Nuño saves bullpen early
When the Diamondbacks called up left-hander Vidal Nuño on Monday, it was to provide emergency length after manager Chip Hale relied entirely on his bullpen the day before. Even with eight relievers prior to Nuño’s addition, the ranks were looking thin.
Hale didn’t want to have to break the glass and use Nuño so quickly, but a short start from righty Josh Collmenter forced him to do just that. And thanks to a strong 6 2/3 innings from the 27-year-old lefty in the 11-1 loss, the Diamondbacks likely avoided needing to summon another reliever for Tuesday.
“He saved us,” Hale said. “He put our bullpen back into play for the rest of this series, obviously, and then we have the off day Thursday, so everybody should be able to go tomorrow.”
It was the secondlongest relief appear- ance in Diamondbacks history, only behind a seven-inning outing by Randy Johnson in 2001 that was really just a continuation of a game suspended the day before.
Nuño entered the game in the top of the second after with one out and runners on first and second. He immediately surrendered a walk and a basesclearing double to make it 10-0, but calmed down after that. He gave up just one more run in the fifth and tallied a career-best eight strikeouts before giving way to Enrique Burgos to start the ninth. He threw 105 pitches.
“I heard the phone ring and it was me,” Nuño said. “So I was just doing my job and tried to keep me in the game as long as possible, keep my pitch count down and try to go and finish the game.”
Nuño was in competition for a rotation spot in spring training, but midway through Cactus League play was shifted to a bullpen role in order to give him a better shot of making the team. Ultimately, the Diamond- backs went with fellow lefty Andrew Chafin as a third long man.
That relegated Nuño to Triple-A Reno, where he returned to a starting role. He got off to a strong start in a notoriously hitter-friendly climate, posting a 3.23 ERA in six starts.
Key to Nuño’s success was the further development of his change-up. Pitchers often lose action on their breaking pitches in higher altitudes like Reno, a fact that led the Colorado Rockies to encourage their pitchers to work on change-ups.
That was Nuño’s mission upon being sent down as well. During spring training, pitching coach Mike Harkey had Nuño switch his change-up grip, from more of a twoseam grip to a palm ball, a grip Harkey also introduced to fellow lefty Robbie Ray. It took until Nuño’s second outing in Reno for it to click, but since he’s thrown it often.
In his previous bigleague stints in 2013 and 2014, he used the change between eight and 10 per- cent of the time. On Monday, 23 of his 105 pitches were change-ups, or nearly 22 percent. Sixty-one percent were thrown for strikes.
“(Harkey) told me to mess with it and told me to trust it and just start with it and just keep on trusting it,” Nuño said. “That’s all. And I’ve doing it and I’ve been throwing it a lot in Reno in my starts.”
Despite the strong outing, it remains to be seen how long Nuño will stick around. The Diamondbacks currently have nine pitchers in their bullpen, a number that will likely dwindle by one when right-hander Archie Bradley returns Saturday.
Even then that would leave the Diamondbacks short on the bench, which might change whenever third baseman Jake Lamb gets healthy. The return of reliever David Hernandez also looms later in the month.
Hudson isn’t going anywhere, and the team’s two other long men, Chafin and Randall Delgado, have performed well.