Milwaukee Brewers’ Zack Greinke speaks out on his curveball grip and batting form
The Milwaukee Brewers are hard at work in Surprise, Arizona. They recently had a match with the Texas Rangers in the Cactus League and were overwhelmingly beaten by an 8 – 1 score line. Zack Greinke, who starred in his second outing in the Spring Training
window, took the opportunity to take part in the contest. However, there were complications as his curveball grip lost him the appreciation from his peers; the player messed up his stint and was later taken off.
Greinke has been working on throwing his curveball with a different grip, and is not overly concerned about his tough going against the Rangers.
“I want to give the curveball the time that it's going to take,” he said. “It's been pretty good, though, in between starts. It's got a little 'spike' on it, so it's a pretty big difference. It was a lot sharper today.”
Before Greinke left the Kansas City Royals, a few months back, he was training with Bob McClure (Pitching Coach of the Royals), who had suggested the grip. Greinke is now working with his new pitching coach, Rick Kranitz. Kranitz has admitted that Greinke’s
focus has been on finding the strike zone more then on velocity.
Brewers catcher, Wil Nieves believes Zack’s recent performance was not up to the best standards but it was average, nevertheless.
“He already knows himself so he's just getting in shape for the season. He knows what he can do. Right now, I think what's most important for him is to be healthy and 100 percent,” he said.
Greinke also had the chance to talk about hitting. The Brewers’ pitching faction is weak in the department and they are occasionally practicing on batting at the Maryvale Baseball Park.
“Right now, I'd say I'm the worst hitter on the staff, so that's kind of disappointing. Maybe Randy [Wolf] might be worse right now, based on [batting practice]. It hasn't been very impressive so far,” he said.
There are four spring outings left and Greinke has plenty of time to fine tune.
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