By Paul Gotham
GENEVA, N.Y. – Tommy Bergjans (Haverford) collected plenty of post-season awards this spring. The 6-1 right-hander earned Centennial Conference Pitcher of the Year along with first team All-Mid-Atlantic region honors and second team All-American from D3Baseball.com.
The notoriety could have left the Manhattan Beach, California native with a heady feeling of contentment.
Instead Bergjans got a chance to learn, and he didn’t hesitate to embrace it. That opportunity for growth came early in the New York Collegiate Baseball League season.
“Last game I introduced all three pitches in the first inning and coach asked: ‘why did you do that? You didn’t need to.’” Bergjans said after Geneva’s victory over the Niagara Power in the first game of Sunday’s doubleheader.
With that wisdom from Geneva pitching coach Andy Weeks in mind, Bergjans took the hill against the Power and threw just his fastball and change-up the first time through the order. He fanned the side in order in the first, allowed a leadoff walk in the second who was erased when caught stealing and had a 1-2-3 third.
Bergjans faced the minimum through three and used just two pitches.
Call it holding on to a pitch. Call it keeping one up the sleeve. Call it sandbagging. But make no mistake, it’s good pitching.
“We’ve been talking to him about it,” Week said. “Instead of being so fine and going for the punch out on every single pitch, you can pitch to a little bit of contact early in the at bat, get ‘em going, and then if you get 0-2, 1-2 then go for that strike out pitch.”
Bergjans wasn’t much for pitching to contact on Sunday. He fanned seven of the first nine Power hitters.
“My fastball was on,” Bergjans stated. “I was able to spot it up pretty well.”
By the time Niagara saw his curveball, Berjans was a third of the way to a no-hitter.
“Leaving that pitch to where he’s not showing it the first time through the order, it just becomes deadly,” Weeks continued. “They couldn’t pick that up. They couldn’t see that curveball.”
An hour and eighteen minute rain delay threatened to derail the effort. Bergjans returned, and Niagara continued to struggle at the plate.
“Even though the opposing team knows you have that curveball,” Bergjans added. “The fact that I don’t show it means they can’t time it. They don’t know the movement, and it changes the eye-level a lot. I’m able to introduce that and throw them off a little more. I can throw it 0-0, and they’re not going to swing because they haven’t seen it.”
Bergjans took a no-hitter into the seventh before surrendering a two-out single. In the eighth he retired the side in order striking out two more for 14 on the day.
“When you can get through three innings successfully just using a change-up and a fastball, it’s going to be tough for our guys that second or third time through because they haven’t seen that curveball yet,” said Niagara head coach Josh Rebandt. “He’s a smart pitcher. Hat’s off to him.”
Before Bergjans could make this adjustment work was needed on his changeup.
“When he came here, his changeup was very firm,” Weeks explained. “It was only a couple miles an hour drop off. He was getting a little bit of action on it, but it was not the velocity drop he wanted. I literally just showed him how to move a couple of fingers on the ball. It was right in the middle and down, so he kinda chokes it a little bit more and took off about five miles per hour. Now, he’s got a good variance between his fastball and his changeup. He’s spotting it better as well.”
Bergjans threw five innings of no-hit ball in his first start of the NYCBL season. Making this adjustment, though, could be the difference in the stretch run and beyond.
“We’ve been working with Tommy on going deeper into games,” Weeks said. “His very first outing he was at a very high pitch count early in the game. That would prevent him from getting deep into games later in the season when our pitch counts start going up, and guys get into the flow.”
The Red Wings (8-7) currently sit in fifth place just two games out of first. They host Hornell Friday night before playing a pair against the Dodgers on their field over the weekend. Bergjans will have a chance to get Geneva a step closer to the top spot in the NYCBL.
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