Will Cardinals’ Mikolas bedevil batters with a special pitch this year? Only he knows

Lars Nootbaar has a fear of lizards, which isn’t ordinarily an issue around either his home in southern California or during the season in St. Louis. In Florida, however, constant vigilance is required. Walk past a rustling bush outside the complex and, if you look quickly, you’ll see green legs and tails disappearing into the vegetation.

It’s a perfectly common fear, given the unknown, but Nootbaar’s mistake came in letting on to his teammates. Returning from his Thursday workout, he threw open the cubby door to his locker and promptly jumped straight back several feet. There may have been an expletive, and then the word that everyone expected: “Miles!”

There may not have been any consumption involved this time around, but the culprit was formerly known as the Lizard King for a reason.

Cardinals starter Miles Mikolas, in his days with the San Diego Padres, once was the star of a viral video in which he can be seen eating a live lizard for the entertainment of teammates with a can of soda in hand to wash it down. There may not have been any consumption involved this time around, but the prior incident earned this week’s culprit the nickname “The Lizard King.” Clearly, from time to time, he lives up to that reputation.

Mikolas rebounded from two years lost to injury to become one of only three pitchers in the National League to top 200 innings pitched in 2022. He enters camp in the last year of his current contract, soon to depart for the World Baseball Classic. Assuming his representation of Team USA goes off without a physical hitch, he’s likely to be in line for a significant contract extension which could take him through the end of his playing career.

He is also a man capable of many surprises, not all of which are green and scaly.

Take Friday’s work, for instance. According to Baseball Savant, Mikolas threw five distinct pitches in 2022, and mixed them substantially. His four-seam fastball was the most common at 27.3%, and fourth-most came his curveball, still 21.1%.

Fifth, at a mere 4% – 126 of his 3152 offerings – came his changeup. It was that changeup that he delivered to Paul Goldschmidt in a simulated full count during a live batting practice. Goldschmidt was groaning even as he made contact, weakly bouncing the pitch toward third base. Mikolas’s laugh could be heard from the third base dugout immediately following.

It was also the changeup that he threw to Nootbaar as the first pitch of his plate appearance. The pitch shattered Nootbaar’s bat at the end and leaving rookie lefty Matt Liberatore to gape at the mark on the ball, which rolled harmlessly to him in foul territory. Nootbaar, shaking off his stinging hands, was also met with a rebuke from the righty, who insisted his teammate had only 10 seconds to get back in the box.

Already a fast worker, Mikolas is more than prepared to make the pitch clock do his bidding.

“He forgot I threw one,” the smirking starter said later about the surprise he sprang on Goldschmidt. He also confirmed a whisper that took to the air around the back fields as he prepared for his first official matchup with hitters of the spring.

He didn’t throw five pitches in 2022. He threw six. And the sixth was, in theory, the only one of its type thrown by a pitcher in all of MLB last season.

The same tracking that broke down Mikolas’s repertoire identified 19 offerings that the system classified as a knuckleball. All were thrown by players who are primarily position players – Ernie Clement of the Guardians, Jack Mayfield of the Angels, and Frank Schwindel, formerly of the Cubs.

Mikolas threw, at minimum, the 20th, and he’s preparing to let loose with a surprising flutter more frequently in 2023.

On October 3 in Pittsburgh, Mikolas and José Quintana prepared for the postseason by splitting up a start against the Pirates. Quintana was scripted for the first three innings and Mikolas entered to pitch the middle three. In his second inning of work, with two out, the bases empty, and an 0-2 count on Diego Castillo, a careful watch of the video clearly shows the fingertips of his right hand curled back, nails dug into seams, and an almost imperceptible push rather than flick out of the hand.

The pitch, which the automated system classified as a curveball, came in at a fast-for-a-knuckler 75 miles per hour. Compared to his typical, slow curve that dips and dives, the ball instead approached the plate and then took a sharp turn toward the left-handed batter’s box.

It went largely undetected. None of the generously counted 12,702 fans in attendance at PNC Park seemed to find anything amiss, and the secret stayed under wraps through the winter. All the while it was tweaked, altered, prepared for competition, and could perhaps make a return appearance as soon as the WBC.

Mikolas was reluctant to delve too deeply into the pitch’s conception, happy to keep his trade secrets to himself. Or, perhaps, he knew to share just enough to pique curiosity on the hopes that rumor grows into myth and from there into fact, giving hitters one more thing to worry about when they step to the plate.

If nothing else, most would rather face down the knuckler than worry about agitated reptiles in their personal space. Their king is already waiting on the mound.