Alzolay maneuvered his way out of two jams in Game 1 of Saturday’s doubleheader, but the third came back to bite him.

After retiring the first two hitters of the game, the 25-year-old right-hander let Paul Goldschmidt reach base on a walk after a seven-pitch battle. But he rebounded to strikeout the red-hot Brad Miller to pop out on a middle-in fastball.

One positive sign was Alzolay’s ability to use all four of his pitches in the 1st inning. He relied heavily on his newly developed two-seam fastball and reshaped curveball to keep Cardinals hitters guessing. 

In the 2nd inning, the first two batters reached base on a walk and an error by Kris Bryant. This brought to the plate a pair of left-handed hitters: Matt Carpenter and Dylan Carlson. Alzolay proceeded to throw only one fastball over eight pitches to retire both hitters. He threw three consecutive changeups to Carpenter and seesawed between speeds against Carlson with his curveball and changeup. 

“When you have that arm speed and the hitter has to respect 95-96 [mph on the fastball], that 86-87 mph changeup looks better,” Marquee Sports Network analyst Sean Marshall said on Cubs Postgame Live!

Alzolay’s attempt to escape danger in the 3rd inning came with one out and the bases loaded. He threw a middle-middle sinker to Paul DeJong who rolled it over to third base. Bryant turned the ball to second baseman Nico Hoerner, who fired it on to Anthony Rizzo at first base. But the ball popped out of Rizzo’s glove as he stretched for it and the Cardinals tied the game.

“A little palm ball maybe from Nico and it pulled Rizzo off the bag just enough,” Marshall said. “[Alzolay] was counting on that out and after that, he was pretty erratic.”

Alzolay walked the next two batters on eight consecutive balls. Ross came out quickly after to cut Alzolay’s outing short. Ryan Tepera cleaned up the mess and kept the Cubs’ deficit at just 1 run entering the 4th inning. 

Alzolay balanced his four-pitch mix more than he ever has in an outing this season or last. He threw no pitch more than 29% of the time and no pitch less than 19% of the time. While he prefers to throw his changeup to left-handed hitters, the deepening of his repertoire is a positive sign for the future. If the rookie got out of the 3rd inning, it could have been a different story in Game 1 for the Cubs.

“I thought the curveball had some quality depth to it,” Marshall said. “But [Alzolay] needs to trust his stuff, trust his movement and trust his offspeed.”

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