SF Giants
SCOTTSDALE — The last time Scott Kazmir pitched in a major league game, Charlie Blackmon was in the opposing Rockies lineup. But so was Nolan Arenado. So was Carlos Gonzalez. On Sept. 23, 2016, during that Rockies-Dodgers matchup, Chase Utley was Kazmir’s LA teammate.
1,632 days days later, Kazmir was back on a professional mound and facing the same Rockies. Or the different Rockies. His first official step toward reviving a career that barely had a pulse has begun well.
Kazmir, whose career was halted by first injury and then out of a need to care for his family, threw a scoreless inning nearly 4 1/2 years since his last major league appearance and started his Cactus League bid to make the Giants’ roster in earnest.
The first two batters he faced made solid contact, a lined Greg Bird single to center before a ground single up the middle from Elias Diaz. But his fastball was sitting at 91 mph and touching 92 mph, with good downward movement, and his changeup induced a big whiff for strike three from Raimel Tapia. He was happy with the velocity and happier that he wasn’t going max-effort to get it.
“I didn’t want to embarrass myself out there — first time out and just throw nothing but balls and overthrow and everything,” said the 37-year-old with a smile. “So this one was kind of a controlled [effort] — I say controlled, but I was a nervous wreck out there. But after that first couple pitches, I feel like [the nerves] went away.”
There were several swings and misses, which encourages even more than the velocity. He has thrown pretty much every pitch in a 12-year career that began in 2004, but Friday he stuck to fastball, changeup and cutter, while he has thrown a curveball in live batting practice.
After the 9-8, eight-inning victory in front of 1,339 at Scottsdale Stadium, Gabe Kapler was succinct.
“Kaz was good,” the manager, who called the velocity “impressive,” said over Zoom. “… Changeup looked good, attacked the strike zone, very competitive, came into the dugout pretty fired up. I thought it was a good outing.”
Kapler picked up on the nerves, but said Kazmir was able to channel that energy.
Last year, during the pandemic, the veteran was pitching in a start-up independent league because he loved the game and wanted to see if he could still do it. A few months later, his catcher has been upgraded.
He crossed up Buster Posey several times because “I was so jacked up on what pitch I wanted to throw.
“I didn’t even pay attention too much to the sequence and ended up getting it wrong quite a few times,” Kazmir, in camp on a minor league deal, said over Zoom. “A couple of times I had to step off the mound and act like I was messing with my cleats, but I had the wrong grip in my hand and realized it halfway through.”
He is competing with a group that includes Shun Yamaguchi, Nick Tropeano and Conner Menez as a long man/sixth starter/insurance once someone from an injury-prone rotation goes down.
So far, so good. He said he’s throwing his fastball a little bit differently and is getting more ride on it. He will probably have to whittle down which pitches work best at this stage of his career, but it’s a career that is not over.
“Hopefully we can we can build on this outing,” Kazmir said.