Pete Fairbanks, Jason Adam Looking Forward to High-Pressure Moments in Postseason
CLEVELAND, Ohio — What makes playoff baseball so great is that everything is amplified. Every inning means a little more, every out, every pitch, every deep breath.
The pressure is intense. After a marathon of a season for six long months, the playoffs are a sprint to 27 outs in front of loud sold-out crowds. And getting to that 27th out is what it's all about.
That's why it's so important to have dominant bullpen arms you can trust. It's a priority — probably even the biggest priority — for a Tampa Bay Rays organization that's in the playoffs for the fourth straight year now. Their bullpen has won them a lot of games the past four years, and the plan is for that to be the case again.
No one knows that better than Pete Fairbanks and Jason Adam, the two guys who anchor the back end of the Rays' bullpen these days, two stalwarts who have had sensational years when manager Kevin Cash and pitching coach Kyle Snyder needed them the most through a boatload of injuries.
Their value was on full display last week — for not pitching. It's proof positive that the Rays cherish their value, because the goal since clinching a playoff spot last Friday was to make sure those two — and a couple of other banged-up players —got all the rest they needed to be ready for Game 1 of the wild-card series on Friday against the Cleveland Guardians.
Mission accomplished.
Adam and Fairbanks, they are ready to go. Both understand the postseason is different, and they're ready to embrace the moment. It's different, but it's also still the same game they've been playing forever, with just a few million extra people watching.
"There is the ability to overfocus on how different it is in the postseason, but I'm about to put on the same pair of pants and the same spikes and all the same stuff I've put on every day all season long,'' said Fairbanks, who has gone 22 straight innings without allowing a run and has a 1.13 ERA for the season with eight saves. "They give you a different hoodie and put a patch on your hat that says 'postseason,' but we'll still go out there and prepare the same way, and work to get guys out just like we've been doing, too.''
Adam, who has pitched in a career-high 67 games and has a 1.56 ERA with eight saves, concurs. One season ended on Wednesday, and a new season starts on Friday. He gets it.
"There's a shift, for sure, and at this point, the stats don't matter,'' Adam said. "It's a long season, but none of it matters now. We have to go out and get the job done, and I'm a big fan of hitting that re-set button. I'm very excited for the postseason to be here.''
Both appreciated the rest, not having to pitch at all in the final week. Fairbanks had a good bullpen session on Tuesday in Boston, and Adam did the same Wednesday. They are fresh and ready to go.
"There are pros and cons (to rest vs. rust) but I think how they handled that this week was great,'' Adam said. "We rested, but it's not like we're sitting there doing nothing. We're preparing to go into games, doing all the mental stuff, and I know I had a high intensity bullpen session (on Wednesday) that really got me ready. It gave me a chance to refine some things, really dial in on a couple of things I've been working on. I threw maybe 10-15 actual pitches and had a batter stand it to make it as real as possible. I'm good to go, however they need me.
"Physically, I feel great. There are ups and downs to a season and I feel like I am on an up right now. The arm feels fresh, the body feels fresh and I'm definitely ready to go. I hope a month from now we're talking and I'm telling you about how gassed I am, but for today, I feel great. I can't wait for Friday afternoon to get here. Postseason baseball, that's what it's all about.''
The Rays have been careful with Fairbanks since returning from a lat injury in July. He gave up runs in his first two outings, but has been perfect ever since. Only once, though, was he asked to get more than three outs. He had one four-out outing, and that was it.
It's likely that will change in the postseason, where Fairbanks and Adam will be asked to pitch more than an inning.
Bring it, they say.
"We've been talking about it, knowing that things shift in the postseason,'' Adam said. "However many outs they need me to get, that's what I'm going do. We're already mentally and physically prepared to do whatever it takes to get a win and keep moving on.''
This wild-card series is best-of-three, with all three games in Cleveland. The Guardians are 4-2 against the Rays this season, and all three games in the recent road trip to Cleveland on Sept. 27-29 were one-run games.
They know it's probably going to be more of the same this weekend, too.
"The workload goes up, but the job remains the same. The guys up there at the plate, get them out,'' Fairbanks said. "Maybe you do that three times, maybe you do that four or five or whatever it takes to get the job done. We're ready for that added stress, and we're all ready to accept that.''
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Tom Brew is the publisher of Inside The Rays, and has been with the Sports Illustrated/FanNation network for three years. He is an award-winning writer and editor who has spent most of his four-decade career at the Tampa Bay Times, Indianapolis Star and South Florida Sun-Sentinel. He has written four books.