The image imprinted on Adam Wainwright?s memory of young Michael Wacha forever has the Pittsburgh skyline in the background and a steely glare in his eye.
With Wainwright watching from the dugout at PNC Park and wondering if he would get a chance, just one chance, the chance to pitch the Cardinals into the National League championship series, Wacha made his postseason debut. He was what stood between the Cardinals and elimination in Game 4 of the NL division series against the host Pirates.
?So when I think about Michael Wacha, I think about Pittsburgh,? Wainwright said. ?He was 22. He was thrust into the biggest game of his career, without question. One of the biggest games in all of our careers since he?s been here, and we?ve been in some pretty big games. In the most hostile environment we?ve ever played in, probably. Against a very good team. And he ? almost throws a no-hitter. That?s when I think about Michael Wacha.
?That, to me, is poise beyond his years.?
That afternoon in Pittsburgh, Wacha arrived as a showstopper. He returns there Tuesday night to assert how he can thrive as a starter.
The Cardinals? 24-year-old starter, three years removed from his brilliant October, earned the second start of the season as the Cardinals continue the opening series against Pittsburgh. The draw puts Wacha on turn to start the home opener at Busch Stadium, and it positions him actually where the Cardinals have figuratively put him over the past two seasons: right behind Wainwright. Wacha led the team with 17 wins a year ago, though beneath the strong record was a tattered ending as innings and inconsistency caused his ERA to balloon and effectiveness to wane.
Wacha enters the 2016 season, his third as a starter for the Cardinals, looking to put together the full season portended by his October 2013 excellence. His 2014 was interrupted by a shoulder injury. His 2015 saw his first All-Star invite and a climb to 181 1/3 innings, but flighty mechanics.
Now 2016 is there for his taking.
?Thirty-five starts. Two-hundred-plus innings. That?s what?s next,? pitching coach Derek Lilliquist said. ?He?s training himself and learning how to do that. It?s one thing to say that you?re going to throw 200 innings and make 35 starts and be that kind of starter. But what about 230 innings? What are you going to do to get there, to still get yourself those last 10 starts and allowing your adrenaline to pull you through them. What can you do to be competitive in those six starts that you don?t have your best stuff? That?s where he is.?
The way for Wacha to become the starter expected was underscored during spring training. The righthander had some erratic starts, mostly because of the timing of his delivery. Wacha has, according to one NL scout who evaluates the Cardinals, a complicated delivery. When it is in synch, it gives Wacha the high, downward plunging angle on his pitches that manager Mike Matheny refers to as ?tilt? and hitters know only as trouble. When his delivery is awry, the timing between his foot landing and his hand releasing is off, and so is the accuracy of his fastball.
If his fastball is off, the success of his sinister changeup falters and his pitch counts soar, costing him the efficiency to pitch deeper into games.
That?s what happened in 2015.
?I definitely lost the fastball command late in the season,? Wacha said. ?And that?s when you start getting hit around. You?re not hitting your corners. You?re not staying at the knees. At this level, you can?t get away with those mistake fastballs. It seems like all of my pitches and secondary pitches play a lot better off a well-located fastball. If I can establish that, the secondary pitches and everything else I can be works from there.?
The final two months of the 2015 season offer a study in command. Wacha went 3-0 with a 1.13 ERA and 28 strikeouts in 32 innings in August. He struck out nearly three times as many batters as he walked. During that month, according to data from BrooksBaseball.net, he threw 282 fastballs and 51 percent of them were swung at by the hitter. Hitters missed 11.35 percent of them, and 56 percent of his pitches that month were fastballs. In September, Wacha went 2-3 with a 7.88 ERA and he walked (18) almost as many batters as he struck out (19). That?s because the rates on his fastball flipped.
All of the other pitchers stayed similar in use and swing-and-miss rate. But hitters only swung at 48 percent of his fastballs and missed on 8 percent. Of his pitches in that final month, 62 percent were fastballs.
?His timing was just off,? Lilliquist said. ?You?ve got a guy who had to stay in hitters counts and he had to lay off the pitch he would normally go to. They just couldn?t work. It was flipped. The game flipped on him. It?s important for him to stay in those 0-1, 0-2 counts and do less pitches per at-bat.?
Like he did in his final start of spring.
Wacha?s breakthrough came in his final appearance in Florida, but only after he and Lilliquist, with an assist from Wainwright, simplified his mechanics. Wacha watched video and saw that his delivery ?would be coming from different spots at different times,? he said. ?That makes it tough to throw that same fastball when you?ve got different movement every time.? Through the video and work on the field, Wacha found basic points in his delivery and then worked on repeating those over and over ? from the windup and the stretch. Simple proved better, and with the steep-incline fastball he was able to turn to his changeup.
Those were the two pitches he utilized so effectively on Oct. 7, 2013, at PNC Park. The Pirates could have knocked the Cardinals from the postseason with a win, and instead Wacha took a perfect game through five innings and a no-hitter into the eighth. The Cardinals won 2-1, and former ace Chris Carpenter lauded how Wacha ?didn?t scare.? He shined.
Wacha was a comet, streaking through October.
This season, he?s out to show he?s a star, set to stay.
?He?s right there,? Wainwright said. ?He?s right there, where certain hitters are going to get in the box and know they?re not real confident. For him to take that next step, that one we all talk about and get to that point, he?s just going to have to keep going out there and have good quality results. He?s going to get those when he has stuff like that, the poise like that, the command like he does. He?s going to gain that next step just by going out there. That?s how you build a reputation.
?That?s something earned,? Wainwright concluded. ?He?s fixing to get it.?
With Wainwright watching from the dugout at PNC Park and wondering if he would get a chance, just one chance, the chance to pitch the Cardinals into the National League championship series, Wacha made his postseason debut. He was what stood between the Cardinals and elimination in Game 4 of the NL division series against the host Pirates.
?So when I think about Michael Wacha, I think about Pittsburgh,? Wainwright said. ?He was 22. He was thrust into the biggest game of his career, without question. One of the biggest games in all of our careers since he?s been here, and we?ve been in some pretty big games. In the most hostile environment we?ve ever played in, probably. Against a very good team. And he ? almost throws a no-hitter. That?s when I think about Michael Wacha.
?That, to me, is poise beyond his years.?
That afternoon in Pittsburgh, Wacha arrived as a showstopper. He returns there Tuesday night to assert how he can thrive as a starter.
The Cardinals? 24-year-old starter, three years removed from his brilliant October, earned the second start of the season as the Cardinals continue the opening series against Pittsburgh. The draw puts Wacha on turn to start the home opener at Busch Stadium, and it positions him actually where the Cardinals have figuratively put him over the past two seasons: right behind Wainwright. Wacha led the team with 17 wins a year ago, though beneath the strong record was a tattered ending as innings and inconsistency caused his ERA to balloon and effectiveness to wane.
Wacha enters the 2016 season, his third as a starter for the Cardinals, looking to put together the full season portended by his October 2013 excellence. His 2014 was interrupted by a shoulder injury. His 2015 saw his first All-Star invite and a climb to 181 1/3 innings, but flighty mechanics.
Now 2016 is there for his taking.
?Thirty-five starts. Two-hundred-plus innings. That?s what?s next,? pitching coach Derek Lilliquist said. ?He?s training himself and learning how to do that. It?s one thing to say that you?re going to throw 200 innings and make 35 starts and be that kind of starter. But what about 230 innings? What are you going to do to get there, to still get yourself those last 10 starts and allowing your adrenaline to pull you through them. What can you do to be competitive in those six starts that you don?t have your best stuff? That?s where he is.?
The way for Wacha to become the starter expected was underscored during spring training. The righthander had some erratic starts, mostly because of the timing of his delivery. Wacha has, according to one NL scout who evaluates the Cardinals, a complicated delivery. When it is in synch, it gives Wacha the high, downward plunging angle on his pitches that manager Mike Matheny refers to as ?tilt? and hitters know only as trouble. When his delivery is awry, the timing between his foot landing and his hand releasing is off, and so is the accuracy of his fastball.
If his fastball is off, the success of his sinister changeup falters and his pitch counts soar, costing him the efficiency to pitch deeper into games.
That?s what happened in 2015.
?I definitely lost the fastball command late in the season,? Wacha said. ?And that?s when you start getting hit around. You?re not hitting your corners. You?re not staying at the knees. At this level, you can?t get away with those mistake fastballs. It seems like all of my pitches and secondary pitches play a lot better off a well-located fastball. If I can establish that, the secondary pitches and everything else I can be works from there.?
The final two months of the 2015 season offer a study in command. Wacha went 3-0 with a 1.13 ERA and 28 strikeouts in 32 innings in August. He struck out nearly three times as many batters as he walked. During that month, according to data from BrooksBaseball.net, he threw 282 fastballs and 51 percent of them were swung at by the hitter. Hitters missed 11.35 percent of them, and 56 percent of his pitches that month were fastballs. In September, Wacha went 2-3 with a 7.88 ERA and he walked (18) almost as many batters as he struck out (19). That?s because the rates on his fastball flipped.
All of the other pitchers stayed similar in use and swing-and-miss rate. But hitters only swung at 48 percent of his fastballs and missed on 8 percent. Of his pitches in that final month, 62 percent were fastballs.
?His timing was just off,? Lilliquist said. ?You?ve got a guy who had to stay in hitters counts and he had to lay off the pitch he would normally go to. They just couldn?t work. It was flipped. The game flipped on him. It?s important for him to stay in those 0-1, 0-2 counts and do less pitches per at-bat.?
Like he did in his final start of spring.
Wacha?s breakthrough came in his final appearance in Florida, but only after he and Lilliquist, with an assist from Wainwright, simplified his mechanics. Wacha watched video and saw that his delivery ?would be coming from different spots at different times,? he said. ?That makes it tough to throw that same fastball when you?ve got different movement every time.? Through the video and work on the field, Wacha found basic points in his delivery and then worked on repeating those over and over ? from the windup and the stretch. Simple proved better, and with the steep-incline fastball he was able to turn to his changeup.
Those were the two pitches he utilized so effectively on Oct. 7, 2013, at PNC Park. The Pirates could have knocked the Cardinals from the postseason with a win, and instead Wacha took a perfect game through five innings and a no-hitter into the eighth. The Cardinals won 2-1, and former ace Chris Carpenter lauded how Wacha ?didn?t scare.? He shined.
Wacha was a comet, streaking through October.
This season, he?s out to show he?s a star, set to stay.
?He?s right there,? Wainwright said. ?He?s right there, where certain hitters are going to get in the box and know they?re not real confident. For him to take that next step, that one we all talk about and get to that point, he?s just going to have to keep going out there and have good quality results. He?s going to get those when he has stuff like that, the poise like that, the command like he does. He?s going to gain that next step just by going out there. That?s how you build a reputation.
?That?s something earned,? Wainwright concluded. ?He?s fixing to get it.?
