MOOSIC, Pa. — Orioles pitching prospect DL Hall dealt with an internal battle recently.
The 24-year-old wants the ball, loves to compete and is blessed with a lightning-quick left arm. He’ll pitch in games as long as he can. But he also hasn’t had the same, radar-gun-igniting fastball of the past. To regain it, he knows he has to throttle back and pitch less.
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That, in essence, is the 2023 rub for Hall, who has made just one appearance for the Orioles this season while pitching 10 times for the Triple-A Norfolk Tides.
Hall, listed by The Athletic as the Orioles’ fifth-best prospect and 84th overall in baseball, has lacked his traditional oomph that pushes his fastball to 98 or 100 mph when he reaches for it. He is healthy. His command is better than ever. But his fastball sat at 92 or 93 mph in May.
And he knows why.
Hall is a gym rat. He believes his success as a power pitcher comes partially from the time he spends lifting weights. This winter, however, he dealt with lower back discomfort and doctors told him to stop pumping iron.
“I’m a power guy. I lived in the weight room, always building my power,” Hall said. “Power is one of my biggest things, so when I wasn’t really able to lift, it kind of took a lot away from me.”
For roughly three months, as a way to protect his back, Hall was instructed to stay away from weight training. Once he returned to full workouts in spring training, he concentrated on getting his arm stretched out to begin the season in a rotation — with either the Orioles or the Tides.
Initially, the Orioles had some rotation openings and wanted Hall, the organization’s first-round pick in 2017, to be in the mix, even though the back injury delayed his ramping up for the season.
Ultimately, the Orioles sent Hall to Norfolk to build up his innings and be ready to plug into the big-league rotation when needed. Since then, he’s had some good outings for the Tides — and one fill-in, seven-strikeout performance for the Orioles in late April — but his velocity dragged.
DL Hall's 3Ks in the 6th
— Rob Friedman (@PitchingNinja) April 29, 2023
That often can mean an arm injury. But Hall felt great physically — his shoulder, his arm, his elbow, his back all felt fine. He just didn’t possess his usual strength at this time of year.
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So, the organization approached Hall with a plan: Switch to three-inning starts once a week on Tuesdays. Spend the rest of the week with a more intensive lifting program, something players usually don’t do in-season.
It would mean he’d spend more time in the minors, which Hall — or any young pitcher — doesn’t want. But it would also mean he’d add power, which should help him as the season progressed. It also would help keep his innings total down in the first half of this year.
Hall was somewhat torn. It’s tough to think of the big picture when you are 24 and pitching pretty well in the minors. But he also wanted his velocity back because it’s such an important tool in his arsenal.
“It’s really hard. It’s something that I’ve battled,” Hall said of thinking about the big picture. “I just keep reminding myself, (think) long game. Just keep reminding myself of that. For me, personally, it’s trusting in God’s plan. I know he’s doing this to strengthen me in the long run.”
Every Tuesday in the last few weeks, Hall has thrown three innings or up to 60 pitches and then completed a heavy lifting session following his start. He lifts again on Thursdays, and then throws a bullpen and lifts on Saturdays. On the other days he goes through lighter workouts. Hall has posted a 7.36 ERA in the four truncated Triple-A outings so far, but that’s been skewed by one awful start. Otherwise, his ERA in the other three games is 2.89.
More important, his velocity is creeping upward. On May 10, the start before his “deloading,” Hall’s fastball averaged 92.7 mph and peaked at 94.5 mph. According to Statcast, it jumped to 93.2 on average and a 95 peak on May 16, and was at 94 on average and 96.1 peak on May 23 and May 30. It did drop a bit in his start Thursday, 93.6 mph average and 95.3 peak, but his routine was thrown off by two consecutive game cancellations due to poor air quality near Scranton, Pa.
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“I think he understood why we were giving him this opportunity to kind of regroup or ‘deload’ or however you want to put it,” said Norfolk pitching coach Justin Ramsey. “And we’ve seen what we wanted to see with the (velocity) starting to come back a little more consistently and at the higher ends. And so I think there’s plenty of positives to the thought process. Even though you can look at it as we’re limiting him to only three innings a week, for what that can mean long term, it was kind of a no-brainer.”
There’s also been another benefit to Hall’s “deloading.” Without having the blazing fastball, he’s had to focus on mixing his pitches, and he now has a lot more confidence in his ability to locate all of his secondary offerings. His command has often been a work in progress.
“It’s helped my pitchability tremendously … not being able to get away with misses as much as I could when I was throwing 98,” Hall said. “It’s been a pretty substantial difference, especially analytically. There were a couple of weeks where I was leading the organization in quality locations and things like that. … To go out there and compete my butt off with my ‘C’ stuff has been really big.”
On Thursday, Hall threw 59 pitches in 3 1/3 innings — both highs since being in the new program — and didn’t allow a hit, though he did walk four (which also may have been a byproduct of the longer layoff). His pitch count will now be increased by five or 10 each outing until he no longer has one. He expects to start pitching every sixth day now as part of the regular rotation instead of only every Tuesday.
“The end game is obviously to get him back to the big leagues as a starter,” Ramsey said. “And so that’s kind of what we’re looking to do. And we’re in the process of making that transition back into building back up and getting him back on track for that.”
That was one of the reasons Hall was willing to try the “deload.” He sees himself as a big-league starter, but since he has battled some injuries and also had success in the Orioles’ bullpen last September, there’s been speculation that Hall will end up as a full-time reliever. He’s willing to pitch however the Orioles need him, but his goal is to become a rotation mainstay. And this calculated program to up his velocity, while keeping his 2023 innings initially in check, is designed to have him ready for the rotation later this year.
“We hear the noise. We hear the chatter, and I had pretty good success in the last month of the year last year out of the bullpen,” Hall said. “You hear people say, ‘Just move him to the ‘pen, just move him to the ‘pen.’ But I know deep down inside I’m a starter, I did it for my whole life. Obviously, not at this high of a level, but it’s still the same thing. … It’s just that I’ve dealt with injuries these last couple of years and it seems like everything has been super untimely for me. But I think this is gonna be big for me as a starter.”
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Ramsey, for one, is on board with Hall’s plan as much as Hall is on board with the Orioles’.
“I’ve always thought he could start. Four plus pitches from the left side, throwing 100,” Ramsey said. “If you can hone in the command, which he did a really good job of that early, if you can just build off of that, there’s no reason not to start him.”
Now it’s a matter of continuing to build back the power so he’ll be ready for a big-league call-up in the second half of the season. There’s no set timetable for that.
There’s no guarantee that Hall will return to the Orioles in 2023 or start hitting 98 mph consistently again. But he has bought into the program and continues to work toward that goal. And that commitment is a win for the Orioles right now.
“I don’t think it was easy, because like any starting pitcher, they want to go out there and they want to throw the ball as long as they can, right? But he’s been great. He knows the work that he needs to do,” said Tides manager Buck Britton. “I’ve known DL for a long time. I know when to push his buttons. I know what it looks like when he’s not right. I know what it looks like when he’s going really well. And I just try to keep him on that track of consistency.
“I think DL is in a good place and I think, honestly, this could be a blessing in disguise for us, just the way this is happening for him.”
(Photo of Hall with the Orioles in April: Paul Sancya / Associated Press)
