A raucous Mother’s Day crowd rose to their feet in an explosion of joy and tears and shivers. And it was for Antonio Senzatela.
For the second time in three years, the young Venezuelan who tragically lost his mother about a year before making his MLB debut, found himself toeing the rubber on the day we all take a moment to celebrate moms.
Donning the famous pink apparel, he pitched one of the best games of his young career, powering his club to a win of the game and the series.
It was an emotional afternoon for him and just about anyone who witnessed it.
“Today is a really special day because I don’t have my mom with me,” he said after the game. “I just feel grateful to God and the team for giving me an opportunity to be here. It’s really special for me.”
He was better than the final line indicated. The 6.2 IP, 3 ER isn’t even as good as his season debut, also against the Padres (but in San Diego) when he went 6.2 IP, 1 ER.
But the final two runs came after softly hit singles and were actually cashed in against Carlos Estevez, who also wasn’t hit especially hard. Even the first run of the game was nearly erased on a double play, the only reason it wasn’t is that Senzatela made too good of a pitch and it wasn’t hit hard enough toward second.
Then, of course, there were the seven strikeouts, matching a career high.
It’s also worth noting that this performance came immediately after his first and only truly bad outing of the season, a game against the San Francisco Giants wherein he surrendered seven runs and failed to go five innings.
The most impressive part of his Sunday dealings was the mental fortitude he showed that has defined his young career.
Senzatela famously began his career by jumping straight from Double-A to becoming the first pitcher in the National League to reach 10 wins in 2017. He began to fade and found himself in the bullpen by the end of the season and in Triple-A to begin the next season.
But he was always on standby and always seemed to rise to the occasion when needed to the most, pitching his best games down the stretch and even putting up five innings in the NLDS in which the only damage he surrendered came on a two-run homer off the bat of NL MVP Christian Yelich.
Anticipating an opportunity to build on that experience, Senzatela came into the 2019 campaign with high hopes but got some bad news when he was sidelined with a foot injury that kept him out the first month of the season.
But, again, the very moment he was needed, he stepped up and has, for the third time now, grabbed a rotation spot with a grip that suggests he has no intention of letting go.
And he still has so much room to improve given more reps at the MLB level.
On Sunday, he didn’t even have his go-to pitch in top form. “I didn’t have the best velo on my fastball,” he said, “But good changeup and a good slider.”
He was able to use his secondary pitches to fantastic effect against a very good lineup and it was because he was able to control the emotions of the day.
“I just got in my mind to stay quiet and throw quality pitches.”
There is still a lot we don’t know about who Antonio Senzatela will be as a major leaguer.
Can he develop the breaking and offspeed pitches to take another step and become a truly feared starter? Will he remain a solid, quality-start machine whose numbers will never jump off the page but is nonetheless valuable over the course of a season?
The answers to these questions will emerge over time. But one thing we know for sure is that, so far, Senzatela has been able to handle everything that baseball – and life – have thrown his way so far and come out the other side knowing he’s made mom proud.
