{"id":6792,"date":"2013-05-29T09:33:18","date_gmt":"2013-05-29T13:33:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=6792"},"modified":"2014-05-09T14:55:49","modified_gmt":"2014-05-09T18:55:49","slug":"nathan-karns-first-look","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=6792","title":{"rendered":"First Look: Nathan Karns"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Karns looked good enough considering the circumstances in his debut. Photo Brad Mills-USA TODAY Sports<\/p><\/div>\n

A surprise callup for Nathan Karns<\/strong> resulted in an up-and-down performance on 5\/28\/13. \u00a0He showed a power fastball that averaged 94.7 and peaked at 97.36<\/a>. \u00a0He struggled with his curve on the night, only throwing 7 of 16 for strikes as the ball seemed to slip out of his hand (he throws a knuckle-curve and the combination of humidity, steady rain and his own perspiration conspired against his grip all night). \u00a0He threw a few changeups here and there but mostly worked his 4 seam fastball.<\/p>\n

He worked around a very tight strike zone in the first (look at the ball\/strike plot for the first inning<\/a>: the first pitch he threw and a 2-strike call that was within the strike zone by literally 6 inches were missed calls) to get a 1-2-3 inning. \u00a0 Yes he missed his spot, but the ball was clearly a strike. \u00a0Robot Umpires now! \u00a0\ud83d\ude09 \u00a0He got touched for a run in the 2nd off of a couple of well-hit balls before reaching back and getting a key strikeout of the Baltimore #8 hitter (and then finishing off the helpless #9 AL pitcher Kevin Gausman<\/strong> for two of his three Ks on the night). \u00a0He continued to get weaker ground ball outs in the 3rd before getting touched up for a couple of runs and a couple of bombs in the 4th.<\/p>\n

He was running on fumes by the middle of the 5th, having sat out a lengthly weather delay, having thrown 85 pitches and seeing his velocity dipping. \u00a0His only two walks on the night were the last two guys he faced, a telling sign. \u00a0He was lifted for Zach Duke<\/strong> (the guy whose performance was so bad in his own spot start that he couldn’t keep this role above a AA player), who “stole” the Win from Karns with a clean 5-out performance. \u00a0That sucks for Karns frankly; he had a 7-3 lead with the bottom of the order coming up; you couldn’t try to let Karns get that double play to get a victory?<\/p>\n

On the night; he induced a number of weaker ground ball outs (especially to 2nd base; Steve Lombardozzi<\/strong> was really busy on the night). \u00a0His fastball just seemed “heavy” to the hitters, and despite giving up a few hard hit balls he also got a number of weaker hit balls and wristed floaters into the outfield. \u00a0I’d like to see more strikeouts (just 3 on the night). \u00a0 Pitch F\/X says he throws both a 2-seamer and 4-seamer; I didn’t see any difference in any of his fastballs though and the velocity looks too similar to be distinct (I think the horizontal movement delta was why Pitch F\/X classified the balls differently; I just think some of his pitches had more horizontal movement than others). \u00a0So right now Karns is what we though he is; a good fastball, a plus curve when he can grip it, a relatively unused changeup and no 4th pitch. \u00a0After this little stint I think the team sends him back to AAA to learn another pitch. \u00a0Why not incorporate a 2 seamer and try to get some sink? \u00a0He throws basically overhand (his curve is a 12-to-6 er) and a power 2-seamer could be an effective change of pace to his 4-seamer moving horizontally. \u00a0Or try a split-fingered fastball to see if his over-the-top delivery can get some drop?<\/p>\n

In the end; He pitched pretty durn well for a guy with just a handful of minor league starts above A-Ball. \u00a0He did well enough to earn another start. \u00a0And he’ll need all the help he can get; that start is next sunday in Atlanta against the first place and streaking Braves. \u00a0He was clearly nervous in his MLB debut and the conditions didn’t help; lets see how he does after a regular turn and in more “calm” conditions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A surprise callup for Nathan Karns resulted in an up-and-down performance on 5\/28\/13. \u00a0He showed a power fastball that averaged 94.7 and peaked at 97.36. \u00a0He struggled with his curve on the night, only throwing 7 of 16 for strikes as the ball seemed to slip out of his hand (he throws a knuckle-curve and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1788,196,142,906],"class_list":["post-6792","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mlbpitching","tag-kevin-gausman","tag-nathan-karns","tag-steve-lombardozzi","tag-zach-duke"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6792","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6792"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6792\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8924,"href":"https:\/\/nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6792\/revisions\/8924"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6792"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6792"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6792"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}