Baltimore Orioles: The Reason Every Team Desires Kevin Gausman
Jul 30, 2014; Baltimore, MD, USA; Baltimore Orioles starting pitcher Kevin Gausman (39) pitches in the first inning against the Los Angeles Angels at Oriole Park at Camden Yards. Mandatory Credit: Joy R. Absalon-USA TODAY Sports
Baltimore Orioles pitcher Kevin Gausman has a rare arm. You can’t teach 98-mph fastballs in the seventh inning. You can teach placement, sequence, and secondary pitches that will make the fastballs even more unhittable. And all of this is what young Kevin Gausman is learning.
Before his last call-up to the Orioles, my friend Blaine Beatty – the pitching coach at AA Bowie – sent me a text message with a picture of the two of them. He simply entitled it, “Our future.” Blaine is one of those in the organization who has worked with Gausman to encourage the development of his secondary stuff. And when it all comes together … well … it is regularly going to look like it did Wednesday night in Baltimore.
For the first 14 Angels batters, Gausman was in total control. None reached base; nothing was hit particularly hard. Gausman was living on the corners and his secondary pitches were salted and peppered into the sequence in a fashion that kept everyone completely off balance.
This could become a regular experience. Teams around Major League Baseball know this, and Dan Duquette is probed continuously about Guasman’s potential availability at times such as this trade deadline.
It’s not going to happen. DD is not going to mortgage the future in any event. And why give away the future when the future is today? What was seen Wednesday night is as good as most anything that could be secured in return. Gausman is very quickly learning on the job.
Becoming a successful major league pitcher has a learning curve … along with learning a curve.
Becoming a successful major league pitcher has a learning curve … along with learning a curve. (Did you catch that? I went figurative on you before I went literal.) Lessons were learned on this evening – Gausman’s 15th career start in the big leagues – on the way to getting a 4-3 win and pushing his record to 5-3 for this season.
Orioles broadcaster Rick Dempsey is famous for saying that “nothing good happens after a walk.” Well, if that is true, then it is three-times as true that nothing good happens after three consecutive walks.
With 14 consecutive Angels having been sent back to the dugout, Gausman walked three batters in a row to load the bases with two outs in the top of the fifth inning. Two run-scoring hits immediately followed and the O’s 4-0 lead was reduced to 4-3. Mike Trout was at the plate with runners at second and third. Gausman threw five fastballs ranging from 96-99 mph before fanning him with an 88-mph forkball to end the threat and put out the fire.
If the truth be told, Gausman should have been out of that inning before any hits were registered. He did not get calls on the corners several times. And telling the truth on this matter means telling the truth (from my six decades of avidly watching this sport) that plate umpires in MLB are worse not than they have ever been. Variation from ump to ump is understandable, but the inconsistencies are inning-by-inning realities.
Gausman fell into a pattern over this series of five batters that reached base where he attempted to be just a little bit too fine, rather than trusting his stuff. He got out of rhythm with the umpire as he was suddenly throwing more balls out of the zone. No umpire (except the most grandiosely arrogant) want to draw all the attention to themselves by ending a big rally with giving the pitcher a strike call on the black. Gausman should have been out of the inning.
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Even so, he came back for two more very good innings, giving up only one additional hit. In the process, he saved the bullpen while getting the Orioles to Darren O’Day in the eighth inning and Zach Britton in the ninth. That will win most games.
All in all, this outing against the Angels may be a pivotal one in the young career of Gausman. There is no way he will be pitching for anyone else before he becomes a free agent well into the future.
The Baltimore Orioles have really played their cards well with Kevin Gausman. Duquette is not exactly a wizard—as that designation is for the GM of a different sort of bird in the Baltimore Harbor area. But the decision to limit Gausman’s innings early in the season so as to have them available for the final two months is … well … looking at this point as the calendar turns over into August to be a very, very wise decision.