After shaky start, Chicago White Sox's Giolito looks to get into form
James Shields can have a bad stretch of starts and the Chicago White Sox aren't going to lose too much sleep.
Ditto for Miguel Gonzalez and Chris Volstad. And dating to last season, Derek Holland.
They are all veteran starting pitchers who do not factor into the Sox's future, and eating innings is the main job at hand.
Lucas Giolito is different.
One of three young starters (Reynaldo Lopez, Dane Dunning) acquired from the Washington Nationals in the Adam Eaton trade on Dec. 7, 2016, Giolito is expected to be in the White Sox's rotation for the foreseeable future.
The 23-year-old righty's results matter, and that's why there is some understandable concern at the moment.
"Obviously, the results have been pretty poor," Giolito said.
Heading into Thursday night's start against the Royals at Kansas City, Giolito is 0-3 with a 9.00 ERA.
His first start of the season was OK - Giolito allowed 3 runs in 6 innings at K.C. Over the last three, he is 0-3 with a 10.93 ERA, and the 15 walks in 14 innings are even more alarming.
Giolito has gone back and looked at video when he has struggled in the past, but he hasn't spent much time breaking down film during the current slide.
"I know what I have to make adjustments with," he said. "It's a matter of putting it all together and hopefully getting some good ones here."
Joining the Sox's rotation from Class AAA Charlotte last July, Giolito struggled in his first start but got much better from there. Over his final 6 starts, the 6-foot-6, 245-pounder was 3-2 with a 1.83 ERA.
"I've been working on getting the mechanics right, repeating the delivery better," Giolito said. "At this point I just need to kind of get my flow back. I feel like my delivery, I'm not repeating much of anything. Very out of sync, so I just need to go out there and kind of let it loose a little bit."
Like a lot of young pitchers, Giolito tends to overthink when things aren't going well.
"We'll see where we can help him improve and see if we can put him on the right track, because you know he's got the stuff to go ahead and be able to manage ballgames and keep us there and give us opportunities," manager Rick Renteria said.
"We know that even earlier in the season, when he didn't have his best stuff or his best command, he was grinding, he was eating up some innings, and getting some key outs in certain situations and minimizing damage."
Having done it before leads Giolito to believe he can do it again.
"I've been able to maintain my confidence through this whole process a lot because of what I did last year," he said. "Right now, I feel like there might be a few other factors in play, but, honestly, the main thing is just continue to work on what I have to work on every single day and go out there and pitch and compete to the best of my ability."
Two of the factors are pitching in bitter-cold conditions and making his last start the day after teammate Danny Farquhar collapsed in the dugout with a brain hemorrhage and ruptured aneurysm.
"It's tough," Giolito aaid. "It's on all of our minds. But once you step between the lines you just compete to the best of your ability."