Senior Chris Keck is a third baseman and one of UCLA baseball’s leading run producers. He doesn’t hesitate to say that the bullpen is the backbone of this No. 3-ranked Bruins team.
“Our bullpen’s been phenomenal this whole year,” Keck said. “Whenever we need some stopping from the opponent, they’re who we call on. … They’ve been the backbone of this team.”
On Tuesday night against UC Irvine, UCLA needed to call on its bullpen earlier than usual. After junior starter Cody Poteet allowed seven runs – four earned – in the first 2.2 innings, the Bruins fell into a 7-6 hole.
Coach John Savage took the long walk to the mound and summoned a freshman reliever, Jake Bird, from the bullpen.
As he entered the game, Bird had only 2.1 innings of college pitching experience to fall back on. Yet he lived up to the standard that the Bruin bullpen has set all year: scoreless innings.
Bird went 2.1 innings
“It’s not an easy mindset coming into some tough, really pressure situations when the game’s on the line,” said senior closer David Berg. “So it’s just great to see those guys really stepping up and doing a great job.”
Berg pitched the last inning of Tuesday’s game, as he does in nearly all of UCLA’s victories. The senior currently ranks fourth in the nation with a 0.96 ERA
Berg credits his success this year to the solidity of the other bullpen pitchers in front of him. Redshirt sophomore middle reliever Tucker Forbes and sophomore setup man Grant Dyer have formed the bridge from the starting pitcher to Berg – a bridge that has rarely folded.
“Grant’s been doing a great job in front of me making sure I don’t have to work too hard,” Berg said. “When I get out there, I’m usually only going out for one inning because he’s been doing such a great job. So just really being able to stay consistent, only having to pitch one inning.”
As a whole, the trio of Forbes, Dyer and Berg has a 1.36 ERA on the year with no losses.
“When you have success out of the bullpen, you shorten the game a little bit,” Savage said. “So we feel if we can get six innings out of our starters then we can turn it over to Forbes and Dyer and of course Berg.”
After carrying a majority of the workload Tuesday, UCLA’s bullpen will have a few days to rest before playing Stanford up north on Friday night.