(Photo: Bobby Kraus/WCSN)
When Tracy Smith emerged from the slightly rain dampened dugout in Fullerton, California, it was to make a pitching change. The game’s score was lopsided.
Arizona State had a 6-0 lead over Cal State Fullerton, a resilient and storied baseball program, long recognized as the Devils’ toughest non-conference opponent in 2019.
As Smith climbed the mound, taking the ball from his junior southpaw Chaz Montoya, the strategy was one of out with the old and in with the new.
The old was Montoya: one of the Devils’ two left-handed pitchers, one of their 11 upperclassmen and one of the pitchers that had been nothing but reliable to start 2019’s campaign.
Replacing him, the new. It was Blake Burzell.
Burzell is a lanky right-handed freshman from Laguna Beach, California.
At 6’6, the newest addition to Smith’s relief corps was a two-sport athlete in high school. On the diamond he was California’s 17th overall high school player in 2018 and on the basketball court, he was one of the states best big-men, making the 2018 All-State CIF team and finishing his high school basketball career as Laguna Beach High School’s all-time leading scorer.
But, on March 5, 2019, Burzell’s focus was simpler and more complex all at the same time. His list of jobs was certainly shorter than his high school agenda. However, the pressure to perform in his only role was magnified at that moment more than ever.
Prior to that night, Burzell was a bullpen juggernaut. In his first 7.1 collegiate innings, the righty gave up just two base-hits and did not allow a single run.
But, as if the past mattered at all, Fullerton’s cool night time air was enough to put out Burzell’s flaming start to the year.
In the bottom of the seventh, he got the one out asked of him: a strikeout to end the inning. But, as Burzell walked back out to the mound for the eighth, he was a whole new pitcher.
Without recording an out in the inning, Burzell surrendered three total runs, one of them unearned. His confidence looked shot, his velocity even more so.
Burzell struggles only started there. In his next 2.1 innings pitched, the hard-throwing reliever gave up five earned runs and went from Smith’s go-to high leverage guy to just someone that needed work on the mound.
In those hard-to-watch games, Burzell’s pitching felt very give and take. When he took velocity, he sacrificed control. When he chose control, there was nothing behind his fastballs.
But, on Wednesday, March 20, when Burzell took the mound to face California Baptist University under the lights of his home stadium, his velocity was sitting comfortably at 93-95 miles per hour and his control had pin-point strikeout accuracy.
The difference? Mechanics.
Burzell noticeably made a tweak in his delivery.
Where he would normally use his long arms to come home from a much wider spot in his throwing motion, his arm circle was drastically shortened and the results were fantastic.
Burzell gave up a leadoff home run, sure. But, what followed the wall-scraping solo shot were three straight dominant punchouts. Burzell was pitching well. He was pitching to expectation.
“This is what we’re looking for,” Smith said of Burzell’s performance. “His pitching was the highlight of the night for the bullpen.”
Without taking too much stalk in just one appearance, Burzell’s results are unbelievably encouraging for one reason and one reason only: it was a mechanical change that led to success, not the same mechanics yielding a new result.
The abbreviated delivery allows Burzell to stay in control of pitches and even opened the door to a 79-83 mph slider that collected him a strikeout.
Through the Fullerton series, Burzell had not thrown a single pitch other than his four-seamer.
So, in Burzell’s one game highlight outfitted with a new delivery, the takeaway is one of great positivity: he found a delivery that works.
If Burzell can regain confidence in his stuff with this new throwing motion, his results should uptick in a big way.
