DENVER -- Kumar Rocker did not make his scheduled start on Tuesday at Coors Field.
That sentence on its own is terrifying for any starting pitcher, especially one with his injury history. But Rocker wasn’t scratched completely.
Entering the day, Rocker had an 11.25 ERA in the first inning this season and a 2.45 ERA in all other innings combined. So manager Skip Schumaker opted to go with Tyler Alexander as an opener before letting Rocker come in relief behind him. It’s the first time Rocker has come out of the bullpen in his young big league career.
“I just felt that Rocker, in the first inning, hasn't been what we think it should be,” Schumaker said pregame. “We felt like this gives us a better chance until we kind of figure out the first inning woes for him. We're trying to give him the best shot and give us the best shot for today's game. Hopefully, we can still get five or six innings out of him.”
Maybe it’s a bit of a galaxy brain move by Schumaker. Truth be told, it could have blown up in his face. But it worked.
“I said before, I'm not going to stand still and just watch the same thing happen over and over again,” Schumaker said. “So, you try different things and see if they work. Maybe this is something that worked.”
Rocker hurled 7 2/3 scoreless innings with seven punchouts, three hits and three walks, helping the Rangers to a 10-0 win over the Rockies at Coors Field. It’s only the second time in his career that he’s completed a full seven innings. It’s also the longest scoreless outing of his career.
It’s just the seventh scoreless relief outing of seven or more innings in Rangers history (since 1972), and the first since 1988.
“It was incredible,” said catcher Danny Jansen. “He's a bulldog. He competes every start. It was an awesome one tonight, obviously, for us, for him. Obviously, having a lot of run support helps, too, with the attack, but even so, it was awesome. … Anytime he gets the ball, he competes. He's gonna do his thing. Today, we went with the opener and [he] came in and handled it like a pro.”
Rocker said he was willing to do whatever was necessary to help the team win, especially after an unplanned bullpen day in Monday’s series-opening loss.
“I just like -- I like pitching,” Rocker said. “So however which way I can get the ball, I’ll do it.”
An opener only works if it’s clean. And Rocker was gifted a perfect set-up from Alexander and a five-run cushion from his offense. He dominated with a majority slider (43%) and sinker (31%) mix with the cutter (15%) sprinkled in. Of his 19 whiffs, 12 came on the slider, as well as six of his seven strikeouts.
"His slider was devastating tonight,” said Rockies manager Warren Schaeffer. “We didn't have an answer for it -- then the heater up, we started laying off it a little bit. But the slider was a tough pitch tonight."
It was a different situation for Rocker, but his routine wasn’t too different, he said. And he’s not necessarily sure that the opener affected the results, anyway.
All that to say, neither Rocker, nor the coaching staff, has a definite answer to his first-inning struggles. Maybe it’s his routine, maybe it’s his mindset, maybe it’s something physical or mechanical. Jansen said maybe it was their fault on the catching end, with pitch selection and sequencing.
Whatever that answer ends up being, Tuesday night was a step in the right direction toward figuring that out.
“We have gone through different ways and different processes to help it,” Schumaker reiterated. “You also have to remember that he is still really young in his Major League career. He's not got that many career starts in general professionally, so still trying to figure that out for him and help him through the process. He's not a finished product. I don't think we're gonna do this every single time. I think it’s just this start and then we'll circle back next start and see what it looks like.”