Tweet
Hottovy offers ‘intriguing’ option in Royals’ search for lefty relievers
BY BOB DUTTON
The Kansas City Star
Tommy Hottovy threw in the eighth inning on Thursday against the Rockies.
SCOTTSDALE, ARIZ. --It speaks to the charm of spring training that every year, every camp seems to have one guy — sometimes more than one — who comes out of nowhere to make (or nearly make) the club.
An early candidate this spring for the Royals just might be a hometown kid — no longer a kid, really — named Tommy Hottovy, a 30-year-old lefty reliever signed in the offseason as a minor-league free agent after eight years in the Boston system.
Emphasize the “early candidate” part; the Royals are just six games into their 32-game Cactus League schedule. Still, Hottovy has already turned in two scoreless one-inning outings, including one Thursday in a 5-0 victory over Colorado at Salt River Fields.
“Intriguing,” manager Ned Yost said. “Very intriguing as a left-handed option setup guy. Watching him, he’s like a left-handed Louis Coleman a little bit. He gives a lot of deception from the left side.”
The deception stems from a mechanical adjustment following a layoff of nearly two years due to reconstructive-elbow surgery. Hottovy began toying with a sidearm motion after returning in 2009 but didn’t make a full-time commitment until last year.
The result was the best season of his career and a brief taste — four appearances — of life in the big leagues after opening the season at Class AA Portland.
“Really, last spring was the first time that I owned it,” he said. “Next thing I know, four months later, I’m in the big leagues. Obviously, I had good results with it. I had a pretty good feel for it.
“Now, it’s a year later, and I’ve had a whole season under my belt. Plus winter ball and into spring training. I feel better than I ever have.”
Hottovy made a quick camp impression on his new club by showing the ability to keep his sinker-slider repertoire down in the zone while throwing bullpen workouts and live batting practice.
“With my sidearm approach,” he said, “90 percent of the time, my ball is sinking. It’s easy for me to keep the ball down because of the way I throw and the action the ball gets. For me, it’s all about attacking the zone and using what I have.
“I’ve learned, too, as I’ve gotten older, that this game is so much more about getting guys out in the strike zone than trying to get them out by having them chase stuff outside the strike zone.
“When I throw stuff in the zone, I want it late and moving. I want it sinking. That’s my slider and my sinker. Once I finally realized that’s what I needed to do, I began throwing a lot more strikes, you attack a lot more guys and you find yourself in favorable counts.”
Hottovy is where he always wanted to be.
A Kansas City native, he attended Park Hill South, where he was picked by The Kansas City Star as the 2000 Scholar-Athlete of the Year after earning 11 varsity letters while maintaining a 4.0 grade-point average that placed first in a class of 273.
From there, Hottovy went to Wichita State, where he was an All-Missouri Valley Conference selection and, in 2004, chosen in the fourth round by the Red Sox. He was climbing through the Boston system when his elbow blew out.
“My surgery wasn’t the traditional torn (ligament) that is snapped on one pitch,” he said. “My elbow, over time, just kept deteriorating and fraying. I rest-and-rehabbed it three times. Each time I did that, it kept scar-tissuing over it.
“In 2008, I went to spring training, and it was still killing me. I threw eight innings the whole year. Then I missed over half of the year the next year. I didn’t pitch at the end of 2007 and didn’t really pitch again until July of 2009. That’s a long time.”
Hottovy’s 2010 numbers were only so-so and no doubt contributed, despite a scoreless spring, in being assigned to start last season at Portland. By that point, though, he was seeing increasing success from his sidearm delivery.
“You talk about a year when a lot of things could have gone either way…,” he said. “I was just fortunate enough to stay positive about everything and work at what I needed to be successful at.
“I’m in a position now where I have a much better foothold on my career and where I’m going and what I’m doing. It’s amazing how one little change makes such a difference, but it’s also a matter of staying positive.”
Hottovy was a minor-league free agent when last season ended and, after initial talks stalled with Boston, jumped at the opportunity to sign with the Royals.
“My whole career,” he said, “I’ve always had an interest in being here. This is my team. Obviously, I love the Red Sox, but if there was ever going to be a time for me to move on, this was probably the time.
“It didn’t take much for me to sign here.”
The Royals do offer opportunity. Club officials want to keep two lefty relievers. While free-agent signee José Mijares is a strong bet to get one spot, the other shapes up as a competition between Tim Collins, Everett Teaford and, just maybe, Tommy Hottovy.
“He has good action on his pitches,” Yost said. “It’s an uncomfortable at-bat for left-handed hitters. So we’ll see. He’s intriguing to me. I’m anxious to see what happens now that we’re playing games.”
So is Hottovy.
“My goal right now is not to say, ‘Hey, I’ve got to make the team,’” he said. “My goal is to put myself in the best position I can be so that on April 1, I’m 100 percent ready to go. What they decide to do, where they decide to send me, that stuff is out of my control.
“But another thing — I’ve been around long enough to see that moves are made. You have injuries and things. Guys come up. So if they decide to send me to Triple-A, it’s not like I’ll be struck there the whole time.
“My goal is to get to the big leagues. I see this as a great opportunity, and I’m looking forward to letting the Royals see, first-hand, what I’m able to do. We’ll see what happens the rest of the way.”
Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2012/03/08...#storylink=cpy
BY BOB DUTTON
The Kansas City Star
JOHN SLEEZER
Tommy Hottovy threw in the eighth inning on Thursday against the Rockies.
SCOTTSDALE, ARIZ. --It speaks to the charm of spring training that every year, every camp seems to have one guy — sometimes more than one — who comes out of nowhere to make (or nearly make) the club.
An early candidate this spring for the Royals just might be a hometown kid — no longer a kid, really — named Tommy Hottovy, a 30-year-old lefty reliever signed in the offseason as a minor-league free agent after eight years in the Boston system.
Emphasize the “early candidate” part; the Royals are just six games into their 32-game Cactus League schedule. Still, Hottovy has already turned in two scoreless one-inning outings, including one Thursday in a 5-0 victory over Colorado at Salt River Fields.
“Intriguing,” manager Ned Yost said. “Very intriguing as a left-handed option setup guy. Watching him, he’s like a left-handed Louis Coleman a little bit. He gives a lot of deception from the left side.”
The deception stems from a mechanical adjustment following a layoff of nearly two years due to reconstructive-elbow surgery. Hottovy began toying with a sidearm motion after returning in 2009 but didn’t make a full-time commitment until last year.
The result was the best season of his career and a brief taste — four appearances — of life in the big leagues after opening the season at Class AA Portland.
“Really, last spring was the first time that I owned it,” he said. “Next thing I know, four months later, I’m in the big leagues. Obviously, I had good results with it. I had a pretty good feel for it.
“Now, it’s a year later, and I’ve had a whole season under my belt. Plus winter ball and into spring training. I feel better than I ever have.”
Hottovy made a quick camp impression on his new club by showing the ability to keep his sinker-slider repertoire down in the zone while throwing bullpen workouts and live batting practice.
“With my sidearm approach,” he said, “90 percent of the time, my ball is sinking. It’s easy for me to keep the ball down because of the way I throw and the action the ball gets. For me, it’s all about attacking the zone and using what I have.
“I’ve learned, too, as I’ve gotten older, that this game is so much more about getting guys out in the strike zone than trying to get them out by having them chase stuff outside the strike zone.
“When I throw stuff in the zone, I want it late and moving. I want it sinking. That’s my slider and my sinker. Once I finally realized that’s what I needed to do, I began throwing a lot more strikes, you attack a lot more guys and you find yourself in favorable counts.”
Hottovy is where he always wanted to be.
A Kansas City native, he attended Park Hill South, where he was picked by The Kansas City Star as the 2000 Scholar-Athlete of the Year after earning 11 varsity letters while maintaining a 4.0 grade-point average that placed first in a class of 273.
From there, Hottovy went to Wichita State, where he was an All-Missouri Valley Conference selection and, in 2004, chosen in the fourth round by the Red Sox. He was climbing through the Boston system when his elbow blew out.
“My surgery wasn’t the traditional torn (ligament) that is snapped on one pitch,” he said. “My elbow, over time, just kept deteriorating and fraying. I rest-and-rehabbed it three times. Each time I did that, it kept scar-tissuing over it.
“In 2008, I went to spring training, and it was still killing me. I threw eight innings the whole year. Then I missed over half of the year the next year. I didn’t pitch at the end of 2007 and didn’t really pitch again until July of 2009. That’s a long time.”
Hottovy’s 2010 numbers were only so-so and no doubt contributed, despite a scoreless spring, in being assigned to start last season at Portland. By that point, though, he was seeing increasing success from his sidearm delivery.
“You talk about a year when a lot of things could have gone either way…,” he said. “I was just fortunate enough to stay positive about everything and work at what I needed to be successful at.
“I’m in a position now where I have a much better foothold on my career and where I’m going and what I’m doing. It’s amazing how one little change makes such a difference, but it’s also a matter of staying positive.”
Hottovy was a minor-league free agent when last season ended and, after initial talks stalled with Boston, jumped at the opportunity to sign with the Royals.
“My whole career,” he said, “I’ve always had an interest in being here. This is my team. Obviously, I love the Red Sox, but if there was ever going to be a time for me to move on, this was probably the time.
“It didn’t take much for me to sign here.”
The Royals do offer opportunity. Club officials want to keep two lefty relievers. While free-agent signee José Mijares is a strong bet to get one spot, the other shapes up as a competition between Tim Collins, Everett Teaford and, just maybe, Tommy Hottovy.
“He has good action on his pitches,” Yost said. “It’s an uncomfortable at-bat for left-handed hitters. So we’ll see. He’s intriguing to me. I’m anxious to see what happens now that we’re playing games.”
So is Hottovy.
“My goal right now is not to say, ‘Hey, I’ve got to make the team,’” he said. “My goal is to put myself in the best position I can be so that on April 1, I’m 100 percent ready to go. What they decide to do, where they decide to send me, that stuff is out of my control.
“But another thing — I’ve been around long enough to see that moves are made. You have injuries and things. Guys come up. So if they decide to send me to Triple-A, it’s not like I’ll be struck there the whole time.
“My goal is to get to the big leagues. I see this as a great opportunity, and I’m looking forward to letting the Royals see, first-hand, what I’m able to do. We’ll see what happens the rest of the way.”
Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2012/03/08...#storylink=cpy
Comment