Hughes Has Nice Outting, and a New Pitch

From Chad Jennings:

Did you know Phil Hughes (left) has scrapped his slider in favor of a cutter? I did not. But once I found out, tonight's outing made a lot more sense.

Throughout the game, Hughes kept having success with an 87-89 mph pitch that seemed to have more movement than his regular fastball but too much velocity for a slider. He used it to strike out George Kottaras in the first inning, he used it to get a double play in the second, and he threw it off the plate to setup a 93 mph fastball for his final strikeout in the fifth. I thought he might be taking something off his fastball and getting a little extra movement, but no. New pitch. New to me, anyway.

His fastball touched 95 four times in the first inning, and regularly sat 93-94 most of the night. He leaned heavily on the fastball and cutter through the first three innings before mixing in his other pitches more often in the fourth and fifth. He threw three straight changeups the second time he faced Chris Carter. The first two missed up. The third got a routine popup.

Assuming he's not called to New York in the next five days, Hughes will throw 85 pitches on Tuesday in Pawtucket. Scranton/Wilkes-Barre has an off day on Monday, but Nardi Contreras said Hughes will stay on his five-day schedule, meaning someone will be bumped back a day to make room for Hughes.

“Phil Hughes was very good tonight,” Contreras said. “The (velocity) was there obviously. He had a great cutter tonight. His changeup is still not there. The curveball was good. Next time he’ll be even better. He’ll be going 85 pitches and he’ll be a little more crisper.”

I like the addition of a cutter. His slider wasn't that great of a pitch anyway, and he didn't seem to like using it too much. At least this season he didn't. Maybe he will feel more comfortable with the cutter.

It's also nice to see his velocity up.

When Hughes was successful last season it was when he mixed in all of his pitches. Earlier this season he seems to give up on his slider and change, and it hurt him. Hitters were sitting on his fastball and mashing it. The addition of the cutter will help this, and using all four of his pitches regularly will as well