The Cincinnati Reds starting rotation has been an absolute mess because of injury and that continued on Sunday when they had to bring up another starting pitcher from the minor leagues. The Reds called up 28-year-old right hander Tim Adleman for his Major League debut.
The journey for Adleman to the Major Leagues was a long and tough one. He was the 24th round draft pick of the Baltimore Orioles out of Georgetown in 2010. He only spent two seasons with the Orioles before he was released. The righty then pitches in various independent leagues for the 2012 and 2013 seasons before signing a minor league free agent contract with the Reds before the 2014 season. He’s performed very well since signing with the Reds, spending most of his time at the Double-A level working in both the rotation and the bullpen.
Tim Adleman began the 2016 season with the Triple-A Louisville Bats and made three starts, posting a 4.24 ERA in 17.0 innings with four walks and 13 strikeouts. He was held back from his regularly scheduled start on Saturday as the Reds knew they may need him to pitch on Sunday and sure enough, they did.
The former Georgetown Hoya pitcher threw 6.0 strong innings, allowing just two runs on three hits and two walks while striking out six batters. He only needed 92 pitches to get through his start, throwing 59 strikes, getting three ground ball outs and five fly ball outs along the way.
Against the Pirates on Sunday Adleman nearly averaged 93 MPH with his fastball according to BrooksBaseball.net. He would also mix in an 87 MPH change up and a 77 MPH curveball to keep the Pittsburgh hitters off balance. The right hander used either his 4-seam or 2-seam fastball 69% of the time, then relied more on his curveball (18%) with a few change ups mixed in (12%). In total he would generate 11 swings and misses, getting five on his 4-seam fastball and two each for his other three offerings.
Adleman isn’t the youngest guy around, and he’s not one of the organizations top prospects, particularly as a starting pitcher. On Sunday though he did exactly what he’s been doing since joining the organization: Throwing strikes with all of his pitches, mixing them all up well and keeping hitters off balance because of it. Now that he’s on the 40-man roster there’s a chance that perhaps he winds up in the big league bullpen, who needs anyone who can throw strikes in the worst kind of way, when the team begins to get some of their currently injured starting pitchers back onto the big league roster.