Trevor Cahill can’t seem to stop his costly, first-inning woes

Honestly, Trevor Cahill makes me want to gouge my eyes out. He has excellent stuff and you wonder how anybody could put any crooked numbers up on this guy, let alone in the first inning!

But that’s exactly what the Pirates did in the first game of their three-game series with the Diamondbacks. The Pirates put a crooked three up in the first inning on Cahill. And this has been the way of things for Cahill in a D-backs uniform.

Last year, he had an ERA of over 5.00 and an inordinate amount of walks in the first inning. When compared to all the other innings pitched after the first, it’s like Trevor Cahill is two different pitchers.

Watching Cahill pitch frustrates me because his stuff is filthy. His ball moves so much it’s hard to fathom but he gets himself in trouble often, especially with walks, and gives up runs early.

I used to believe it was because he wasn’t ready to go. I used to believe he didn’t bring the requisite amount of intensity to his starts and that was why teams got to him early.

I no longer believe this.

Cahill struggles early because he’s trying to find his arm slot and release point. The ball movement he gets varies from start to start, which is why he struggles early. I don’t think Cahill knows how his ball is going to go until he’s 20 or more pitches into the start.

Unfortunately for the D-backs, this has cost them some games and it happened again against Pittsburgh. And the worse thing about it is I don’t think there’s anything Cahill can do about it.

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