Phil Hughes Ready For Regular Season

“I threw him a good backdoor cutter that he fouled off, a good fastball that he fouled off and then I threw him a terrible curveball,” Hughes said. “I was a little ticked.”

In their next meeting, Hughes provided the Rays’ hitter with an education in major league pitching and how to expand the strike zone, punctuated with his patent backdown cutter.

Like a fair number of Hughes’ strikeouts with the cutter, the pitch skirted around the strike zone. Because he hit his target with such precision, catcher Kurt Suzuki barely moving an eyelash, the umpire punched him out looking. In disbelief, Bauers lingered in the box after the inning-ended strikeout, he mumbled “that’s not a strike” to the ump while shaking his head. The slow walk back to the dugout was followed with more disagreement.

“He seemed like he had an attitude.” Hughes joked.

In all, Hughes looked sharp and pounded the strike zone like business as usual. Hughes ripped out 70 pitches and threw another twenty in the bullpen to work on finishing his curveball and emphasizing his arm speed.

The start also including several changeups and a few more in the bullpen session. One change prompted both pitching coach Neil Allen and Suzuki to let him know how good that pitch was moving.

“I’ve never been a guy with great feel for it,” Hughes said of the pitch. “I just have to make sure that my arm speed is good and that I’m just releasing it out

front. I threw a couple good ones in the bullpen afterwards just to mix it in and get a little feel.”

Pitch data suggests that Hughes threw about a dozen changeups last year but the side work where he can focus on the feel rather than the results has helped build his confidence in the pitch.

“It’s feel and confidence really,” Hughes said about progress of his change. “If I’m not confident enough I won’t throw it in a game and I’ll rely on the three pitches I used primarily last year. If the feel's there and I throw it and the results are there I’ll gain confidence and I’ll throw it more.”

With one more start in spring between now and opening day, Hughes said he is not sure what the plan will be for the next outing. After 90 pitches on Friday, he believes that he may either ramp up to 100 pitches or throw fewer in preparation for the real games.

“Ideally, Neil [Allen] would want to back us off on our last start before the regular season but he also mentioned he wanted to get us throwing 100 pitches so I don’t know if this next start is going to be backed off or (go) to 100.”