World Series: An ‘Inspired’ pitcher leaves his previous failures behind

HOUSTON – The pitcher is the initiator, the one who dictates the action. That is the job description, at least. There is no guidebook for those harrowing nights as a driver on a steep and craggy slope, all downhill with no brakes and no clue.

“Sometimes things just tumble on you, you know?” said Lance McCullers Jr., a veteran starter for the Houston Astros, after Game 2 of the World Series on Saturday night. “It’s hard to say why they do that or how it happens. But I’ve had games where you just feel like, before you know it, you’ve given up four runs and you don’t really understand how it happened.”

McCullers was talking about his teammate Framber Valdez, who had just made a thorough transformation from his World Series flameout of 2021. Valdez carved through the Philadelphia Phillies’ lineup with hard sinkers and jackknife curveballs, evening the World Series with a 5-2 victory that was out of his grasp last fall.

“I’ve just been playing really inspired,” Valdez said through an interpreter. “It just feels really good to be here in the World Series having this kind of outing.”

With Justin Verlander recovering from elbow surgery during last year’s World Series, the Astros made Valdez their Game 1 starter against the Atlanta Braves. He had just stymied Boston at Fenway Park, but was flattened twice in the World Series with an ERA evocative of a crash: 19.29.

“Definitely last year my emotions got the best of me,” Valdez said Saturday, after working 61/3 innings and allowing one run. “I wasn’t able to throw even more than two innings without giving up a run. But those were things that I was able to learn: separate my emotions from my job on the field. Whenever I’m on the mound, I just keep my emotions outside of the field and try to stay calm.”

Even last fall, in the aftermath of his starts, Valdez, a 28-year-old left-hander from the Dominican Republic, never denied the reason for his struggles. It was refreshing candor, an athlete who freely acknowledged that the spotlight had simply been too hot. He needed to learn from it, and he did.

“It’s his focus and his self-confidence,” said third baseman Alex Bregman, who homered off a wobbly Zack Wheeler in Game 2. “He’s confident in himself, he attacks, and he knows that he’s got good stuff.”

Valdez worked 2011/3 innings this season, the most in the American League, while going 17-6 with a 2.82 ERA. He was so consistent that he set a single-season major league record with 25 consecutive quality starts (at least six innings, no more than three earned runs), and his sinker-curveball mix has made him one of a kind: His career ground-ball rate, 66.6%, is the best for a starter since the statistic was first tracked in 1987.

“Not many guys throw quality sinkers and curveballs as a part of an arsenal,” said Josh Miller, the Houston pitching coach. “If a guy’s got a sinker, it’s usually a slider to go with it. If the guy’s got a four-seamer, it’s usually a curveball. So it’s kind of a unique look. He’s differentiated himself from the rest of baseball, in my opinion.”

Valdez is the physical opposite of Verlander, the prototype of a tall, strapping power pitcher. At 5 feet, 11 inches and 239 pounds, Valdez is a keg with a smooth, powerful pour. His wrist action and hand strength help him manipulate pitches like few others.

“He’s got really sausage-like fingers and really strong wrists and hands,” Miller said, “and he can hold positions that most guys can’t.”

Valdez also changed gloves during Game 2, which is unusual, and has a habit of rubbing his pitching hand onto the palm of his other hand on the mound. Phillies manager Rob Thomson said the team had noticed this, but stopped short of accusing Valdez of applying an illegal substance to the ball to enhance pitch movement.

“The umpires check these guys after almost every inning, and if there’s something going on, MLB will take care of it,” Thomson said.

Several Phillies hitters marveled at the depth on Valdez’s curveball. Outfielder Nick Castellanos said the pitch had a bigger, harder break than the version the Phillies saw when they faced him here at the end of the regular season.

“His curveball was unbelievable today,” Castellanos said. “It was extremely sharp and it just fell off the table.”

Valdez insisted there was nothing strange going on.

“I do it out in the open, but it’s all tendencies I do,” he said. “I do it throughout the game, maybe distract the hitter a little bit from what I’m doing – like maybe look at me rubbing different things, and nothing about the pitch that I’m going to throw. I’ve been doing it all season. Just tendencies that Dominicans do just to be able to stay loose.”

Unless manager Dusty Baker uses him on short rest for Game 5, Valdez will not pitch in the next three games in Philadelphia. While home-field advantage tends to mean little in the World Series – more teams have actually clinched on the road than at home – it could mean more at Citizens Bank Park, where the Phillies are 21-9 in postseason games. Their .700 home winning percentage ranks as the best in the majors (min. 25 games) since 2007.

McCullers, who will face Noah Syndergaard in Game 3, has made postseason starts in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and Seattle, helping the Astros win in each spot. But he has never pitched at all in Philadelphia.

“Really looking forward to experiencing the crowd; I’ve heard a lot about it,” McCullers said, adding later: “I’ve started games in Minute Maid Park before in the postseason and I have had great success here. But you get to really test yourself and kind of see what you’re made of when you have to go on the road.”

For an example of composure when it matters most, McCullers needs only to think of Valdez in Game 2. That outing came before friendly fans, but Valdez’s most challenging opponent was himself. He conquered his own nervous energy and pulled the Astros even in the World Series.