In baseball you have utility players. Those are guys who can man multiple positions effectively. Usually those players specialize in being around the infield and dabbling in the outfield.
The Padres are turning Christian Bethancourt in to a completely different kind of utility player.
He is a catcher by trade … an outfielder by necessity … and now a relief pitcher by curiosity. Last year Bethancourt made his big league pitching debut, going 1.2 innings over two appearances and not allowing a run.
The Friars were encouraged enough that when the season ended they asked him to focus more on throwing off a mound.
“I did work a lot on it, especially when I was in Panama,” said Bethancourt, who played winter ball in his native country during the off-season. “I was playing left field every day and pitching three times a week. I put a lot of emphasis on my mechanics and watching a lot of videos comparing myself to other pitchers just to get a feeling and see how it goes. I feel like I’m in a pretty good position right now.”
Bethancourt arrived in Peoria, AZ, for Spring Training expecting to work with the pitchers but he’s not trading in his catcher’s mask or outfield glove fully quite yet. He is still a viable offensive threat. Despite a high strikeout rate Bethancourt packs 20-home run potential at the plate.
But it is awfully hard to ignore a mid-to-high-90’s heater so San Diego is exploring this incredibly unique opportunity.
“Obviously my fastball is my best pitch,” said Bethancourt. “My changeup will be my second-best pitch; slider is still a work in progress.”
Bethancourt is trying to slow down his slider to give it more depth. Right now he throws it so hard it doesn’t have much bite to it, coming off more like a cut fastball. But velocity is something that comes natural to the 25-year-old.
“My expectation is he just has a nice, relatively easy side (session),” said manager Andy Green. “His expectation, probably, is he throws 95 MPH so we’re going to try and dial that back a little bit and make sure his body is in a good position.”
That’s how the Padres will handle Bethancourt for the beginning of Spring Training when it comes to his pitching workload. In Panama his fastball is routinely in the mind-90’s and he can probably reach back for a little more if he needs to, but the Friars want to make sure he’s doing it safely so nothing will be rushed.
“I think just get him off the mound, see where the mechanics have changed from when we first put him on the mound last year,” said Green about what he would like to see from Bethancourt in the early going. “That’s about it. He’ll go through PFP’s (Pitchers Fielding Practice) and stuff that he’s not normally accustomed to doing so that will be different for him as well.”
Last season Bethancourt spent 322 innings at catcher, 42 innings in left field and 31 innings in right field … but it’s those 1.2 innings atop a 10-inch mound of dirt that could have unlocked his true baseball future.
