McCullers hopes for fully healthy season
Righthander expected to take on significant role with Verlander out
In years past, Astros pitcher Lance McCullers Jr. has zeroed in on his changeup, curveball, velocity or control during spring training, fine-tuning one area of his arsenal leading to a season.
This year, McCullers’ objective has more breadth: stay well and get outs.
“My goal for this spring training is to ramp up and be healthy and every time I go out there add a new layer to my game,” McCullers said Thursday, the first day of workouts for pitchers and catchers in West Palm Beach, Fla. “I’m going to have time to be able to get my stuff sharp for when the first game comes around.
“I want to be full-go. I don’t want to have any pitches missing.”
McCullers missed the 2019 season while recovering from Tommy John surgery he had in November 2018. He debuted last year on July 25, pitching six innings of a 7-2 Astros victory at Seattle, allowing five hits and two runs in his first appearance since the 2018 playoffs.
Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Major League Baseball played a 60-game regular season schedule that began July 24, and the Astros squeaked into the postseason with a 29-31 record. Nothing about 2020 was ideal, McCullers said Thursday, but the 27-yearold righthander found a personal silver lining in the shortened, oft-wayward summer and fall.
“Last season kind of sucked as far as everything we had to deal with and the tough place we were in as a world,” McCullers said. “(But) getting my feet wet and getting back into (a groove) with that short season … I feel like is going to set me up for a good 2021. I’m fully expecting to have a full workload and be good to go for the whole season.”
That’s good news for the Astros, considering ace Justin Verlander underwent his own Tommy John surgery on Sept. 30 and will miss most, if not all, of the season. McCullers, whom the Astros selected 41st overall in the first round of the 2012 draft out of high school, pitched 55 innings in the 2020 regular season, going 3-3 with a 3.93 ERA in 11 starts.
He then started Game 1 of the Astros’ victory over Oakland in the American League Division Series and didn’t factor in the decision. The Astros won the best-of-five series 3-1.
He started the second and seventh games of the American League Championship Series, losing both in Tampa Bay’s seven-game triumph.
McCullers, an All-Star in 2017 when the Astros won the franchise’s first World Series, said the 2021 bunch — with its core of second baseman Jose Altuve, third baseman Alex Bregman and shortstop Carlos Correa intact — expects to make its third World Series in five years.
“We want to go back, and we want to win a World Series,” he said. “The goal doesn’t change, and I think we have the team to do it. … We’re going to count on our big boys — Carlos, Bregman and Altuve. We’re expecting those guys to have great seasons this year. We’re expecting a little three-way MVP race on our team between those three.”
McCullers channeled his inner Yogi Berra when asked his personal priorities this season.
“Almost the same as every year,” he said. “Every year is the same — but it’s different. I want all of my stuff working 100 percent when I enter the season.”
McCullers said he anticipated star center fielder George Springer leaving Houston following the 2020 season — Springer’s six-year, $150 million contract with Toronto is the largest in Blue Jays history, but left fielder Michael Brantley’s return to the franchise made McCullers downright emotional.
“When the George news broke, it still sucked, but it was expected,” McCullers said. “(But) it was pure emotion and pure happiness when we got ‘Uncle Mike’ back.”
Relayed that Bregman told reporters earlier this month he expects McCullers “to have the best season of his career” based on his work ethic and passion for the game, McCullers nodded appreciatively. His top season to date came in 2018, when he was 10-6 just before the Tommy John surgery.
“These guys are family to me. … I came up with a lot of these guys in the minor leagues, and for my teammates to have confidence in me means a lot,” McCullers said. “I think I’ve earned that confidence and respect from them from the work I’ve put in. I fully expect to be at the top of my game for a full season.
“I know I’m physically and mentally prepared for that.”