Taillon Working On New Slider To Be Stronger Pitcher For Cubs

Jameson Taillon is dedicated to improving his strength as a starting pitcher now that he is healthy.

Now that Jameson Taillon is fully healthy, he’s working on a new sweeper slider that he believes will make him an even stronger starting pitcher for the Chicago Cubs.

The first-year Cubs right-hander is hoping to utilize his new slider when the 2023 regular season starts.

“It was hard to truly have an offseason to really lock that down and work on it,” Taillon told reporters Thursday a spring training in Mesa, Ariz. “So, this year felt like a good time to try to add it. And so far, the results have been pretty promising. I’m excited to break it out in games and see how it fares, but metrically and stuff I’m pretty encouraged by it.”

Taillon noted that the process began in December shortly after he signed with the Cubs.

“I’ve had a few bullpens early on where it’s like, ‘I’ve already got this down, it feels great,’ and I’ve had a few bullpens where it’s taken a step back,” Taillon said. “So it depends what day you catch me on right now. There’s some days where I’m like, ‘this is easy; this is going to be a weapon.’ And there’s other days where I’m like, ‘I’ve got to go fix this thing and figure it out.’ ”

Catcher Yan Gomes told the Chicago Sun-Times that the new pitch is going to be difficult for hitters to time.

“I missed one of them,” Gomes told the Sun-Times. “It’s going to be a phenomenal tool, for sure. One of them that he threw definitely took off — not that I couldn’t catch it; it was out of my reach. But you could definitely see a lot of the movement.”

Taillon will enter this season with a career 3.84 ERA over 143 starts in six seasons with the Pittsburgh Pirates and New York Yankees.

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