Orioles' Relief Pitcher Brad Brach Joins Scott And Jeremy To Discuss His Performance Against The Red Sox On Sunday
Orioles' relief pitcher Brad Brach joins Scott and Jeremy to discuss his performance against the Red Sox on Sunday, as well as the club's team chemistry.
Brach, 4-0 this season with a 2.37 ERA, earned the win on Sunday after striking out four of Boston's batters in three innings of work. Being that the game went to extra-innings, Brach's performance was exactly what the Orioles needed in a clutch situation.
"It was nice to be out there with the game on the line. I enjoy that spot and it was nice to be out there again," said Brach.
Speaking on that close win, it would have been easy for the Orioles to complete their collapse and let Boston have a walk-off win to take the weekend series, but Brach mentioned his team's grit in crunch time.
"That seems to be the theme here lately. We fight till the last out and the last at bat," Brach acknowledged.
With extra baseball and a lot of high pitch counts against a patient Boston team, it's common for relief pitchers such as Brach to struggle finding a rhythm with their catcher. However, Brach said that's not the case with his clubhouse.
"If you don't trust you catcher it's going to be tough. Whatever Caleb [Joseph] put up there, I felt comfortable throwing. We talk a lot in the pitcher-and-catcher meetings and we all have a good rapport. There's definitely a huge trust factor there," said Brach.
What's more, under Buck Showalter, the Orioles have become notorious for switching up their roster quite often, interchanging roster spots to accommodate match-ups. Though that may create friction in some clubhouses, Brach describes quite the opposite result.
"Like Buck says in spring training, it's not going to be 25; it's going to be forty of us to win this whole thing. It's a different guy every night. It's been awesome, and it's fun to be on a winning team, that's for sure."
Elaborating on that team unity, Brach explained the dynamic between the defensive unit and the pitchers.
"Having an infield that seems to cover every inch of the dirt is really great, and in the outfield Adam Jones always tells me 'just let us make the plays for you,' that really makes a difference," said Brach.
Looking ahead to the Orioles' four-game series with the cross-town Nationals, Baltimore will need to keep that chemistry going. Though the series is in a National League team's ballpark for the first two games, Brach doesn't see any extra challenges from a pitcher's point of view.
"The games seem a little bit quicker. That's the only difference, really. It's still major league baseball and it's still a tough game."
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