Dodgers News: The MLB Lockout Contributed to Andre Jackson’s Down Year
Right-hander pitcher Andre Jackson won the final spot in the Dodgers bullpen after a solid showing during spring training. He made only 4 appearances but struck out 10 batters and walked just 1 over 7.2 innings. After a down year in 2022, it was a nice way of showing that his hard work over the last few months paid off.
Jackson’s MLB numbers won’t show you a terrible season last year (1.86 ERA over 9.2 innings late in the season). But things down at Triple-A early in the year looked bleak. His ERA was up over 7 over the first two months of the minor league season. At one point he was pulled from AAA and brought back to Camelback Ranch to work on getting back to the basics.
Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic reported one thing that lead to some trouble for Andre. He took some information and implemented it in a bad way during the baseball lockout during the 2021-2022 offseason.
He’d tinkered over the previous winter, attempting to implement some of the mechanical adjustments that had been recommended to him but without the benefit of in-person coaching or supervision due to the ongoing lockout.
“I kind of brought myself away from what I was good at,” Jackson said. His calling card had been his ability to locate his fastball for strikes and play a strong changeup off of it, but he had spent the lockout trying to perfect his slider.
Via Fabian Ardaya, The Athletic
From July onward, Jackson posted a 3.62 ERA and limited hitters to a .222 average. He still walked his fair share, but he proved he could still get hitters out. And during spring training this year, he proved to Dave Roberts that he can be an asset or even a weapon out of the bullpen.
“To have a guy that can give you 75 pitches is really meaningful,” Roberts said. “Andre has earned the opportunity to be the length guy on our roster.”
Via Juan Toribio, MLB.com
Jackson will be LA’s long reliever to start the season, but it wouldn’t be surprising to see him get more important innings as the season motors along.
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