Arizona Diamondbacks Manager Torey Lovullo Evolves With The Times

Arizona manager Torey Lovullo was old school. Grade school book report old school.

“I am very traditional at heart,” Lovullo said as the Diamondbacks prepared to play the Philadelphia Phillies in Game 4 of the National League Championship series on Friday. “In fourth grade I did a book report on Roy Campanella, and my next book report was written about the ‘Gashouse Gang,’ right? Who is doing that in fourth grade?

“Nobody.”

Back then, nobody —or at least very, very few — was replacing starting pitchers who had thrown 5 2/3 scoreless innings in a postseason game, a game that was as close to a must-win as baseball history suggests a game can be. That was then.

A sellout Chase Field crowd booed Lovullo during his walk to the mound and back when he removed starting pitcher Brandon Pfaadt in the top of the sixth inning in a 0-0 game Thursday, which the Diamondbacks won 2-1 on Ketel Marte’s walk-off single to center field in the last of the ninth inning to cut the Phillies’ series advantage to two-games-to-one.

Pfaadt (it’s pronounced fought) had thrown 70 pitches and given two hits while striking out 11 without a walk, and with that outing became the first pitcher in major league history to have back-to-back postseason starts without allowing a run or a walk. He pitched 4 1/3 scoreless, walk-less innings in the NLDS clinching 4-2 victory over the Los Angeles Dodgers his last time out Oct. 11.

He won neither. The Diamondbacks won both.

The game has changed, and Lovullo and his crew has changed with it. The 180-pitch complete game is parked out behind the old schoolhouse.

“One of my biggest fears is getting stuck in 2005 and not evolving as a manager and getting run over by this game,” Lovullo said.

“I think everybody in every industry has that same feel. If you are going to evolve and stay ahead of the curve, you’re going to be successful. I know where I came from. I know my roots in this game, and I appreciated the (Bob) Gibson-(Don) Drysdale games for sure. Loved them. Loved them.

“But this is a new generation of baseball where things are broken down to the inning, to the batter, to the out, to the pitch on a level that we’ve never seen before. I’m sure that if Bob Gibson had that data today and some managers had that data and information today that we have, that they would have evolved as well.

“I don’t want to take anything away from that generation. I am so grateful that these guys are throwing 250-plus (innings) every year, but it’s just not how baseball is today. For whatever reason, it’s not, and I think I need to make that adjustment.”

The Diamondbacks have used a quickish hook more than one this season, and recently. Zac Gallen, a likely top three finisher in the NL Cy Young race, was taken out of a 4-2 victory at Los Angeles in Game of the NLDS after giving up five hits and one run in 5 1/3 innings, when his pitch count reached 84.

Pfaadt, like Gallen, is on board. The Diamondbacks’ plan going into Game 3 was to have Pfaadt face 18 batters, plus or minus a few on either side.

“At the end of the day who knows — woulda, coulda, shoulda,” Pfaadt said “Obviously I’m a competitor. I want to keep going. Everybody does, but at the end of the day you just have to trust his decision and move forward. Go to the bullpen, let them do their jobs.”

Tampa Bay, in particular, has used that strategy for years under Kevin Cash. Blake Snell was taken out after giving up two hits in 5 1/3 scoreless innings in Game 6 of the World Series against the Dodgers, a move that opened a cottage industry of second-guessing. The Dodgers scored two runs after Snell left and won the game 3-1 and the Series that night.

“I have a strategy to everything that I do, and it’s talked about with minimal stimulus, and it’s like how am I going to play this game of chess? That’s how my mind works,” Lovullo said.

“I am really genuinely excited about today’s maneuverability once the game starts. I can’t wait to get it going to see how those pieces come out. So that strategy is something that I believe in, and when it works, you can look like you’re pushing the right buttons, right?

“When it doesn’t work, you got those basement keyboard pounders that are just going to annihilate you. That’s the nature of the beast. But I can assure everybody that’s watching and listening to what I’m saying right now, there’s a strategy to it, and there’s a reason for everything that I do on a daily basis when it comes to a baseball game.”