After making his first three Spring Training appearances out of the bullpen, Tony Gonsolin got the start in Sunday’s matchup between the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Francisco Giants at Camelback Ranch.
The right-hander turned in a solid performance, allowing three runs on three hits with five strikeouts and no walks over 4.1 innings of work. Gonsolin’s only blemishes on the day were a pair of home runs allowed to Evan Longoria and Mike Yastrzemski.
Gonsolin has now notched 12 strikeouts without issuing a walk in four Cactus League games. “Just trying to throw a lot of strikes and trying to throw strikes with all pitches,” he said. “Attack the zone, try to stay ahead of guys and hopefully not walk them.”
Gonsolin refuted the notion that he has been incorporating a new pitch this spring to increase his strikeouts. “Not really. Just trying to attack the zone, not trying to be too fine,” he reiterated.
“If they hit it, they hit it. Saw with the Yastrzemski at-bat, I had 3-1 and stuck with the heater. Tried to get back in the zone a little bit and he just got to it.”
Gonsolin, who is one of several pitchers vying for a spot in the Dodgers’ Opening Day starting rotation, attributed his early success to throwing more aggressive bullpen sessions over the offseason. “My body is just feeling better,” he said.
“I was able to get used to things like throwing hard earlier so that I’m not feeling as terrible between outings.”
Gonsolin elaborated on the type of workouts that helped him this past winter. “All the workouts and running was relatively normal. I worked a little bit on mobility and trying to get better with it and stronger within the ranges that I have,” he said.
“Ultimately the biggest difference was how I threw bullpens. I threw them a lot harder, there was a lot more intent behind them. I think it’s paying off.”
Roberts pleased with Gonsolin’s first Spring Training start
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts gave his assessment of Gonsolin after Sunday’s game. “Tony was really good. I think he threw near 70 pitches,” Roberts noted.
“He made two mistakes with the fastball — the one to Longo and the one to Yaz. But outside of that, I thought the slider, change and fastball command were really good.”
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