Wild Thing: James Karinchak’s rapid rise to quirky, first-rate Indians reliever
Zack Meisel 6h ago 12
CLEVELAND — It’s a swift motion, a quick flick of the baseball from his bare hand to his red Rawlings glove.
If a hitter calls time or a bat boy retrieves a splintered piece of lumber or the umpires consult instant replay, James Karinchak flips the ball in the air. When he power walks to the mound after covering first base or he waits for his catcher to retreat to the plate after a visit, he flips the ball in the air. If the bullpen catcher pauses to sneeze during his warmup, Karinchak flips the ball in the air.
There’s not an idle minute in Karinchak’s day. Baseball occupies every square inch of his schedule, every nook and cranny of his cranium. On the mound, he never stops fidgeting. He flips the ball in the air to pass the time before his next pitch. Away from the mound, he never stops fixating on what he can do to train for that next appearance.
For his first sit-down interview with an Indians scout in college, Karinchak suspended a lower-body workout and hustled over to Bryant University’s Beirne Stadium press box. He arrived in sweat-soaked athletic gear. When the discussion ended, he darted back to the weight room.
The organization has, ever since, been enamored by his work ethic. It’s how he added nearly 50 pounds of muscle to his previously lanky frame during his three years at Bryant. It’s why he inquired, in that first meeting with area scout Mike Kanen, about the routines Bradley Zimmer adopted that once aided his rise to the top of the Indians’ prospect board.
Chat with him on the phone, his college coach says, and it’ll seem as though he’s paying only partial attention, rapidly mumbling through his response because he’s busy thinking ahead to his next workout or throwing session. Those regimens are as vital to him as oxygen. By the second inning of a game, Karinchak has already rehearsed his delivery on the bullpen mound.
The baby-faced rookie boasts a jarring strikeout rate and has developed into one of the Indians’ most reliable, imposing late-inning relievers — and into appointment viewing. He bellows expletives toward the moon after walks and strikeouts, gnaws on his glove in moments of peak tension and mimics his own throwing motion while pacing behind the mound, all while mixing in those restless ball flips.
Those quirks have followed him from college, where he served as the ace of Steve Owens’ pitching staff at Bryant, to the majors, where he wears No. 99 and enters to a cover of “Wild Thing” by the punk rock band X.
“People say, ‘He’s pretending,’ or, ‘He’s putting on a show,’” Owens said. “They’re both wrong. It’s natural. He’s crazy out there. But it’s not an act. This is who he is.”
Three summers ago, Owens discovered a hand-written note tucked in the corner of his locker. Karinchak had scribbled in pencil a one- or two-page message to coaches, trainers and anyone else who contributed to his ascent toward being the Indians’ ninth-round selection in the 2017 draft.
“He was truthful and from the heart,” Owens said. “That’s something I won’t forget.”
Owens started recruiting Karinchak at a prospect camp in the fall of his sophomore year of high school in Montgomery, N.Y. At the time, Karinchak threw 83-84 mph and flashed a decent curveball.
“He had a lot of energy,” Owens said. “He was very confident.”
By his sophomore year of college, Karinchak had evolved from the gangly teenager with a mid-80s fastball into a 225-pound stallion who paired a 93-94 mph fastball with a devastating curveball and solid change-up. He even contemplated designing his own cutter modeled off the one Jake Arrieta threw.
“He got too big,” Owens said. “He looked like an NFL linebacker.”
His velocity and stamina increased as he averaged more than six innings per start during a dazzling sophomore campaign, when he pitched Bryant to the NCAA Regional. He pitched on Friday nights and served as the bat boy for the remainder of the weekend series. He unintentionally obstructed Owens’ view as he dashed to the plate to snag abandoned bats. He outraced runners to the plate to salute them after scoring.
Karinchak posted a 2.00 ERA in 15 starts as a sophomore with 112 strikeouts in 94 innings. Owens said he struck out every hitter in practice, in games, even in his dreams. He placed himself firmly on the MLB Draft radar with a high-spin heater and a breaking ball Owens described as “coming out of the clouds and all of a sudden, they’re either giving up on it and taking it for a strike, or it looks really yummy and they go to swing at it and it bounces in the dirt.”
He dealt with injuries during his junior season, but his strikeout rate soared to nearly 14 per nine innings and his fastball topped out in the upper 90s.
“He just really thought,” Owens said, “that he was better than every hitter he ever faced.”
Kanen recently reviewed his amateur report on Karinchak, which included comparisons to Mark Fidrych, the colorful Tigers hurler known to talk to himself and the ball. Kanen said Karinchak is the most animated pitcher he’s ever scouted, but he stresses that it has “always been a positive.”
Karinchak made six starts for the Indians’ short-season affiliate in 2017 before they shifted him into a relief role.
“He’s a high-intensity guy from Pitch 1,” Kanen said. “It didn’t take very long for us to say, ‘Hey, this guy’s stuff is going to be premium enough in one-inning stints, so let’s go ahead and do this, and he might be up in the big leagues in two years.’”
Karinchak is hungry for strikeouts … and other things, it appears. (Jason Miller / Getty Images)
Right away, Karinchak recorded numbers that would seem far-fetched for a video game. Kanen would receive texts from other Indians scouts or cross-checkers who had witnessed the Karinchak experience in person.
Geez, did you see the box score again tonight from Akron?
2018: 81 strikeouts in 48 2/3 innings, 1.29 ERA
2019: 74 strikeouts in 30 1/3 innings, 2.67 ERA
“I had the reaction of, ‘At some point, he’s gonna not strike everybody out,’” Kanen said. “’There have to be a couple balls in play.’ But he just kept doing it.”
Karinchak debuted for the Indians last September at Progressive Field, with the entire scouting department in attendance for an annual end-of-year gathering. When Karinchak relieved Nick Goody in the eighth inning of the nightcap of a doubleheader against the Twins, Kanen and a few colleagues moved behind the plate to watch his appearance up close.
For the first time, they viewed the unorthodox delivery and those familiar mannerisms on a big-league mound — the ball flipping, the muttering of not-so-sweet nothings to himself, all of the elements Sandy Alomar Jr. says equip Karinchak with the swagger to thrive as a future closer.
Karinchak struck out three of the five batters he faced and said he gained “confidence that I can compete with the best in the game.”
Brian Sweeney, Cleveland’s bullpen coach, resides in Upstate New York. Every Wednesday during the sport’s shutdown, he trekked two hours south to Professional Baseball Instruction, a facility in Ramsey, N.J., where Karinchak threw to hitters. Sweeney marveled at how Karinchak tunneled his two pitches, with his fastball and curveball leaving his hand at the same release point and exhibiting similar initial flight paths, so a batter can’t decipher which pitch is zipping his direction.
“If somebody made contact off of him,” Sweeney said, “that was a big to-do.”
Karinchak quickly earned trust from the coaching staff to pitch in high-leverage situations. Over his first 15 appearances this season, he held opposing hitters to a .302 OPS. Only one of the first 60 batters he battled crossed home plate.
Last week, however, pitching coach Carl Willis noticed a posture-related issue — in which Karinchak’s shoulders weren’t properly aligned during his delivery — that resulted in a problematic release point and fueled three consecutive rough outings.
“We have data from everything now,” Karinchak said. “If your release point or something moves by an inch, they’ll tell you.”
Karinchak, of course, wanted to repair the issue immediately and sprint to the mound for another late-game appearance. Willis, Sweeney and assistant pitching coach Ruben Niebla helped him work through the mechanical defect, and he returned to the mound on Tuesday and breezed through a scoreless frame.
Karinchak has struck out about half of the hitters courageous enough to step into the batter’s box against him this season. He owns a 2.70 ERA, but a 1.41 FIP (fielding-independent pitching), the product of limiting batters to a .164 average and .224 slugging percentage.
He has tallied 39 strikeouts in 20 innings to go along with an endless supply of pacing, cursing and ball-flipping.
“He’s the guy you want on your team,” Owens said, “and if he’s not on your team and you’re competing against him, you hate him. You can’t figure him out. ‘What’s this guy’s deal? Why’s he acting this way?’ Well, he’s not acting. That’s just who he is. So when he’s on your team, you love him. And when he’s on the other team, you can’t figure him out and you detest him.”
