My Interview With Justin Masterson, Part II |

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My Interview With Justin Masterson, Part II

By Administrator | February 17, 2009

Justin Masterson started the 2008 season as a starter at Double-A Portland (ME). He allowed only two runs in his first four starts, including three scoreless outings, yet thanks to his bullpen his record stood at only 1-0. He made his major league debut against the LA Angels on April 24th at Fenway Park, receiving a No Decision despite allowing only one run on two hits over six innings.

After that start, he returned to Portland and struggled mightily – seemingly suffering a ‘letdown’ after his visit to The Show. He took the loss in three of his next four outings. He surrendered eight runs on nine hits and five walks over 8 2/3 innings as he suffered the loss in each of his next two outings (against Bowie and New Hampshire). Then, on May 15th, he allowed seven runs on nine hits and two walks over six innings as he suffered the loss in Trenton.

He was again called up by the Red Sox to make an emergency start at Fenway Park on May 20th. He earned his first big league win against Kansas City with 6 1/3 innings of three-hit ball. After that game, he was again sent down – but this time to Triple-A Pawtucket. He would soon be recalled as a stop-gap for the Red Sox rotation, this time making seven starts in June and July (he went 3-3).

The Red Sox front office then determined they needed help in the bullpen, so Masterson was sent back to Pawtucket and converted to relief. Over his next three appearances, all as a reliever, he provided the PawSox with two perfect outings, earning himself a promotion to Boston. He never returned to the minor leagues

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S1F: Did any of the Sox pitchers take you under their wing and mentor you last season?

JM: In spring training, Curt Schilling tried. He’s a nice guy and I like him and all, but some of his speeches were more on the money side of things. And while some of the guys, maybe most guys, are driven by that, it’s not what’s driving me right now. He had a lot of good things to say and a lot of good advice. He’s an interesting individual… a great pitcher… and I had a good time being able to talk to him. Even during the season, he’d come into the clubhouse and visit every once in a while… and he always came over to say ‘hi’ – which I appreciated.

When I was a starter, pretty much all of the starters took me aside. Josh Beckett and Tim Wakefield. And Jon Lester, too. We’re a lot closer in age, but we’re friends too and a good friendship developed and we talked a lot.

When I went out to the bullpen, it was more of me searching out and those guys did a good job of listening and replying. Javy Lopez, in particular, was one of my ‘go to’ guys. And our bullpen coach, Gary Tuck, he was great to have around and to be able to talk with. Mike Timlin and Manny Delcarmen helped too… I tried to get Okajima to say something, but he’s pretty quiet.

S1F: Your numbers (stats) suffered a little bit last year when you hit the major leagues. Your walk ratio increased from a walk every 3.5 innings pitched to a walk every 2 innings pitched… and your home run percentage (the percent of fly balls that went for home runs) increased from 4% to about 14%.

Fellow prospect Michael Bowden said you struggle a little bit when you open up too quickly with your left side. He says that tendency causes you to have trouble with your control and to elevate the ball a bit – which seem to be illustrative of why you had trouble with your walk and home run ratios. So I’m wondering whether your struggles, such that they were, stemmed from you mechanics… or consistency… the quality of major league hitters… or maybe all of the above?

JM: Honestly, throughout the entire year I thought my sinker wasn’t as good as it had been the year before. Someone might not understand how I can say that when I did so well, but in my head, the sinker I know and the sinker I’ve seen in the past was not the one that I had last year. There were some mechanical issues at the beginning of the year. My body was leaning over a little more, which made it harder for my arm to get over the top.

Talking about the walk-ratio, the majority of the time I was walking guys was probably when I was trying to pound sinkers, because they would always be about six inches off the plate… every time I tried to throw (a sinker), it would be inside too much to a righty and outside too much to a lefty.

S1F: So, what exactly were you doing that caused the pitch to be six inches off the plate?

JM: Like I said, my whole upper body was bent over. It was preventing my delivery from being free and easy. I always threw across the body a little bit, but (at that point) I was doing it more and the arm was having a tougher time getting over the top. Even though I am a side-arm pitcher, I still have to, in a sense, get over the top of the ball. It’s a lot like Michael said with the shoulder, I open up because I am trying to over-compensate to get (my arm) out in front.

It was interesting because when I went to the bullpen people thought I got a little better because I was throwing harder; but honestly, in my opinion, I took that time in the bullpen to make the mechanical adjustment. I had tried beforehand to make the adjustment but it just got worse, so I decided to use what was working for me (at that time)… Then when they said that I was moving to the bullpen, and that I was going to Pawtucket for a couple of weeks, I figured it was a perfect chance to work on it. So I worked on staying up taller so that my arm could get through… so I could go straight to the plate and get better sink. It still wasn’t perfect, but it was a lot better.

The change allowed me to hit my spots better, so I started doing a little bit better against lefties. I mean, it’s not like I was doing too terribly against lefties – they only hit something like .230 against me – so it may be a little nit-picky. But now when I was pitching inside to a lefty, instead of having the fastball stay six inches inside I was hitting my spot and getting a strike. Now the lefty has to be conscious of the inside corner, and that opens up a sinker away or a slider in… so that one mechanical adjustment made me more consistent and that made me a better pitcher. It helped me get back to who I am.

S1F: Did you expect to have the success you had last season?

JM: That’s a tough question. A part of me knew I could do this, but did I expect it to be so soon? I don’t know. At the beginning of the year, I thought that maybe I’d get a September call-up… and I thought that would be fast because that would have been my second year going into my third year. I thought I might get a September call-up and then maybe make the team coming out of the next spring training, which would have been this year (2009).

S1F: Was your first taste of the big leagues everything you thought it would be?

JM: Yeah… and more. And our clubhouse made it even more enjoyable. We had talked about it a little earlier today (at the Hot Stove Cool Music Rountable)… someone asked me how it is that our young guys can come up and be so good. Long story short, I said that it has a lot to do with being able to come into a clubhouse with a manager and a group of quality people like we have… these guys welcome you and say “Hey, you’re coming in to fill a spot and we expect you to do well and we’re going to do everything we can to help you be good and succeed”. They are such a great group of guys, quality guys, and they allow a young guy to come in a feel like a part of something that can be successful. And that has a lot to do with why us younger guys ARE successful.

S1F: Did you ever feel like you wanted to pinch yourself to make sure it was real?

JM: You know, it really took until after the season to understand what had taken place. Honestly, during the season, I had only one real instance where I thought “WOW!”. We were in Cincinnati and I got to pitch against Ken Griffey, Jr. Cincinnati had been my favorite team growing up and I’d been following him for so long, and I’d played his video game, and then all of a sudden he was walking up to the plate. I was like, “WOW!”. It was almost like a movie.

S1F: How’d you do against him?

JM: I walked him the first time – on four pitches – and then I struck him out. And of course, that’s all my buddies wanted to talk about after the game. You know, I gave up two home runs, but afterwards everyone I knew who went to the game – I probably had something like 2,000 people at that game – every single one of them wanted to talk abot the Griffey strikeout.

Getting back to your earlier question, if we’d have had this conversation a year ago, I couldn’t have dreamed what took place last year… not just how cool it’s been and what took place, but also feeling so confident and feeling relaxed throughout the entire season. I mean, that’s what I wanted to happen, but a year ago I wouldn’t have EXPECTED it to happen..

S1F: A few weeks ago, the ballclub traded Coco Crisp to KC and got Ramon Ramirez… with him plugged into the bullpen, it appeared the fifth starter slot would come down to you and Clay. Then the club signed Brad Penny, so then I started to think that maybe you would stay in the bullpen and Clay would start the year in Pawtucket. And now they’ve signed John Smoltz.

Those of us outside the organization wonder about the communication within the organization. We wonder if the Sox spoke with you earlier in the off-season and told you to work on stretching your arm out to prepare for the rotation… or whether recently, with the acquisition of Penny and Smoltz, they have now told you to prepare yourself for the bullpen?

JM: The reason the club moved me to the bullpen during the season was need. There were mixed feelings at the time… some people wanted me to move and others thought that I was doing fine and maybe they should just leave me where I was (in the rotation).

When we moved to the off-season, I think the the thinking was – and it continues to be – that I should be preparing myself to be a starter, and then we’ll work from there. And it’s a lot easier to do that.

I’m very satisfied to know that I’ll be with the big league club. This is obviously the first year I’ve had that type of assurance. I’m coming in with the mind set that I’ll be a starter; but, like you said, I see that we’ve acquired guys like Brad Penny and John Smoltz, and we also have guys like Clay and even Michael Bowden. We have a lot of quality guys, and that may lead me back to the bullpen.

If something happens, the team has the knowledge that I’ve started before and I can do it… that’s not to say that I’m going to be in the bullpen for life or that I’d be a starter for life. Someone told me that my diversity, being able to do both, actually hurts me, but in a good way – because I can be used in any way they want.

Honestly, it sounds like a trite response, but I am just really happy to be pitching in the big leagues.

S1F: Tell me about the hairdo… or should I say, the lack of hairdo.

JM: I think I did it my sophomore year in high school. I was Mr Clean for Halloween. I was able to convince my mom so I could shave my head. I had a buzz cut, and she likes a little bit of hair, so I said I had to shave my head in order to be Mr Clean. She said okay, so I did it. That’s when I started it and why I started it, and that’s a big part of where the nickname, Mr Clean, comes from. It gets a little bristly at night so I shave it every day… but I love the feeling of the smoothness. I love it!

S1F: I know you’ve only been here a short time, but I wonder if you think it’s too crazy here in Boston. Is Red Sox Nation too intense?

JM: Wow. I guess you could say that, but you certainly want people to have passion. Of course, sometimes you may want to push their passion in a certain direction, but you’re happy there’s a passion and that baseball is something they care about so deeply.

There are times when it does encroach so deeply that (the players) are no longer people, they’re items… or when things are said in such a way that they become personal. That’s when you want to say: “Wo! Slow down a little bit. He is a person, he has a family, he has feelings”. When we don’t do well, we know it. We’re not happy, so relaying the message fifteen times isn’t going to help things. That could be why some players maybe don’t listen anymore or maybe are as responsive to the fans.

So sometimes I think things can go a little too far, but overall it’s cool. The fans here are amazing. There is such knowledge of the game, and not just in the New England area. In actuality Red Sox Nation extends throughout the country. No other club has that type of fans like Red Sox fans… not even Yankees fans have the kind of intensity that there is here for the Red Sox.

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Masterson Interview Part I

Masterson Interview Part III

Masterson Interview Part IV

Masterson Interview Part V

Topics: Sox Player Interviews, Sox Players |