Ivan Nova had his best appearance of the season Monday night against the Cincinatti Reds and showed significant signs of progress. It’s almost funny how just a few weeks ago, the media was declaring that following Nova’s poor start in Seattle his next start was a test as to whether he can stay in the rotation. Although he had his share of growing pains, Nova has consistently improved throughout the season. Once known for his problems facing a lineup the second and third time through – last night he was stronger each time through the lineup. He became so dominant throughout the game that he retired 24 of the final 26 batters he faced. What really impresses me is the Reds are an offensive powerhouse (most runs in NL), and Nova shut them down in the Great American Ballpark, which is known as a hitters park.
Nova pitched 8 solid innings against the Reds for a total of 105 pitches. I don’t think anybody would dispute that he could have pitched the 9th inning, but not for Girardi over managing the game. Through 8 innings, Nova only allowed 4 hits and issued no walks. Even more impressive was his 7 strikeouts, which was his season high. Although the numbers are impressive, what I found to be more important was his actual performance.
Normally Nova relies upon two pitches – his fastball and his curveball. In fact, this is what gets him into trouble on many nights. When his curve isn’t working or his fastball isn’t sinking, he continues to use those two pitches almost exclusively and ends up with too many walks for the game or elevates his fastball causing monster hits. Last night was different though. Nova did throw his fastball and his curve, but he also used his changeup and his slider. The changeup which definitely lacked his fastball velocity was his “out” pitch last night (along with the sharp slider) but this wasn’t your typical changeup. Something was a little funny about this changeup that during the post game show, many reporters were asking Russell Martin whether the pitch was actually a changeup or a variation on a breaking ball.
The changeup had some movement to it which caused batters to get on top of it and forced ground outs to the infield. During last night’s game, Nova forced 16 in-play ground balls. In the first inning when reigning NL MVP, Joey Votto was at bat with runners on the corners, Nova threw him a changeup. Votto did get the run in, but grounded into a double play in the process. Following Votto’s at bat, Nova retired 22 of the next 24 batters. Nova forced so many ground balls and had great command over his slider that 22 of the 24 outs during his 8 innings were either ground outs or strikeouts. At the end of the night, both Votto and Jay Bruce (#3 & #4) didn’t record any of those 4 hits. Nova discussed this after the game and said he wouldn’t throw either of those guys a fastball because of their power. Instead he used the changeup and the slider.
Besides the great changeup, Nova threw a dynamic slider. The slider had some serious movement on it and Nova was able to locate the pitch extremely well. By throwing the curve, changeup and the slider batters were always caught on their heels. This caused the hitters problems with the fastball, especially since the fastball had velocity and was thrown in the bottom half of the strike zone. No batter could get the barrel of their bat on the ball in time, because they had seen too many breaking pitches. All in all, it was a terrific performance from a young pitcher. Hopefully this start, puts all the negative press to an end as Nova proved he can dominate any team…. And hopefully Girardi will let him finish the game next time rather than calling in the relief… if you can even call it relief!
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