-year-old Morton, who has thrown a curveball as his best swing-and-miss pitch for more than a decade.
Their discussions ranged from hand placement and release points to overall mindset. McCullers, who often is Fiers’ throwing partner, told him how he views his curveball and how he throws it to certain areas of the strike zone.
“I’m not trying to hit a glove,” McCullers explained. “You can’t set up a glove low in the bottom of the zone on the outside corner and tell yourself I’m going to throw my curveball, my best curveball, and it’s going to hit that spot. Ten out of 10 times, you’re going to hit it once. And the other nine are going to be bad pitches.
“So I think with him, he was just trying to do a little bit too much with it and try to make it too perfect.”
Instead of eliminating Fiers’ curveball, hitters again have to account for it when ahead or behind in the count. His ability to throw it for a strike or a ball when he intends to has led to more swings and misses. His ERA is 4.29 and trending to where it should be for the No. 5 starting spot he will reassume when Keuchel (neck discomfort), McCullers (lower back soreness) and Morton (lat strain) return.
“When I can throw it, it’s really good,” Fiers said. “I’ve always said that I don’t even care if they know it’s coming. If I throw it well and I throw it down in the zone, it’s still a tough pitch to hit.”