A Q&A with John Curtiss, who hopes breakout 2020 carries over with the Miami Marlins
What was supposed to be a relatively casual Wednesday turned into a 12-hour endeavor for relief pitcher John Curtiss.
The original plan was to get his physical at the Tampa Bay Rays’ spring training site in Port Charlotte ahead of the club’s first pitchers and catchers workout on Thursday.
But by 7:30 a.m., when he received a text from Rays senior vice president of baseball operations and general manager Erik Neander, he knew his plans were about to change.
“I knew pretty obviously that I had been traded,” Curtiss said Sunday.
Specifically, he had been traded to the Miami Marlins.
From there, Curtiss coordinated with new Marlins travel secretary Max Thomas, packed up the house he was staying at and made his drive to Jupiter, stopping midway at a Dunkin’ Donuts parking lot so he could call in to the Marlins’ organization-wide Zoom meeting. He arrived in Jupiter around 7 p.m. Wednesday.
After clearing his COVID-19 intake session, Curtiss joined his new team for the first time on Sunday and is expected to be a key contributor in the Marlins’ revamped bullpen.
Last season with the Rays was his first extended look in the big leagues. The results? a 1.80 ERA over 25 innings in 17 games, while holding opponents to a .233 batting average and struck out 25 while walking three. His 3 percent walk rate last season ranked in the top percentile of pitchers.
The Rays used him in a slew of roles last season. He was used as an opener three times. He was used as a closer twice, converting both save opportunities. He had five outings in which he threw at least two innings. He finished seven of the 17 games in which he played.
Curtiss also made nine playoff appearances (one start) for the Rays as they made a run to the World Series before losing to the Los Angeles Dodgers in six games.
And he’s more than insightful about his progress and his process to this point in his MLB career.
Here are the highlights from Curtiss’ Zoom interview on Sunday.
How much did the 2020 season with the Rays help your development as a pitcher?
“It helped a ton. I’d say the only thing in my career I’ve ever really wanted is to help contribute to a winning big-league team, to be in the big leagues and to be a net positive member of the team. So being able to help in any way possible, if that’s the first inning or the ninth or the seventh or the fourth or whatever it is. If you can go in there and get any number of outs that they ask at any point in the ballgame, if it’s keeping it at two if you’re down two, if it’s holding on to one-run lead, if it’s a tie game, whatever. Just being a good teammate. Anything I can do. That’s all I’ve ever wanted. And so getting an opportunity to be a part of a special group, and to be a part of, not just a big-league team but a pennant-winning team, I think gave me confidence that will pay dividends for the rest of my career, hopefully.”
What was the experience like playing in the World Series and what kind of experience can you bring to a young Marlins team?
“The main thing I learned very quickly after my horrible outing against the Yankees in Game 1 of the [American League Division Series] was just how similar baseball is, whether you’re on a backfield at the alternate training site or if you’re in a regular-season game against the Phillies or if you’re in a division series, championship series or World Series game. When you get ahead in the count, you’re going to do well. When you get behind the count, you’re not going to do well. When you execute the fundamentals, you’re going to win. When you don’t, you’re not gonna win. So it’s a little bit of a pressure cooker and you obviously want it more, but by the end of the World Series I don’t know if it was because we had been in the bubble and because it had been such a stressful year with COVID and everything, but the World Series felt as much like baseball to me — just playing professional baseball — as any time else in my career. I think that it was a product of just kind of how rare and unique a circumstance that was with how isolated we were and how the only thing you were doing every day was going to the bubble, going to the field, going to the bubble, going to the field. So, in terms of if anybody else has any questions, I’d be happy to talk about it but I mean, I’ve got like a year and 45 days [of service time]. I’m sure there’s other people who have a lot more experience to pass around here than me.”
The Rays have a knack for finding pitchers and maximizing their talent. What is it about their organization that makes them so successful on that front?
“It sounds corny or obvious, but one of the main things they did is they just told you you’re good. I mean, they told me from day one over and over again ‘Hey, you’re good. We believe in you. Hey, you’re gonna throw strikes. Hey, you’re good.’ And when you’re constantly coaching and preaching to people in terms of positive reinforcement, it just changes you psychologically. You start believing in yourself in a way that you might not have before. That’s not saying anything negative about anywhere else I’ve been open before. Obviously, the Rays aren’t only team who want you to be your best self, but I’m not sure how often in my entire time there I heard the word ‘don’t.’ Like, if I was ever a coach after spending a year with the Rays, I’m not sure I would ever coach somebody and say, ‘Hey don’t do this’ because you’re giving them the negative of what to do so like ‘don’t throw balls, don’t walk people, don’t give up home runs. Like ‘throw strikes, get ahead of people. Attack the zone.’ And then they obviously have their metric system and their numbers and they understand it. I don’t know, maybe I’m underestimating how much like the situations they put me into. They put me in positions to be successful, matchups and stuff. But in terms of like coach to player, I’d say just the positive reinforcement and kind of keeping it simple were the two main things they did very well.”
It’s obviously early, but what are your impressions of your fellow bullpen members?
“I’m excited. I remember distinctly playing Miami in the two series last year and thinking to myself that they had some incredible arms obviously in the starting rotation and also just from what I’ve seen so far in sides today and catch and resumes and track records we have here, we have a lot of big league experience in our bullpen. We have a lot of guys that I can go to and ask questions and learn from. A lot of guys who have been there and done that, and I think you mix that element in with the youth and the talent that they have and how deep the roster seems to be and how the organization really has seen to kind of turn over in the three years, I was making the comments somebody earlier that the vibe around here was just substantially different than the vibe of the complex when I was in High A playing against the Jupiter Hammerheads. Just the entire atmosphere in the building seems more winning focused, more, just kind of, for lack of a better word, professional. So I’m really really excited and really really grateful for the opportunity to be here.”
What specifically are you planning to work on this spring?
“This year specifically I’m working to continue to refine my delivery just to be even more repeatable, to kind of tighten up my command a little bit. Last year, I feel like I improved my control but just continuing to refine command. There’s a few mechanical cues I worked on with the Rays last year and then with my guy Skip Johnson in Oklahoma over the offseason and then [Marlins pitching coach] Mel [Stottlemyre Jr.] had mentioned the changes he had noticed last year to me that he’d seen on video. I’m gonna keep working on those specifically and then I’ve got a goal this year for what I want my splits to be in terms of my pitch usage and then I’ve got a goal for kind of what my first-pitch strike and overall strike percentage is, targets that I think I should be working towards. Again, it’s pretty simple. I’m a fastball-slider reliever. But until you’re the best pitcher in the league, you have a lot to work on. And even then, I remember a few years ago, Max Scherzer won the Cy Young, and somebody asked him what he could work on to do better. He basically said everything, so just never being satisfied.”
This story was originally published February 21, 2021 at 1:27 PM.
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