Chris Tillman flashed dominance in his start at Boston last night. During the first three innings he relied heavily on his fastball, throwing it 87% of the time. In the 4th and 5th he started using his curveball and changeup more often, which is when he started to look dominant. Why didn’t he use them earlier on in the game? He was only able to go 5.3 innings because of the pitch count. Throughout the game he had loose command of fastball, which caused his pitch count to be so high.

Dan Haren had a better outing compared to his first one. The box score of 5 innings and 10 hits wasn’t a true indicator of how well he pitched because two of the hits were fluky. A lot of the White Sox batters looked uncomfortable at the plate (i.e. they took bad swings). He showed a glimpse of the old Haren when he threw two consecutive splitters to get out of a bases loaded jam. That said, he would lose his command from batter to batter. He’s a long ways away from the vintage Haren, but he’s a spot starter in the right matchup.