PITTSBURGH (WKRC) – For a while it appeared Cincinnati Reds starter Chase Burns would have earned his first career victory. He’ll have to settle for a piece of Major League Baseball history instead.
The rookie right-hander struck out ten Pirates in six innings, and allowed just a run and a walk on three hits. He topped 100 mph five times while striking out the side in the first. Alas, Pittsburgh rallied for two runs off the bullpen in the eighth inning to keep Burns winless.
Per Elias Sports, Burns is the third pitcher with 10+ strikeouts in four of his first eight career outings since at least 1893, when the mound was moved to its current distance. Fernando Valenzuela (1981) and Bob Feller (1936) were the other two.
Masahiro Tanaka, Mark Prior, Dwight Gooden, José DeLeón, Nolan Ryan, and Herb Score all did it three times.
“I feel like I’m learning every time I go out there. I’m just trying to put the team in a situation to win,” Burns said, via Mark Sheldon on MLB.com.
In his eight outings he’s thrown 34â…” innings with 57 strikeouts.
Chase Burns last 5 starts:
10 K at PIT2 K (rain shortened vs. ATL)10 K vs, LAD10 K @ WSH10 K vs. COL
Per OnBaseMachine on Twitter, only two Reds pitchers have notched more strikeouts through their first eight career starts than Burns and his 57. Noodles Hahn had 61 in 1901 and Gary Nolan punched out 60 in 1967.
Burns has a 14.94 K/9 in eight career starts. Yet he is 0-3 with a 5.24 ERA.
According to OptaStats, no other MLB pitcher in the modern era has had an eight-start span at any point in his career where his K/9 was that high but he had no wins to show for it (min. 30 IP).