The Farnsworth Experiment off to shaky start
By ALAN ESKEW
The Kyle Farnsworth experiment to make him a starter after a decade in the bullpen did not get off to a good start Monday.
In the Kansas City Royals’ 14-5 loss to the Cincinnati Reds, Farnsworth made his spring training debut and faced 13 batters. Only eight reached base. Just five scored. There were merely three extra-base hits – two doubles and a Drew Stubbs home run – among the six hits Farnsworth allowed. And Farnsworth kept his walk total down to three in 1 2/3 innings. He did retire five, striking out two.
Just the kind of results you expect from your No. 5 starter. NOT. And not the kind of results Farnsworth wanted either in his spring training debut.
“Of course not,” Farnsworth said. “But at the same time, I’m just out there trying to get a feel. It’s the first time in game situation in four months. I definitely would have liked the results a little better, but I’m just trying to get a feel for mechanics and the whole game atmosphere.
“I was trying to throw the ball down the middle of the plate and try to get a feel of the release point and go from there. I wasn’t going to try to be too fine and try to put everything where I wanted to. I was just trying to get a feel of my pitches and just go from there.”
Farnsworth was 1-5 with a 4.58 earned run average in 41 relief appearances last year, allowing 43 hits and striking out 42 in 37 1/3 innings. He missed nearly two months of the season with a pulled right groin.
He made five starts, including the second game of the season against the New York Mets in Tokyo
“I definitely like starting,” he said. “It’s something I haven’t done in a long time. It’s going to take some used to if that’s the role I’m going to be taking this year. It’s definitely something I’m looking forward to. I’ve been looking forward to it all off-season.”
Returning to the rotation crossed Farnsworth’s mind in 2009.
“I actually thought about it this time last year what it would be like to do it again,” he said. “They came up to me halfway through the season and asked me. It was kind of a joint thing on accident. We both agreed to give it a try. They asked me, but I was thinking about it before they even came and asked me.”
But why?
“Sometimes I guess when you start getting old, you think about how you came in the game or just try something different,” said Farnsworth, who turns 34 on April 14. “It’s a game of adjustments, what works and doesn’t work and go out there and have fun with it.”
Farnsworth could be throwing 100 pitches every fifth day if he makes the rotation.
“Instead of 100 every three days,” he said and laughed.
To prepare for a starting job, Farnsworth said he did more off-season running (“As a reliever, I really didn’t do that much,” he said) and took his changeup out of the moth bag.
“I pulled it out of the back pocket and tried to find a new grip for it,” Farnsworth said. “It’s a feel pitch. You’ve got to throw it for awhile to find out what feels best for you, get a good grip that works with you and work with it day in and day out.”
There is also another adjustment from going to the bullpen to starter.
“I’m just trying to get myself more mentally prepared as far as going just one inning, going a lot longer in the game,” he said. “(I’ll) try to setup hitters better instead of just going in with two pitches or one pitch. You’ve got to learn how to set them up from their first at-bat to their third. So there are more mental things you’ve got to learn how to do.”
Farnsworth said the worse thing that can happen is he goes back to the bullpen if he is not in the rotation.
If he does not pitch any better than Monday, he has no chance to be in the rotation.
“They squared four or five of them up, but they hit a couple off the end of the bat and he didn’t get help on the ball to left-center (a Jonny Gomes double that Brian Anderson should have caught),” manager Trey Hillman said. “He wasn’t real good at locating today. I saw some depth on the slider. He threw a couple of good changeups. I’m glad he got that in. The two-seamer had real good life. He just missed out over the plate with his four-seam fastball.”
Brian Bannister pitched two scoreless innings and Anthony Lerew retired all three batters he faced in the eighth. The other Kansas City
“You try to give them a little more of a leash in their first outing against people in a different uniform, but there’s a lot of competition this spring, so hopefully they’ll take the bull by the horns in their next time out, locate their pitches better and pitch ahead in the count.
“We’ve got to take 12 guys with us that are going to throw strikes. We need strike throwers. Our walks went up way too high last year. We’ve got to get guys who are going to throw strikes cause we think we’re going to be better and more efficient defensively.”
Posted by Matt Fulks at 3/10/2010 6:30 AM 
Categories: article
Tags: Kansas City Royals Alan Eskew Kyle Farnsworth
Categories: article
Tags: Kansas City Royals Alan Eskew Kyle Farnsworth
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