WASHINGTON – Cubs lefty Justin Steele stuck with the changeup after it dipped out of the zone to Joey Meneses for ball two. Steele immediately threw another, this time getting the whiff he was looking for.
Steel, who held the Nationals to one unearned run through six innings on Tuesday, hadn’t thrown a changeup in a game in over three weeks. But he threw six on Tuesday, according to Statcast, including back-to-back pitches to Meneses in the fourth inning of the Cubs’ 7-5 extra-innings win against the Nationals.
“My four-seam [fastball] has that late cutting action in to righties, and then the slider’s going to their back foot,” Steele said in a conversation with the Sun-Times this week.