CLEVELAND -- The most dominant reliever in baseball so far this season has been Padres closer Mason Miller, and there's no question about it. The 27-year-old flamethrower has tossed 9 1/3 scoreless innings with only one hit allowed, 23 strikeouts and one walk over his first nine outings, riding a scoreless streak of 30 2/3 frames dating back to last season.
One hit allowed in 9 1/3 innings is impressive. But there's a reliever in the Orioles' bullpen who has Miller beat in that regard.
Rico Garcia has opened the season with 10 hitless innings over 10 appearances, a streak the 32-year-old right-hander preserved in Baltimore's 6-4 comeback win over Cleveland on Friday night at Progressive Field. He tossed a 1-2-3 eighth inning and fielded a pair of grounders, the second of which was an initial safe call overturned by replay review to end the frame.
Garcia is the only MLB pitcher who has logged more than four innings without giving up a hit this season. The only other hurlers to work nine-plus frames with either one or zero hits allowed are Miller and Reds left-hander Sam Moll, who had each given up one hit through 9 1/3 innings entering Saturday.
"Honestly, just trying to pound the zone. Just trying to control what I can control, and everything else kind of just works itself out," Garcia said. "But just being able to go out there and just pound the zone, help the team win, that's all I can really do."
Much like fellow breakout O's star Jeremiah Jackson, Garcia has seemingly come out of nowhere.
A 30th-round Draft pick of the Rockies out of Hawaii Pacific University in 2016, Garcia pitched big league games for eight MLB organizations from 2019-25. However, he struggled to stick anywhere, never making more than 10 big league appearances in a season until registering a career-high 29 games in '25.
Garcia had a brief stint in Baltimore in 2022, recording a 4.50 ERA in eight innings over six appearances. After pitching for both the Mets and Yankees last year, he returned to the Orioles last Aug. 5, as the O's claimed the Honolulu native off waivers from the Mets. He went on to have a solid showing over the final two months of the season, posting a 2.84 ERA in 19 innings over 20 games.
But this year, Garcia has taken his pitching to another level. He has retired 30 of the 33 batters he's faced, with the other three reaching via walks.
"Talk about a guy that’s not human, it’s that guy right there," said left-hander Trevor Rogers, Garcia's locker neighbor in Baltimore's clubhouse at Camden Yards. "The journey that he’s been on, he’s unbelievable. A great guy, great teammate, and he lays it all out on the line every single day for us, and I’m really happy that he’s getting the recognition. He just continues to put the work in, and it couldn’t have happened to a better guy."
If you take a look at Garcia's Baseball Savant page, there's a ton of red -- a visible sign that a player is having a strong season. However, there's one thing that clearly stands out:
Garcia's 20.7% chase rate ranks in the 6th percentile in baseball -- so, not great. However, that's because he isn't trying to pitch out of the strike zone in an attempt to get batters to chase. He's coming right at them with predominantly a four-seam fastball (which sits around 95-96 mph), as well as his slider, changeup and curveball.
"I kind of learned that lesson in previous years, where I tried to get that chase. Not seeing that chase helped me learn that I'm not the kind of pitcher that gets chase," Garcia said. "My stuff plays better when going right after guys. Just developing my arsenal to do that, I think, has helped a lot."
Whatever works for Garcia, the Orioles just want to see more of it.
"There’s a lot of qualities that Rico has. One, he throws strikes. Two, he can throw his offspeed -- especially his slider -- whenever he wants for strikes," manager Craig Albernaz said. "He has a sneaky, lower-slot, vertical approach with some carry on the heater, so it makes the heater jump a little bit more. He uses that well and pairs that with the slider off that, and he also has the [changeup] to neutralize the lefties as well."
At some point, Garcia will likely give up a hit. But he's proving he can be a key high-leverage member of Baltimore's relief corps, which has performed better than many expected it to thus far.
For Garcia, he's happy to have finally found a big league home where he can contribute.
"Alby and [pitching coach Drew French] and the whole pitching and analytics [staff] -- everyone, top to bottom -- they really put their faith in you. They really make it known that they believe in you and they trust in your stuff," Garcia said. "I was never really around other teams long enough to get that relationship. So just being able to develop that with them, I think, has helped a lot."