DUNEDIN
Dunedin Blue Jays pitching coach Vince Horsman says he has a future major-league pitcher sitting in his bullpen on game nights.
His name is Alberto Tirado, and the main reason he isn't pitching on baseball's biggest stage is that the 20-year-old has thrown just over 200 innings as a professional.
"I think for right now, for him, it's just all about consistency, and the way you get consistency is by going out there and pitching," Horsman said. "So that being said, all it is for me is getting out there and getting game experience.
Most of Tirado's experience to this point has been positive.
The 6-foot, 180-pound right-hander was signed by Toronto when he was only 14 years old after the organization saw him compete in the Dominican Republic for his Santo Domingo Little League team.
"(I) liked baseball and especially in the islands, it's really easy to like baseball," Tirado said via his translator and teammate, Jorge Saez.
In his first professional season of 2012, Tirado split time between the Blue Jays' Rookie League squads, then broke through for a sub-2.00 earned-run average the following year. He spent his time starting and coming out of the bullpen in Bluefield (W.Va.), appearing in 12 games with a 3-0 record and 1.68 ERA.
Tirado moved up to Vancouver of the short-season Single-A Northwest League (3.58 ERA in 17 appearances) and was called up to Toronto's Single-A affiliate in Lansing, Mich., later in 2014. That is where he experienced his first on-the-field setbacks.
"At the lower levels like the half season, sometimes you can get away with just the pure arm strength that he has and throw the ball by people (he has a fastball in the mid 90s)," said Horsman, who was Lansing's pitching coach at the time.
"In Lansing he figured out that he had to throw more strikes — they would just wait on him and he'd walk a lot of guys. Then when he had to throw the ball over the plate, it was usually elevated and he had a hard time getting to his secondary pitches because he was working behind in the counts."
Tirado walked 40 batters in 40 innings. When he was getting the ball in the zone, opposing hitters were all over him, to the tune of a 6.30 ERA in 13 appearances, including seven starts.
Working with Horsman, however, proved to be the remedy to his slide. Tirado impressed enough Blue Jays brass in spring training that he and his pitching coach were promoted to Advanced Single-A ball in the Florida State League.
Now in his second year with Horsman, Tirado is beginning to find success coming out of the bullpen in the late innings. In 17 appearances, Tirado has a 1.77 ERA with a perfect 2-0 record.
"Just let him enjoy the success that he's having and I really think, for me, his future is as a middle reliever in the big leagues," his pitching coach said.
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Explore all your optionsTo help Tirado adapt to the language and culture of the United States, the Toronto organization has classes for non-English speakers. He's feeling more acclimated.
"It was hard when you have to leave home … I didn't know any English or anything like that," Tirado said. "(I've) gotten used to it, (I've) gotten comfortable with the surroundings …"
"It just took time. It was just being here, the classes helped me out a bunch. I've picked up a lot of the English. … A lot of it was just more maturity."
Now that he has matured in his personal life, all that's standing between Tirado and a big-league mound is maturing his arm.