Maddon looking for benefits from a six-man rotation

TEMPE, ARIZ. » Although the Angels’ six-man rotation was borne out of the pandemic, manager Joe Maddon is hoping it turns out to provide the benefit of actually helping the pitchers perform better.

With all pitchers facing a significant workload increase going from a 60game season in 2020 to the normal 162 in 2021, the Angels decided the best way to manage that would simply be to add extra rest between starts by using an extra starter.

That begs a series of questions. Will pitchers who have been accustomed to a certain routine be bothered by the extra rest? What happens when one or more of the pitchers performs so well that the Angels want them to pitch more regularly?

“It’s all interesting,” Maddon said. “I don’t have the answers specifically. Theoretically, in my head, it makes sense.”

The first question, however, is whether the extra rest will actually help them pitch better. Maddon said the Angels have numbers that show that their starters actually have performed better with extra rest.

Of the four starters with a significant enough sample size, three have a career ERA that is slightly better with at least five days’ rest than it is with four. Andrew Heaney (4.40 vs. 4.61), José Quintana (3.66 vs. 3.86) and Alex Cobb (3.73 vs. 4.08) have all been more effective with the extra rest. Dylan Bundy’s ERA on four days’ rest is 4.59, compared to 4.67 with at least five days.

The other two starters, Griffin Canning and Shohei Ohtani, have not pitched enough in the majors to have meaningful numbers. In Ohtani’s case, he’s never even pitched in the majors with less than six days’ rest, though. The Angels have said this year he could pitch on five days’ rest if there are no off days between his starts.

“I’ve done it for long stretches, especially with Baltimore,” Bundy said. “I think the stats show most starters are a little better with that fifth day, so I don’t think it hurts anything. It’s just something to get used to.”

Heaney said the trick is adjusting the routine to account for the extra day.

“It’s a personal thing for every day,” he said. “Some guys like it and some guys don’t. It is what it is. You’ve got to figure it out.”

Maddon said one of the ideas they’ve had so far is to have pitchers throw to hitters occasionally between starts if the rest would be too long, perhaps if there’s an off day that would mean having six days’ rest.

Maddon said so far in spring training he’s noticed that the pitchers’ velocities are slightly up, which could be a factor of getting extra rest. He also believes he’ll be able to extend the starters deeper into each game because of the extra days off in between.

This is not the first time the Angels have tried something like this. They used a version of a six-man rotation in 2018, when Ohtani first began pitching in the majors. In that case, though, it was really four pitchers working on the normal four or five days’ rest, Ohtani working on six days’ rest, and a sixth pitcher going in and out of the rotation to fill the gaps.

This time, Maddon said the plan is to have all six on the same schedule, getting at least five days’ rest each time.

He conceded, though, that plan may need to change if one or two pitchers start pitching so well that he wants to maximize their starts by moving them back to four days’ rest.

“Something like that I would really consider later in the year,” Maddon said.

On the other side, if one of the starters is doing so poorly, or gets hurt, the Angels would face the question of whether they want to use their seventh starter or just go with the normal five.

“We’ll see how it all plays out,” Maddon said. “It’s just a plan. You love when theory and reality come together. We’re going

to find out.”

Alternate site plans

Once the season starts, the Angels will keep their top reserves at their spring training facility in Tempe, instead of hosting an alternate site in Southern California. Last year, the Angels worked out at Blair Field in Long Beach and the initial plan this season was to work out at Inland Empire’s ballpark in San Bernardino.

However, the Angels are one of four teams that will keep their reserves in the Phoenix area, joining the Dodgers, Padres and Arizona Diamondbacks. This allows those teams to play games against each other, which make for better development than simply playing intrasquad games, as they did last year.

The minor-league seasons are currently scheduled to begin in May.

Notes

• The Angels have not yet heard officially whether Jaime Barria will have a fourth option in 2021, but the Washington Nationals reportedly got word that Erick Fedde will not have the extra option. Fedde and

Barria are among about a dozen players around the majors whose option status for 2021 was in the hands of an arbiter because of an interpretation of whether 2020 counts as a “full season” with regard to the option rules.

• Left-hander Jose Quijada finally arrived in Angels camp on Tuesday. Quijada had missed almost the entire camp because of a visa issue. Quijada was placed on the restricted list, but within 30 days the Angels will need to put him back on the 40-man roster.

• It may not be too late for Aaron Slegers to make the Opening Day roster after all. Slegers has missed most of the Cactus League schedule because of back spasms. Slegers threw Monday, and Maddon said on Tuesday that he felt good, so he’ll get into a game in the next day or two. The Angels would like to get Slegers in

HITTING REPORT:

— Jeff Fletcher

two or three games in order to declare him ready for Opening Day, Maddon said. At this point, it seems that even if he is delayed, it won’t be by much.

• Albert Pujols was not in the lineup a day after he suffered a bruised forearm getting hit by a pitch, but he may not have been anyway. Maddon said Pujols he “had not heard anything negative” about Pujols, but expected he would be “sore.”

• Maddon, Ohtani and catcher Max Stassi participated in a video call with Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi, who is an Ohtani fan currently working on the International Space Station. Maddon said he was impressed with Noguchi’s endurance after six months in space. “He was very upbeat,” Maddon said. “I can’t even imagine being in that confined space for six months.”

MATT YORK — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Angels starting pitcher Andrew Heaney could benefit from a six-man starting rotation. THE GAME: Taylor Ward homered and tripled in the Angels’ 6-4 loss to the Texas Rangers on Tuesday afternoon in a Cactus League game at Surprise Stadium. PITCHING REPORT: Lefthander Andrew Heaney gave up five runs in 4-2⁄3 innings, on 97 pitches. In the first inning, he allowed two infield singles and then a two-run double. The Rangers hit him harder in the fourth and fifth, including a homer by Adolis Garcia. Heaney struck out six and walked one. Heaney has allowed 10 earned runs in 14-1⁄3 innings (6.28) this spring, with 16 strikeouts. Heaney said he felt like he was starting to get the feel for his breaking ball in the fifth inning, and he tried to talk manager Joe Maddon into leaving him in the game, but Maddon had already signaled for the bullpen. “I just felt like that last inning I had a better feel for the things I was trying to do,” Heaney said. “I don’t know why it took me 80 pitches to get that feel, but it felt good.”