Strike Three: Golden Spikes Spotlight On Kevin Gausman

Baseball America Article

Kevin Gausman has one of college baseball's best arms, and he is starting to put up numbers befitting of his stuff.

Gausman was a heralded but not entirely polished recruit out of high school in Colorado, and he went 5-6, 3.51 as a freshman at Louisiana State last year, pitching his best down the stretch. He built more confidence last summer with Team USA and in the Cape Cod League, and major league scouting directors voted him onto Baseball America's preseason All-America first team heading into his sophomore year this spring.

A month into the season, Gausman has more than lived up to expectations, going 4-0, 1.32 with 31 strikeouts and just two walks in 27 innings.

Gausman had to repeatedly pitch out of trouble last week against Dartmouth, which rapped out 10 hits against him, but he persevered into the seventh inning and picked up the win. This week against Michigan was a different story, as Gausman allowed just two hits and no walks while striking out 11 over eight shutout innings in No. 13 LSU's 6-0 win.

"Dartmouth battled him, and it was good for him that he was challenged and he had to raise his game against them," LSU coach Paul Mainieri said. "But you don't always go out there and completely dominate a game like he did Friday night (against Michigan). That was complete domination . . . When he is spotting his fastball and has his changeup and curveball working, he's quite a challenge for the other team."

The 6-foot-4, 185-pound Gausman can be simply overpowering when he is at his best, as he was Friday. Mainieri said his fastball velocity has mostly sat in the 93-95 mph range, peaking at 97. In the past, Gausman would try to blow hitters away by just throwing his four-seamer as hard as he could, but Mainieri said he has developed a two-seamer with good run, and his fastball command has made great progress. That is partly a result of his improved secondary stuff.

"He used to have to throw 90 percent fastballs, and now he doesn't have to throw quite as many, but his confidence in it is better," Mainieri said. "He knows hitters can't just sit on his fastball anymore. It seems like his command, his confidence, everything has improved as his offspeed pitches have improved."

Gausman's changeup really took a step forward in the second half last year, and Mainieri said he got most of his strikeouts last year on the fastball and change, using his curveball more to get strikes early in the count. But Gausman has worked hard with first-year pitching coach Alan Dunn to tighten up his curveball, and now he is able to use it as another putaway pitch. The entire package makes Gausman a potential top 10 overall pick as a draft-eligible sophomore this June.

"It's exciting to see," Mainieri said. "He just keeps improving. Each time he goes out, he does something a little better than the week before. Not to mention that he's a great athlete—he fields his position well. That's probably why he's improving so fast—he has such an athletic, wiry body.

"I just see the kid growing before my very eyes. He's becoming a complete package as a pitcher."