Cole Hamels Strikes Back

Cole Hamels is an outstanding pitcher in his own right, but just about any pitcher in baseball could stand to learn a few things from Roy Halladay. Going by his dominant outing to finish off the Reds in the National League Division Series on Sunday night, it is quite clear that Hamels has done just that.

Hamels used to be a pitcher who relied heavily on his changeup, and it is still his best pitch, but much like Halladay, we are now seeing more variety with the Phillies’ left-hander and a far more unpredictable approach. The result is a much more dominant and consistent pitcher.

The Reds tried. They did. Brandon Phillips led off the bottom of the ninth with a groundball base hit under the glove of Placido Polanco, and Joey Votto stepped in as the tying run. The crowd was into it. There were rally towels everywhere. Then Votto grounded a routine 4-6-3 double play, and all the air was sucked out of the stadium. Scott Rolen’s subsequent strikeout was a mere formality, and the Phillies will move on to the NLCS once again, having survived three games of offensive underperformance by getting some excellent work on the mound.

Over the last couple seasons, hitters had one thing on their mind facing Hamels. They were thinking about his changeup and when it was coming. It’s an outstanding plus pitch — one of the best changeups in the game — but somewhere along the line Hamels became too much of a two-pitch pitcher in 2009. He does mix in a good curveball of course, but it was clear he had to make some adjustments to his arsenal.

Cole Hamels has been a pitcher that likes to work the outside corner to righties, both with his 91-95 mph fastball and his 81-84 mph changeup. It had been those two well above-average pitches that opposing hitters have had to deal with, but for the most part those two pitches were in similar locations and with similar action. So, it was mostly only a change in speed with which hitters had to contend.

The Phillies managed to push two runs across the plate, and that was more than enough for Cole Hamels, who spun nine scoreless innings in wrapping up an NLDS sweep of the Reds. Check out more at The Good Phight and Red Reporter.

Reds fans are doing everything in their power to help the home team win tonight.

As the story goes, Cole Hamels was hanging out at Cadillac Ranch this afternoon when a waitress brought him over two shots of tequila. The shots came from a couple Reds fans who apparently wanted to ensure that Hamels is nowhere near the strike zone tonight.

Hamels smiled and laughed, definitely NOT partaking in the gift. Shortly after, two Phillies fans approached the pitcher, told him “You can’t drink those!” and proceeded to down the shots.

Nice try Cincinnati fans.

Topics: joey votto\s car