Cam Schlittler controls contact in Yankees’ spring loss to Tigers
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I do grow weary of spring training games. My standing rule of baseball is that if you’re going to be a boring game, you better be short, and today’s contest against the Tigers was boring but about as long as a real matchup. The Yankees pushed across just a single run in the Saturday matinee, going down 3-1 against Detroit.
I think Cam Schlittler is ready for the games to count:
As we’ve come to expect from Cam, he threw his four-seam, sinker, and cutter 78 percent of the time today, but wasn’t able to avoid much contact, striking out just a single batter in 3.2 innings. This is one of the fun parts of spring training — the Tigers had a lot of their Opening Day starters in the lineup, so were they able to time up Schlittler’s pitches, or was he specifically trying to control quality of contact against him?
I tend to think it was more the latter, as 8 of Cam’s 11 outs came on the ground. That’s not really his style, running a 36.4-percent groundball rate last year, five points lower than league average. I wonder if that increased use of his sinker—the second-most-common offering today—was an attempt to almost pre-adjust to MLB-caliber hitting. In short, there are going to be occasions in the regular season where you don’t have your strikeout stuff, so on those days, are you able to change things up midgame to continue getting outs?
Dominican National Team catcher Austin Wells used the big fundamentals to push across the Yankees’ only run, after back-to-back singles from fellow Dominicans Amed Rosario and Jasson Domínguez:
Domínguez would continue to be the main character of the day, with a truly terrible approach to Dillon Dingler’s sac fly in the sixth:
Then again in the seventh, Jasson kept being the star with a triple, albeit one the hitters behind him couldn’t take advantage of. I’m starting to wonder if the Martian is the new version of Gleyber Torres, where he can actually be a quality part of an MLB roster, while still doing something every other game or so that makes you grind your teeth.
Kenedy Corona had himself a tough day. The farmhand was fighting the bright Florida sun all day, and the sun won on a critical fly ball to centerfield:
At least Angel Chivilli, brought in to replace Ryan Yarbrough in the seventh with two on and two out, was able to strike out old friend Jahmai Jones to end the threat. It hasn’t been an easy spring for the former Rockie, and while he’ll start the season with Triple-A, the approach to Jones — especially a devastating slider whiffed on for strike two — is illustrative to why the Yankees wanted him anyway.
Excluding tonight’s prospect-themed Spring Breakout, there are only three more of these left! Each start made from Thursday on was that pitcher’s final piece of work before the games start to count, and while the Yankees haven’t tapped a starter for tomorrow’s outing just yet, we know they’ll be back at home in Tampa to welcome the Phillies. It’s the last weekend without real baseball for a long time, and that Sunday affair will come at 1:05pm Eastern. As for the Spring Breakout, that will begin tonight against Atlanta’s prospects at 6:35pm ET on YES.
