Spring Training is all about players figuring out different methods to make parts of their games work. It's a time to knock off any rust prior to the season starting. But when you sign a massive 12-year, $325 million contract, poor outings in spring become magnified.
This is exactly what happened to Dodgers rookie right-hander Yoshinobu Yamamoto on Wednesday against the Chicago White Sox. Making his second start of the spring, Yamamoto looked vastly different than in his first outing.
He struggled to find comfort on the mound against Chicago, giving up five earned runs and six hits. Yamamoto allowed the leadoff batter to reach base in every inning, while only throwing 32 strikes out of his 58 pitches.
After the game, Yamamoto revealed what might have caused his issues.
“I was not feeling right [out of the stretch], and that’s something I need to work on, to adjust. Overall, the numbers weren’t good. There were too many balls and walks. But one good thing was I could try what I wanted to try. I was testing a couple of things, and that was good.”
Luckily for Yamamoto, this game didn't count. He isn't going to be perfect every time out on the mound, and there will be a learning curve for him as he navigates a new league and a new country.
The most important part of this is that he learns from it. If he can do that, he will be just fine. Dodgers catcher Austin Barnes had his back after the poor outing, saying that these types of situations can happen in the game of baseball.
“(Yamamoto) is still a human being. Sometimes you don’t have prestige command like he usually does. But I think it’s good to go through a rough patch. Baseball is not easy. I think he’ll learn from it and we’ll just move on.”
Some will overreact to his struggles, but this is normal. It's only his second start in Spring Training, and Yamamoto has the skillset to put this all in the past.
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