Randall Delgado finding niche in Arizona Diamondbacks bullpen
SAN FRANCISCO — When they acquired Randall Delgado as part of the Justin Upton trade three years ago, the Diamondbacks hoped they had a pitcher capable of finding a home in the starting rotation. That hasn't worked out, but Delgado is providing value in another way.
"It's not just this year, but he did it the last two months of the season last year," pitching coach Mike Harkey said. "He's kind of found a nice little niche down there in the bullpen."
Having appeared in six of the Diamondbacks' 10 games, Delgado has logged 71/3 innings out of the bullpen while allowing just two runs. He had pitched in three consecutive games entering Friday, which included throwing the final two innings of Thursday night's 7-6, 12-inning win over the San Francisco Giants.
Delgado still features the dominant change-up he had when the Diamondbacks acquired him — he used it to strike out Justin Maxwell and Nori Aoki in back-to-back at-bats on Thursday — but he's also continued to refine his breaking ball, a pitch he threw three consecutive times to retire the Padres' Wil Myers on Wednesday night in San Diego.
Harkey credited bullpen coach Mel Stottlemyre Jr. for helping Delgado find a useable breaking ball.
"He worked with him every single day last year when he (Delgado) finally went to the bullpen from the starting rotation," Harkey said. "He worked every day to try to refine his slider and get a better feel for it. We all tried to give him something that was mechanically a little bit easier to deal with. He's kind of ran with it."
Harkey said Delgado has shown to have a resilient arm, adding the coaching staff will have to be careful not to overuse him.
Falling fingers
During the 12th inning of Thursday night's game, Delgado was nearly struck by a falling object. Turned out it was a chicken finger that dropped from the clutches of one of the many seagulls who circle AT&T Park every night in search of scraps.
After umpire C.B. Bucknor came out to the mound to investigate, third baseman Aaron Hill wandered over and eventually kicked the chicken tender out of the way.
"I thought it would be funny to act like I was going to eat it," Hill said Friday. "I've never seen that happen. Not a chicken tender. Plenty of things have been thrown on, but not dropped from the sky."
Hill had a good laugh about it and even gave the bird credit.
"He was doing the right thing," Hill said. "He's in San Francisco. We're the visitors. He was trying to dive-bomb the opposing pitcher. They trained him well here."
Short hops
Manager Chip Hale was worried the club might need to make a roster move to add a reliever after he emptied his bullpen on Thursday night. But he said before Friday's game he was hopeful everyone would be was available to pitch on Friday night besides Delgado. The only exception, he said, might be closer Addison Reed, who threw 36 pitches on Thursday.
•Hale had Friday night's starter, Josh Collmenter, warming in the bullpen late in Thursday night's game. He said if he had needed to go to Collmenter, the club would have turned to the minor leagues for a spot starter.
