Kansas City Royals pitcher Kris Bubic talks about intensity of pitching in postseason

Kansas City Royals pitcher Kris Bubic joins Jake Mintz & Jordan Shusterman of `Baseball Bar-B-Cast` to discuss the intensity of pitching in the MLB playoffs and how it differs from a regular season game.

Hear the full conversation on the “Baseball Bar-B-Cast” podcast – and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube or wherever you listen.

Video Transcript

I want to ask you about throwing in the playoffs.

Like, you obviously pitch in big games in college, in regionals, I believe, right, your sophomore and junior year.

I don’t think you were in Omaha, either of those years, but in terms of the adrenaline of throwing in a postseason game, how did that compare to one, big games in college, 2, Regular season games and then 3, like your incredibly low intensity rehab process that you would basically like just finished.

So I’m, I’m very curious to hear you kind of compare and contrast those.

There’s nothing that compared to the playoffs.

The energy in playing in places like Baltimore, New York, like, those are two pretty loud, pretty energetic places, especially in New York.

Like, everybody kind of knows how that is, but you get to the playoffs.

There’s 40, 50,000 people screaming their heads off.

Um, we’re playing in all these close games too, and it’s like, you kinda know, hey, like, I gotta be on it here.

I gotta come in, you know, firing away right away, like I got no time to waste.

Um, so the sense of urgency, the awareness is really heightened compared to the regular season, compared to the rehab assignment, compared to college, like, that’s something.

I’ll always remember and you kind of get out there and you’re, I’m almost like, I mean, there’s a little bit of jitters um that come with it just because it was my first, it was a lot of our actually first taste of the playoffs.

So, um, getting to experience that, well, yeah, that was, that was something else.

Um, and, and you threw like a lot relatively like you pitched in both of the Baltimore games in a one run game in the 8th, right?

Yeah.

Yeah, so I was like, welcome to the bullpen, Chris.

Yeah, so it was kind of funny.

So we were pushing to make the playoffs the last week of the season we were in uh DC and then Atlanta.

Um, in DC that was like we, I wanna say we, we swept the series, but they were all super close games.

I pitched 2 out of 3 there.

We lost Friday night in Atlanta, but we still clinched because I think Minnesota lost.

So we were like staying there waiting to, you know, celebrate and whatnot.

So that kind of gave, but it was nice because that kind of gave us a couple of days to reset.

I ended up pitching the last game of the season.

Getting a save for the first time ever, so that was cool.

But, so that, that gave me like a bridge outing to the playoffs cause I knew, you know, it’s all hands on deck in the playoffs like.

You know, we’re gonna be available.

We know, like, kind of our style of plays to play a lot of low scoring games, you know, our pitching, pitching and defense often carries us.

So we kind of know the expectation going in.

Um, and then, yeah, New York too, I think, uh, I didn’t pitch game one, but I pitched two innings in game two to, to bridge the gap there to Lucas at the end.

Um.

But yeah, I mean, In the moment, you don’t really feel fatigued, but then after you’re done, it’s like, man, the physical standpoint of just getting up every day, like, You know it’s at stake and the metal just being so locked in because you never know what any like just because I’m pitching late in games, you never know like starters have a shorter lease typically, so I could be coming in the 4th inning instead of the 7th or 8th.

So it’s like.

Every pitch, you’re just, you know.

In the zone, so it’s, it’s, it’s exhausting, but like I said, it’s, it’s something I’ll never forget.

Kansas City Royals pitcher Kris Bubic talks about intensity of pitching in postseason | Baseball Bar-B-Cast

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