By Kary Booher (photo by Mark Harrell)
Long before he emerged as a prospect right-hander in the St. Louis Cardinals farm system – this year alone, he’s already pitched not only for Double-A Springfield but also Triple-A Memphis – he was just another dreamer.
Zac Gallen had challenged himself coming out of high school, driving down from cold-weather New Jersey and taking on a mission to pitch for the University of North Carolina, one of the premier programs in the Atlantic Coast Conference.
There in Chapel Hill, he met reality.
“My first year,” Gallen said recently, shaking his head, “I learned how hard it is to pitch in the ACC with one pitch.”
Well, now look who’s armed with a nice assortment of pitches and winning over admirers down here on the Cardinals’ farm. In fact, as playoff-seeking Springfield opens its final regular-season home stand tonight at Hammons Field, Gallen is firmly in the rotation – a remarkable development considering only a year ago he was a third-round draft selection.
As catcher Andrew Knizner put it, “He’s got like 10 pitches and I’m back there calling a game but running out of fingers.”
“I call him ‘Little Smoltzie,’” manager Johnny Rodriguez said, referring to former Atlanta Braves great John Smoltz even though Gallen’s pitching style is more of a Cerebral Maddux than a Fire-balling Smoltz. “He’s got the mentality. When you get him on the mound, there are no butterflies.”
GALLEN’S JOURNEY
For Gallen, this season is best described as a whirlwind. He opened the spring in the high Class A Florida State League, earned a promotion to Springfield but had hardly unpacked his bags when he got deployed to Triple-A Memphis for a couple of weeks. But think he is complaining? Hardly.
“My brother (Jay) was a really good player in high school but undersized,” Gallen said. “He never really got this opportunity. So I’m pitching for the both of us.”
That the Cardinals entrusted Gallen to such an extent, however, should not be a surprise – considering his improvements since that first collegiate season at North Carolina.
At the time in 2014, he was just a wide-eyed-and-eager arm in Chapel Hill, down from New Jersey and in the thick of a program that had been to the College World Series six times in eight years between 2006 and 2013.
To some, he may have seemed out of place. To him, he wasn’t at all.
“I grew up a UNC fan and they were going to Omaha almost every year. And I had family in (nearby) Durham,” Gallen said. “Plus, I was a Michael Jordan fan, and wanted to wear the Tar Heel blue.”
Yet Gallen got a rude awakening that first season as his earned run average ballooned to 4.64 and his record careened to 5-4.
Fortunately, pitching coach Scott Forbes – and a tour through the prestigious Cape Cod League – led to quite a turnaround. Gallen picked up a cut fastball and, the next year, worked his way into the weekend rotation and then the premier role of Friday night starter.
“That summer, I really went into with the goal of trying to pick up another pitch,” Gallen said. “And I picked up the cutter and ran with it.”
The cut fastball, great at missing the barrel of bats with horizontal movement, compliments his 88-92 mph fastball and a low-80s changeup. It turned Gallen into a more mature pitcher, one whom UNC’s staff truly trusted.
“Two years after (Forbes’ advice), he began to let me figure it out on my own,” Gallen said.
WHAT’S NEXT
Because he commands and controls his pitches well, Gallen has the look of one of the more polished pitchers in the Double-A Texas League.
Game plans are now scrutinized more thoroughly, allowing Gallen to set up hitters – an ability which is more advanced than what you see of new Double-A arrivals.
It’s also allowed St. Louis to encourage Gallen to adopt a curveball. With his high three-quarters delivery, it gives him a 12-to-6, north-south pitch (think clock) to offset his cutter.
“It’s like Federal Express with him – you know it’s going to get there,” Rodriguez said of Gallen earning trust. “Even when he doesn’t have his best stuff, he’s hanging in there.”
So far, he is 4-3 with a 3.94 ERA in 11 starts in Springfield.
Said Knizner, “He’s a very calculated type of pitcher. There are some pitchers who will throw whatever I call. But he has in his own mind what he wants to throw. He’s smart and knows how to set up hitters. He’s just fun to catch.”
