Projo Sox Blog

By Joe McDonald
Journal Sports Writer

PAWTUCKET _ When Clay Buchholz would arrive at the ballpark on the day he pitched, he was all business.

The talented young right-hander would keep to himself. He would go through his routine listening to music to keep in focused on the task at hand. Now the music man plays the guitar in the clubhouse and converses with his teammates on the days he toes the rubber.

The 24-year-old top pitching prospect is clearly more relaxed this season and the results prove it.

Buchholz earned his first Triple-A victory of the season in four starts as he worked 5 1/3 scoreless innings, allowing only 2 hits with 2 walks and 6 strikeouts to lead Pawtucket to a 1-0 victory over the Gwinnett Braves at McCoy Stadium.

In order to fully understand how effective Buchholz was on Sunday, it can be described in his two-out bases-loaded situation in the fifth inning.

He cruised through the first 4 2/3 innings, retiring 13 of the first 15 batters he faced. He had two outs in the fifth when first baseman Paul McAnulty made an error to put a runner on first. Buchholz then surrendered a bloop hit to shallow center field and walked the next batter to load the bases.

When a situation like this happened last season, it got ugly. He let the game speed up on him and he lost focus.

Not now.

On Sunday he settled down and knew exactly what he needed to do. And he did it.

Buchholz ended the threat, and secured the PawSox one-run lead, by getting Gwinnett's lead-off hitter Greg Blanco to ground out to McAnulty.

"If I can take anything out of [Sunday] it was that inning," said Buchholz. "To be faced with adversity like that, with a good contact hitter up there with the bases loaded and a 3-1 count, and being able to get out of it, it's all about making your pitches and it could have gone either way fairly easily. I was definitely pleased with that and I feel like everything is set in stride right now and I'll continue to take it outing by outing."

A year ago it didn't matter whether he was in the big leagues or the minors, if he was in a similar situation he would have tried his best to strike the batter out. Now it's about executing the right pitch in a certain situation that calls for a ground ball.

"Those are the little things I see myself doing now versus last year," he said. "I was trying to throw the ball past the batter, making him swing and miss. Now if you're going to hit it, you're going to hit it where I want you to and those things are taking care of themselves right now."

PawSox manager Ron Johnson was very pleased with Buchholz's ability to get out of the jam.

"He didn't keel over in that inning," said Johnson. "It's about maturity. He kept getting back on the mound, trying to make pitches. He made a couple where you could see he wasn't happy with the pitch, but it didn't affect the quality of his stuff - it didn't effect when he went back on the mound and that's what it's all about. I was pleased with it. I think the maturity is coming and he looked that way today."

Entering Sunday's start Buchholz was 0-0 with a 2.45 ERA. After his first start of the season in Buffalo, he suffered a hamstring strain and went 10 days between starts. When he returned he admitted he was favoring the hamstring, but he was still able to be effective.

Sunday was the first time he felt he was able to finally let it go.

"I didn't want to go full effort and interrupt the progress I have going on right now. Today I felt everything was smooth and down through the zone instead of at the very end of [my delivery] pulling off to make sure nothing happened. I felt good," he said.

After the PawSox held on to their 1-0 victory, Buchholz's guitar was packed and in his locker. If it's the music that helps him return to form, he'll be a Grammy-winning artist, too.

 Tags  Clay Buchholz PawSox Red Sox

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