Taijuan Walker's second-half flop continued in brutal fashion on Wednesday night, as the righty was lit up for six runs in two innings in a 12-5 loss to the Red Sox at Fenway park.
Walker's latest clunker is the this time in his last four starts that he has allowed at least five runs, and his ERA in the second half of the season has ballooned to 7.74.
Which begs the question: is Walker struggling from fatigue down the stretch?
"It could be," manager Luis Rojas said. "It's been hard for us to really believe that when we see his stuff playing the same way. There's been differences, but that's happened to every pitcher…they have their ups and downs. I don't want to single out walker because of the innings that you mentioned in the last few years and before this year."
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If Walker is starting to tire in what has been his heaviest workload since 2017, it isn't showing up on the radar gun. His average fastball velocity of 94.8 mph over the last month is almost exactly what it was at the start of the season (94.7 mph), but he has been getting clobbered nonetheless, as opponents have slugged .580 against him in the second half of the season.
If it is fatigue, Rojas believes it would be showing up in different areas, though he still isn't sold on that being the direct link to Walker's dropoff.
"We're seeing things that it could be that," Rojas said. "We're taking that into consideration…we can have those conversations and see the outings he has left in the regular season, what we can do, and just see what's best for him."
With just 10 games left in the season, Rojas said there are no plans to shut Walker down, but he clearly is nowhere near the pitcher that made him an All-Star earlier this season.
"No, we're not talking about that," Rojas said. "But maybe an extra day, take advantage of the couple days off we have, and see if that can play into some consistency and the fastball carry, or pitch location, which is sometimes fatigue that he maybe doesn't feel. But he felt good to go and compete and be the starter [Wednesday]. We don't really have any evidence to show that is the case."
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