Boyle earns first Major League win with 5 K's vs. Detroit

OAKLAND -- When the A’s acquired Joe Boyle from the Reds in exchange for reliever Sam Moll just before last month’s Trade Deadline, the right-hander was viewed as an intriguing prospect whose big arm came with the caveat of frequent command issues.

Since switching organizations, however, finding the strike zone has been anything but a problem.

Following up on a solid Major League debut last week with a limited pitch count, Boyle -- now rated Oakland’s No. 22 prospect by MLB Pipeline -- was rewarded with a larger workload on Saturday afternoon and responded with a stellar performance, picking up his first big league win after holding the Tigers to one unearned run on five hits and one walk with five strikeouts in a 4-1 A’s victory at the Coliseum.

After the game, Boyle was the recipient of a celebratory beer shower courtesy of his teammates, which has been an A’s tradition this season for all Major League firsts.

“That was probably the most memorable part of that,” Boyle said. “Just getting covered in beer and shaving cream and not being able to breathe because of the baby powder. But it was good. I’ll always remember it.”

Through his first two career starts, Boyle has not allowed an earned run over nine innings while striking out nine batters. More importantly, he has limited the free passes to just three.

“Joe was outstanding today,” A’s manager Mark Kotsay said. “Just pounding the zone. The concern when he came here was his strike-throwing ability. But in both outings, we haven’t seen that show its head. It’s exciting for a young guy to get his first win and pitch as well as he did.”

Beginning the 2023 campaign in Cincinnati’s farm system at Double-A Chattanooga, Boyle mixed a tantalizing arsenal of pitches -- headlined by a fastball that routinely flirts with velocities of triple-digit velocities -- with an inability to fully control it. That was evident by his 122 strikeouts and 75 walks over 84 innings pitched at the time of the trade.

Shortly after transitioning to Oakland’s system, Boyle gradually decreased his walk totals while maintaining the strikeouts. Prior to his callup to the A’s on Sept. 17, the 24-year-old combined for 46 strikeouts and 18 walks in 33 1/3 innings with Double-A Midland and Triple-A Las Vegas.

“It’s never one thing,” Boyle said when asked what has led to his command improvements. “It’s just a matter of throwing more and getting more reps. Building a process, sticking to it and trusting it. That was probably the biggest thing that helped me lower those walk numbers -- being more in the zone consistently.”

Saturday’s outing was not smooth for Boyle by any means. He allowed at least one baserunner to reach base in all six of his innings pitched. Yet by the end of it, the only run Detroit plated was the result of an error by Jordan Diaz in the third.

As far as the stuff, Boyle showcased a power fastball that maxed out at 99.1 mph. That, along with a slider and curveball, led to a total of 11 whiffs on the afternoon.

“The slider has been his pitch,” Kotsay said. “He’s really confident with it. He also has the curveball that he throws, but the slider is a true swing-and-miss slider. The fastball obviously has a different gear to it.”

With the A’s hoping to see their young starting pitcher build momentum over this final stretch of the season, the past two games have presented a major positive.

The combination of Boyle’s quality start on Saturday and Ken Waldichuk’s on Friday night marked just the third time this season that the A’s have received back-to-back quality starts by a pitcher. The previous occurrence came back on May 2-3 by Mason Miller and JP Sears.

“It’s been awesome to watch,” said A’s closer Trevor May, who recorded Oakland’s final four outs to notch his 20th save of the year. “There’s a new core that is going to coalesce here. Now it’s turned over a little bit with these guys and I’ve seen them starting to step into it on the pitching side.”