Warning: The Following Sentence Has Five Parts
The respect accorded both Price and Realmuto, as well as their evolving relationship, a more various pitching philosophy, and Realmuto’s two references to starters throwing deep into games in this interview would seem to imply something significant for Velasquez and Pivetta in particular.
They are the older two of the three pitchers named above.
This season is likely their last to do something both have struggled with: “… throw six, seven, eight innings a night.” This is how their catcher puts it, without explicitly attaching the phrasing to either of them.
Everyone knows who’s meant, however.
The second time Realmuto brings up starters pitching deep into games, the phrase is “seven, eight innings per start.”
By the way, when asked if he brought up the notion of pitching too much up in the zone and ignoring going down and away last season, baseball’s best catcher answered, “Too many times.”
What both Pivetta and Velasquez should be saying, then, is “I got this” because the best catcher in baseball doesn’t quite believe in them yet.