Chris Bassitt hadn’t pitched since June 3. On Friday, he walked back out to the mound at Tropicana Field and, in the very first inning, struck out Junior Caminero with a 71.1 mph curveball that Statcast clocked at 23.7 inches of total movement — more than most elite curves average across the entire league. For a pitcher who just came off back surgery, that’s a pitch worth stopping to appreciate.
Why 23.7 Inches Actually Means Something
Bassitt’s curveball isn’t new. In 2026 he’s throwing it 26% of the time — his second-most-used pitch behind the sinker — and it already lives in elite territory: 17 inches of horizontal break and 67 inches of drop, compared to the league average of 10 and 54 inches respectively.
The August 14 pitch was something else entirely. The 23.7 inches of total movement Statcast recorded surpassed even that already-high personal average. To put it in real terms: the ball left his hand at 71 mph, spun at 2,303 RPM, and traced a path to the plate that a hitter’s brain simply can’t process in time. The combination of slow velocity and extreme movement is exactly what makes this curve dangerous — the batter has to commit to the swing before he can read where the ball is going, and by the time it arrives, there’s no fixing it.
Caminero Makes the Strikeout Mean More
Junior Caminero isn’t the kind of hitter you want to use as a measuring stick if your stuff is shaky. The 22-year-old Rays third baseman 🇩🇴 came into Friday’s game as one of the best young hitters in the AL: 45 home runs and 110 RBI in 2025, with an All-Star appearance to go with it.
What makes the moment even sharper is what Caminero has done in 2026: his swing-and-miss rate dropped from 11.7% to 8.3%, now sitting below the league average of 10.8%. He’s been harder to fool than the typical big-league hitter. Getting a whiff from him on that curveball says nothing bad about Caminero — it says everything about the pitch.
Bassitt has always kept hitters off-balance with a full arsenal — sinker, cutter, curveball, sweeper, changeup, four-seamer — and on Friday that arsenal arrived after more than two months away from competition.
The Return Baltimore Had to See
Bassitt, 37, joined the Baltimore Orioles this year on a one-year, $18.5 million deal. Before the back surgery that landed him on the 60-day IL, he was 4-4 with a 5.27 ERA across 12 starts. Those aren’t All-Star numbers — he made it in 2021 with Oakland — but they’re the kind of numbers a veteran innings-eater can build on if his body holds up.
With Baltimore fighting to climb in the postseason race, getting a starter back with Bassitt’s experience and pitch mix matters. Friday’s curveball was the first real sign that the back is responding. The final line from that game will tell more of the story, but that first strikeout against Caminero was exactly the kind of moment a pitcher and a ballclub need to kick off a comeback.
