Adapting and evolving, Nick Mears filling late-inning option for Colorado Rockies
By Kevin Henry
If you look at the journey that Nick Mears has taken to get to the Colorado Rockies bullpen, there are plenty who could argue that Mears should have never made it to the big leagues. However, knowing the belief that Mears has in himself and also the confidence he possesses in his pitch mix and abilities, it’s also easy to see why Mears has cemented himself as a late-inning option in Denver.
Undrafted out of Sacramento City College after missing a significant amount of time with a variety of injuries and the space needed to reset mentally following deaths of family members and a teammate, Mears pitched well enough in the Northwoods League to catch the attention of several MLB teams willing to give him a chance. Among them was Colorado, but Mears ended up signing a $15,000 deal with the Pittsburgh Pirates.
“With life, you’re either forced to change or you change on your own. I wasn’t strong enough for where God planned for me to be, so He did that. Now, I am who I am,” Mears told MLB.com shortly before the 2020 season was postponed by the COVID-19 pandemic. “At the time, I was very confused about why all that would happen to me. I was playing the victim. But with where I am now — and I know that all of those people that aren’t with me anymore, they’re still with me — it helped make me into who I am today.”
Mears would eventually make his MLB debut during that memorable 2020 campaign, but it wasn’t until the 2021 season where he played a sizeable role for the Pirates, appearing in 30 games and facing 107 batters over 23.1 innings.
While the numbers weren’t great for Mears (5.01 ERA/5.66 FIP/1.629 WHIP), there was hope for what he could bring to the Pirates bullpen in 2022. However, before the season began, Mears underwent arthroscopic surgery to clean up scar tissue in his right elbow. Mears would work his way back to pitch in two October scoreless outings for Pittsburgh, but change was coming.
In December, Pittsburgh designated him for assignment, and he was picked up off waivers by the Texas Rangers. Just four days later, Texas designated him for assignment as well. After being interested in him coming out of college, Colorado finally signed him to a deal, claiming him off waivers on January 6, 2023.
While the scar tissue surgery set off a chain of events that eventually landed Mears in the Mile High City, it also changed his pitch mix completely. A pitcher who possessed a four-seam fastball that has hit 97 mph and a curveball that averages just under 81 mph added a slider to his repertoire. That slider has become a weapon for Mears, who sees it as a pitch that helps make his fastball even more effective.
“I felt as if being a two-pitch guy out of the bullpen, it was going to be tough if I didn’t have a pitch that day,” Mears said. “Well, if that’s the curveball, now the hitter just completely disregards anything that looks like it has spin. If I don’t have the curveball that day, they’re sitting on my fastball. If I drop a curveball in there, they’ll be like, ‘Okay, congrats, let’s see you do it again.’ So I think the addition of the slider was more of a benefit to my fastball because, with throwing the gyro slider, it looks like a fastball especially with the way that it moves.
“The slider holds that fastball plane longer than my curveball does, because my curveball has, at sea level, about 15 inches of movement. So it moves a lot compared to my fastball, whereas the slider is harder. It holds that fastball playing longer, and it’s just a little more deceptive to the hitters from what I’ve seen.”
It’s some of that movement and pitch mix that has Mears’ teammates singing his praises on what he can bring out of the bullpen.
“I mean, he has ridiculous stuff, so if he’s in good counts, he’s going to be really hard to hit,” fellow Rockies reliever Jake Bird said. “Even in Denver and you lose a little bit of that spin movement, it’s still absolutely ridiculous. He’s going to be really good.”
The question for the Rockies is exactly how good and in what ways can he be used. With the status of Colorado’s bullpen, Mears is a possibility for closing games. However, the 27-year-old right-hander has already learned that finishing a game in the ninth brings with it a different kind of pressure.
In an April 8 home game against Arizona, Mears was summoned to hold down a 7–4 ninth inning Rockies lead and potentially earn his first career save. However, the command that Mears had shown throughout the spring and early season appearances was not there that night.
Mears walked the first two batters he faced before registering a strikeout and a lineout. So close to finishing the task, Mears allowed a single and another walk before Black pulled him from the game. Bird would finish off the Diamondbacks, earning his first career save.
Rather than focusing on the end result, Mears is choosing to look at the moment as another step in his MLB progression.
“I think that the mentality should always be the same, but the situation that you’re in, even if you don’t want it to, it does dictate your energy level,” Mears said. “When I came in against Arizona, it was a lot of energy and I don’t think I knew how to calm myself down in that moment because I’ve never been in it. But now that I have been in it, I feel like I know more about myself and how to control those emotions and that energy.”
Black agrees.
“I think I saw a little bit extra effort on the fastball, and that leads to command issues,” Black said. “I think in his first few appearances, I saw delivery under control. I saw fastball strikes. Curveball. Slider strikes. I think there was just a little bit more calmness in the outings before. I didn’t see that (against Arizona). That’s expected in a save situation. We talk often right about the ninth inning. There are a lot of quantitative analysis people who think that the sixth inning is the same as the ninth. I disagree with that.
“I think it was more delivery and effort level from Nick that caused him to walk three guys because prior to that, he had 4.2 innings and one walk. He was pounding the strike zone, and we saw the same thing in spring training.
“He’s a young service time pitcher. We love his stuff. Like I told him (after the Arizona outing), hopefully he stays active and performs. A relief pitcher is going to throw anywhere from 50 to 70 games, and I hope he falls in that range, because if he does, keeps his poise and his composure, he’s going to have a good year for us.”
That poise and composure did indeed show itself in Mears’ next outing after the Arizona game, throwing 1.1 innings to finish off a pressure-packed eighth and ninth inning in Philadelphia on Monday night, keeping the score 1–1 and sending the contest into extra innings. Mears didn’t allow a hit and recorded a strikeout while lowering his ERA for the season to 2.35.
“On the road in the bottom of the ninth against a championship (caliber) team — good for Nick,” Black said after Mears’ outing in Philadelphia. “That was a growth moment for him.”
While the role for Mears is still evolving, one thing is clear — he has shown the chance that was taken on him coming out of college was well worth it.
“Everybody at this level, and even the upper levels in the Minor Leagues, has the talent to play in the big leagues. It’s just about how consistently you can do it, and I think that comes down to the mental side of things,” Mears said. “Coming up as an undrafted free agent, I feel like I didn’t have anything to lose. Because they didn’t have a lot invested in me, it was like, ‘Okay, well, here’s the next level. Let’s see if he sinks or he swims.’
“I think that was a good thing for me because I like to focus on very small things and try and master those small things. Going to a new level, it’s like, ‘Okay, I have to lean on my offspeed more. I can’t just blow heaters by these guys.’ It’s about always adapting to the environment that we’re put in.”
— ROCKIES —
