Ex-Cat Kevin Ginkel, with new arm slot and a chip on his shoulder, is dominating the big leagues

Baseball is the hardest sport for a rookie, the great humbler, a wake-up call like a tsunami to the face, especially for a relief pitcher who is thrust into the games at the most inopportune of times. All the success in the world at the lower levels can’t prepare you for Bryce Harper with men on first and third in front of 35,000 fans who want you to suffer. That is the kind of hard you don’t see in Visalia.

So, then, how exactly has it been so easy for Kevin Ginkel?

Through six weeks in Major League Baseball and 21 appearances spread across 20ª innings, the Diamondbacks relief pitcher has a preposterous 1.74 ERA, with just 20 baserunners allowed and 23 strikeouts. He has been one of the best pitchers in all of baseball since his Aug. 5 call-up — among all major league pitchers with 20 or more appearances since the All-Star break, his ERA ranks 11th — and on Monday, he picked up the first save of his Major League career.

Not bad for a 22nd-round pick who thought baseball had given up on him just two years ago.

All 6 feet, 5 inches of Kevin Ginkel is coiled on the mound like a rattlesnake. Is it a surprise he is a Diamondback? Prone and prepared to strike, Ginkel is ready to unleash pure fury.

He looks totally different than he did just a few years ago, when he helped lead the Arizona Wildcats to the College World Series championship series in his lone season in Tucson. Back then he was upright, typical, good, sometimes great, but certainly not the pitcher he is today.

He used every one of his inches back then, looking for that perfect downward plane that 77 inches provide. He was 5-1 in 2016, with a 2.80 ERA, then 1-0 with a 2.61 ERA in 18 outings for the short-season Single-A Hillsboro (Ore.) Hops.

The next year is when things came to a head.

Battling arm issues and topping out at around 91 miles an hour, Ginkel languished in 2017. In just 26 appearances between the Hops and the full-season Single-A Kane County Cougars, Ginkel had a 5.36 ERA and nearly a pink slip.

He knew exactly what the Diamondbacks knew.

“This is a game where some guys get more opportunities than others, and I wasn’t a prospect at the time,” he said. “I was in short-season A-ball, and I was pitching long relief, getting guys out, but I knew this wouldn’t get me to the big leagues. I knew I could throw hard, but how could I do it more consistently?”

Ginkel was put in touch with Luke Hagerty, a Scottsdale-based baseball trainer and a 2002 first-round pick of the Cubs.

“He knew he was in a tough spot,” Hagerty said. The team eluded to that as much. They said when you come back, you need to be ready to go. He was open to adjustments.”

A fast friendship was formed, two tinkerers working with a fun new project that just so happened to be Ginkel’s arm. They toyed with Ginkel’s release point. They changed his whole stance. Rather than come from an upright position, Ginkel started crouching on the mound and firing out and up, rather than just down.

“It sounds like he just came in and I said ‘you need to this’ and it’s done, but really he had to learn a lot,” Hagerty said. “It took a while for him to understand what he needed to do. I’m OK with that. A lot of trainers say only teach him what he needs to know, he’s with a team and a season is ahead, but there is certain language we use, and he needs to understand not just the language but what it means. As soon as he started to feel better, he felt like he was on the right path. Then he started to dig in and get a better understanding of what he was trying to do.”

Within a few weeks of working with Ginkel, Hagerty knew the ex-Wildcat was going to surprise people.

“We looked at older video of him from college, and all these things left clues for how he likes to move,” he said. “We get feedback to tell us if we’re on the right path. He made an adjustment and the ball came out easier.”

The key for Ginkel, Hagerty said, wasn’t so much the arm — there’s always been strength in that arm — but the fluidity of motion. Hagerty wanted Ginkel to expend less energy with every pitch. Less oopmh.

The results were instant, and from a baseball perspective, almost miraculous.

After a sensational spring training in 2018, Ginkel began the regular season at High-A Visalia because of an injury to another Diamondbacks prospect. He was nearly unhittable, sporting a 0.99 ERA with a 0.84 WHIP in 27ª innings across 20 outings, and he earned a midseason callup to Double-A Jacksonville and flourished in Florida, as well, going 5-0 with a 1.69 ERA and 60 strikeouts in 42º innings.

In one season, he went from off-the-radar to setting off the radar gun.

“Coming into the 2018 season, I had no expectations set on me,” he said. “I knew deep down inside that I could really impress some people. I did fly under the radar, and I think I do best when I’m like that.”

Ginkel opened the 2019 season in Jacksonville and picked up right where he left off, going 1-2 with a 2.16 ERA in 14 appearances before getting the bump up to Triple-A Reno. He was even better there, rolling up 36 strikeouts in 16º innings while boasting a 1.62 ERA.

“Confidence is a huge thing with this game, and he had a really nice beginning of the year and then dominated in Triple-A,” said Diamondbacks catcher Casey Joseph, who caught Ginkel in Jacksonville. “He’s really run with that confidence, and the main thing with young guys is getting early confidence in the Major Leagues and trying to run with it.”

As big-league debuts go, Ginkel’s was one to remember.

It’s not every day you’re thrust into a 4-2 game with two runners on and one out and arguably the best catcher in the game at the plate.

Ginkel had a feeling he’d face the Phillies’ J.T. Realmuto in that Aug. 5 matchup, but he wasn’t expecting to go in with two runners on base at a crucial point in the game.

No matter — four pitches, strikeout.

So much for confidence being an issue.

“I thought, ‘Hey, they’re throwing me in the fire,’” he said. “They called down and it was like, ‘Ginkel, be ready for Realmuto.’ And I was like, ‘Uh, alright?’ When I first started warming up, I had to tell myself it’s the same game.”

Since then, that has largely been true.

Ginkel has allowed four runs in his 20º innings heading into Friday’s game against the Padres. He’s given up just one run in seven September outings.

“He could have stuff going on internally but you’d never know,” Joseph said. “I’m not gonna say it’s rare in a young guy, but when things start going sideways, something you can see the panic inside of a young pitcher. He’s got ice in the veins so far.”

Joseph said the key for Ginkel will be to adjust back to hitters once they adjust to him, to engage in that never-ending chess match that makes baseball beautiful.

“I want the game to show me if I need to make an adjustment,” Ginkel said. “Who knows I could pitch like this the rest of my career. Who knows?”

His coaches think they do.

“Believe it or not, I’m not surprised by the success he’s had,” D-backs pitching coach Mike Butcher said. “I think I expected this. During spring training I was telling him the same thing. I said, ‘You’ve got a chance to put yourself on the map this year.’ He’s a guy we can look for in the future here. Even going back to him at the U. of Arizona, this guy had a big arm. You can’t hide a big arm.”

No longer a hidden gem, Ginkel is wide out in the open, because he allowed himself to be open. He reached his limit, found a new path and created a new limit.

“I had conversations with other players, and it was just, what do I have to lose?” he said. “If I come out here and look weird the way I pitch, who cares? If it didn’t work, who cares? I’m not going down without a fight.

“I’m never gonna lose that chip on my shoulder, man,” he continued. “I’ve gotten to this point, and now I can do whatever I want. I have the freedom to pitch the way I want. The team has given me the reins. I’m going to keep carrying that confidence, that attitude and that swagger into next year.”