If Tuesday was a sign of things to come for José Quintana, then the Pirates will feel good about their one starting pitcher free agent signing.
Certainly more so than how he pitched in Bradenton, Fla. this spring, where he was hit hard while focusing on getting his arm ready in the shortened camp.
While Quintana would end up taking the loss in the Pirates’ 2-1 PNC Park opener to the Cubs, it was the best pitching line of any starter in the young season, going 5⅓ innings with a solo Seiya Suzuki shot being the only run against him.
Facing a lineup with only right-handed hitters, Quintana found success by relying heavily on the pitch he has thrown the least each of the previous six years: The changeup.
“That was my plan,” Quintana said. “Get the ball down and offspeed away and the fastball in. That pitch is going to help me out.”
Of Quintana’s 71 pitches, 27 were changeups (38%), throwing it even more often than his four-seamer. Only once in his career has he ever thrown that many changeups (29 on April 29, 2014), and his previous high as a percentage of pitches in a game is just 28%.
It was working, too. While Ian Happ was able to poke one changeup to right field, the rest of the Cubs’ lineup had trouble with it all day. Chicago hitters went 1 for 3 on batted balls against it and struck out three times. On the afternoon, he picked up six whiffs with the changeup, matching a career-high.
Perhaps there’s not much more to read into this than Quintana and catcher Roberto Pérez found a pitch that worked against a right-handed heavy lineup and hammered it home, but there might be something more worth exploring. Wil Crowe is experimenting with throwing more changeups, and the early returns for him out of the bullpen have been impressive.
For Quintana, his problem last year was the quality of contact he allowed, but the Pirates rolled the dice on him this winter because he recorded career bests in whiffs and strikeouts. And while the Cubs’ lineup is not as potent as it once was, there shouldn’t be an excuse for missing this many fastballs and curveballs over the heart of the plate…
… other than Quintana messed with their timing with the changeup.
It is just one start for Quintana, and like with Mitch Keller’s first outing and anyone in April, you have to be mindful of early returns. But Quintana needs to reinvent himself to stay a starter, and this is a sign that if he executes his changeup well off the plate to his hand side, he doesn’t even need to throw it for strikes that often to keep hitters off balance and get away with a few hangers. That could be a recipe for keeping him in the rotation.
