Kumar Rocker surrendered two runs over five innings in his season debut Saturday against the Reds.
In spite of the lengthy layoff, Rocker was pretty sharp tonight in striking out three and walking one. The 26-year-old started ramping up his slider usage this spring and kept at it tonight, throwing the pitch one-third of the time. Interestingly, itaveraged 85.8 mph, up from 84.5 mph this spring and 84.2 mph last year. Rocker wasn’t enough of a strikeout pitcher to succeed last year, when he finished with a 5.74 ERA in 14 starts, but a harder slider could help there. Now isn’t the time to go picking him up, though, as he’s due to face the Dodgers next weekend.