This story was excerpted from Jordan Bastian’s Cubs Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.
PHILADELPHIA -- After a recent outing against the Reds, Cubs starter Ben Brown allowed himself to have a little fun with reporters when the topic of his changeup came up. It has been an ongoing project to help the righty add a third pitch to his arsenal.
“Six percent usage today, so you guys can write that down,” Brown quipped following his start on May 31 at Wrigley Field. “Eventually, there’s going to be no more, ‘I’m not sure about the whole two-pitch [thing] -- if that’s going to work in the big leagues.’ You guys are going to have to figure out something new.”
It was a light-hearted moment for a 25-year-old pitcher who is still growing into a consistent piece within the Cubs’ rotation. Brown has an overpowering fastball and a wipeout curveball, but he has struggled to add an additional weapon in recent years to keep hitters honest. He tried a slider in the Minor Leagues, but he scrapped that experiment.
Brown has now been working on a changeup, using the “kick-change” variety that fellow Cubs righty Jameson Taillon has also been honing this season. It took several weeks for Brown to gain confidence in the pitch through playing catch and bullpen sessions before he convinced himself it was time to debut it in Major League games.
“It’s different for everybody,” Brown said on Sunday morning in Detroit. “Some people can kind of pick up a new grip and just be so confident in their ability to go out there and rip it the same week. Some guys are just more able to do something like that, and it’s super impressive.
“I would probably fall on the complete opposite of that. I’m pretty stubborn with my arsenal, so throwing another pitch was always a challenge for me.”
Brown said he first fired the current version of his changeup in an 0-1 count to Brewers outfielder Sal Frelick in the fourth inning on May 2 in Milwaukee. The pitch faded out of the zone, and Frelick swung and missed at the outside offering. It was immediate feedback that Brown was on the right track with the new pitch.
“I had a bad taste in my mouth,” Brown said of trying to add a third pitch in the past. “I think it’s hard, just the way I release a ball, to throw a slider. So when we kind of eliminated that, the changeup should hypothetically be easier for me to throw. And it just took some time, and [now I'm] seeing results.”
Brown featured his changeup 4.7% of the time in his outing in Cincinnati on May 25, then he upped its usage to 6.5% vs. the Reds on May 31. In the latter outing, Brown logged nine strikeouts over six scoreless innings, and then had his fun postgame with the media.
On Friday in Detroit, Brown was tasked with taking on the American League-leading Tigers and ace Tarik Skubal. The Cubs righty turned in seven strong innings, holding his own in a rowdy environment opposite the reigning AL Cy Young Award winner in a 3-1 loss. Within his performance, Brown showed off the changeup 9.8% of the time.
“It was like a normal pitch for him,” Cubs manager Craig Counsell said. “It was a pitch that was very much a part-of-the-repertoire pitch, not just, 'We’re going to show it.'”
Overall, Brown has a 5.37 ERA through 13 appearances, offering a misleading look at the nature of his season. He has four outings in which he has allowed five or more earned runs. His last two games have featured 16 strikeouts and two walks, with only two runs allowed over 13 innings. Brown’s search for consistency is ongoing, and the changeup might be part of the solution.
“The last two starts, we’ve gotten a great Ben Brown,” Counsell said. “That’s a great sign for us, and a big step for us. And a big boost of confidence for Ben. And a credit to him, right? Things had kind of gone off the rails a little bit for three or four starts, and he’s come back and delivered, arguably, his best two of the year. I’m really happy about that and happy for Ben.”