by Tony Fiorello
The Buffalo Bisons’ season has come and gone, but there were plenty of players on their roster who showed potential for the upcoming 2025 campaign.
Take Trenton Wallace. Wallace, who pitched in nine games for the Herd after being called up in late July/early August, didn’t have the greatest numbers this season but displayed potential through his mental toughness and perseverance on the mound.
We at Buffalo Sports Page caught up with him after his first start at Sahlen Field for the Bisons on August 8, in which he allowed just two runs on three hits in 3.2 innings with three strikeouts and four walks against Rochester. Here are the contents of that conversation:
Q – First home start, what were the emotions and thoughts going into this?
A – Yeah it's cool to be able to see the environment and finally get to put a picture of Sahlen Field and see what it's like to be on the field for the first time. It's always been an adrenaline rush the first time you debut at any level. It’s fun, I enjoyed it. The crowd was awesome. The guys behind me were playing great defense. So it was a good time and a very good experience.
Q – What was the mindset you had coming in to have a good performance?
A – It's just attack hitters. I'm not a guy that's going to overpower another team. I'm a crafty guy. I like to move the ball. My ball has a lot of movement on it with each pitch.
For me, it's a learning curve. I had more strikeouts than last week but also walks. If I can limit the walks, it's a solo shot in the first versus a two-run home run and now we're down 2-0. It's 1-0 right off the bat. So limiting the walks and just keep picking pieces of the game and learning and continuing to add it to my repertoire and being able to move forward.
Q – Giving up the two-run home run, is that a learning moment where you’re in the deep end and you need figure out mentally how you're going to recover and make sure you're staying locked in afterwards?
A – Yeah it's part of the game now. I mean, hitters are good. I still can't give them all the credit because a Hall of Famer’s typically three out of ten at the plate. So you’ve still got to attack guys no matter how they're doing this season but yeah, it happens.
The thing I can control is the first batter. I had an 0-2 count on a guy and he ended up getting on base, put together an at-bat and fouled off a couple pitches, but I feel like I can do better than that moving forward. And that's the learning curve, because I'm okay with giving up a solo shot. If the guy beats me on my best pitch, he beats me. But putting a guy on base for free, then you're putting yourself in the deep end.
Q – You seem to love to go to the breaking ball. How important to you is it when that breaking ball has a high spin and that swing and miss tendency?
A – Yeah, I think it's big. The way the game is moving, it's kind of going back to, like ‘Can you move the ball?’ Everyone throws hard. Maybe not myself, but it's basically whether you can keep hitters off balance.
Guys can hit 100 miles an hour, so having that slider in my back pocket and trusting it, I think, is big for keeping hitters off balance and in a normal fastball count, not allowing them to just jump all over a heater when you have to be in the strike zone. I think it's kind of keeping hitters on their toes. So I think the type of pitcher I am, that's going to help me moving forward.
Q – Was there any one pitcher that you kind of looked up to growing up or anybody who you’ve tried to take bits and pieces from to add to your repertoire a little bit?
A – I mean, Clayton Kershaw’s a lefty. Just the way he is now – he was further into his career when I really got going in baseball. So I've seen him more as a pitcher versus when he was up and coming, obviously he was kind of a flamethrower. He could throw hard and had nasty stuff, but as he got older, he started to pitch more and he added pitches and now he's keeping hitters off-balance and he's making his way back right now. And a guy like that was someone I looked up to because of the way he makes the game look like art when he's out there.
Q – You mentioned it earlier with the defense on how much of a confidence booster it is for you when you're going out there and you got guys making plays in the field like Jonatan Clase. Rafael Lantigua made a bunch of great plays at second base. How big of a confidence booster is that every time you step on the mound?
A – It’s tremendous what they put on. I think for me, it's even more on the learning curve side of understanding, like, let these guys put it in play. Our defense is good, let them get themselves out.
Jonatan made a great play. And I think in the second or third inning, he made a diving play
to end the inning and then just right there you can trust guys in the field behind you. If you just trust your defense – they played tremendous today. Moving forward, I just need to allow them to do their job. That's what they're there for.
Q – Your pitch count kind of got high as the game went along. How did you maintain composure to just fight through each inning to not let things get out of hand?
A – Yeah, it's just taking a step back and breathing a little bit. Obviously the pitch clock doesn’t give you much time, but it's the guys that can control it really quick and bring your heart rate down really fast and get back into the zone and understand what you need to do.
I think for me the pitch count aspect of it is, I got ahead, I felt pretty good and got myself into good counts, but I think my 0-2, 1-2 pitches are too far out of the zone right now to where hitters are just seeing it out of the hand as a ball versus I don't need to be perfect. You just get close, make the hitter make a decision of ‘Oh, is that going to be a strike? Or is that going to be a ball and now they're already in-between and now you got them off their A-swing?’ So I think for me the pitch count and going deeper into games is the type of pitcher I need to be for the team and putting the team in the best place possible to win the game.
Comments