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Right direction: Rookie Jose Urena continues positive development despite loss
MIAMI -- During Sunday's postgame interview, Miami Marlins right-hander Jose Urena broke from Spanish to answer a question in English.
"They just called balk."
Despite taking another tough decision in a 2-0 loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers, Urena continues to look comfortable on the mound.
Los Angeles scored its lone run off him in an unconventional way: Jimmy Rollins beat out Dee Gordon's throw on a diving play to start the fourth. He advanced to second on a balk and moved to third on Zack Greinke's sacrifice bunt. After a walk to Joc Pederson, Howie Kendrick sent a grounder to second. Gordon sent a clean flip to Adeiny Hechavarria, but his throw took Justin Bour off first base.
"Once I saw that he was bunting, just giving himself up, I was trying to get through the at-bat as quick as possible and I rushed myself and I got caught in the emotion and rushed my delivery," Urena said in Spanish through a translator.
The 23-year-old rookie permitted just that run on four hits with four strikeouts and four walks over five innings. Of his 82 pitches, 48 went for strikes. Though a runner reached in each frame, he didn't give up an extra base hit and also induced a double play in the first.
Since not issuing a walk on June 12 against the Colorado Rockies, command has been an issue for Urena. Over his past three outings, he has walked at least three in each of them but has limited the damage by making adjustments. In 16 innings, Urena has allowed just six runs.
"He went out and he battled, gave us five innings," manager Dan Jennings said. "Could've easily ran him back out there for the sixth, but we felt like where he was with his pitch count and the fact that we had a fresh bullpen and an offday tomorrow we didn't want to put the kid in a position to extend him there."
Catcher Jeff Mathis, who caught Urena for the second time, has seen him develop and improve over each outing.
In seven starts, Urena is 1-4 with a 3.66 ERA. He has given up 16 earned runs over 39 1/3 innings. After surrendering five runs on 10 hits in 4 2/3 frames to the Pittsburgh Pirates in his debut as a starter, Urena has limited offenses to three runs or fewer in the next six, including one run on three occasions. He went four straight starts of six frames from June 1-17.
"He's out there and he's throwing his sinker over the plate and mixing pitches in there really well and keeping those guys off balanced," Mathis said. "I think he's done a pretty good job of that over the last few starts. It's picking up on the second, third pitch. His changeup's always been his bread and butter, but he's starting to throw his curveball a little bit better. I think that's helped him out a lot, too."
When Urena first came up in April, he made two relief appearances before heading back to the minors to resume a starter's schedule.
His comfort level has increased with a normal and familiar routine. Aside from facing the Colorado Rockies in consecutive outings, Urena has encountered the challenge of a new lineup and set of batters and taken it in stride.
"It's just going about my routine the same way, keeping the same mentality, focus on each team, focus on each at-bat and just trying to win the at-bat, win the game," Urena said.
You can follow Christina De Nicola on Twitter @CDeNicola13 or email her at cdenicola13@gmail.com.
