Conversations with the Herd: Easton Lucas

By: Brian Frank

Easton Lucas seemed to have a knack for throwing no-hitters growing up in Simi Valley, California. In fact, during his senior year at Grace Brethren High School, the lefty hurler fired three of them.

“At the time I was a two-pitch guy—fastball and curveball,” Lucas recalled in a recent interview with The Herd Chronicles. “I think I was just having a really good year. My fastball was hard enough to sneak up on guys, and the curveball was a good slow other pitch. I mixed it up pretty well. It was a fun year.”

Lucas had a 0.54 ERA and 83 strikeouts in 52 innings pitched during his senior season and was named to California’s all-state second team. He decided to stay local for college, heading to nearby Pepperdine University, where he played four seasons.

“It was a smaller private school,” Lucas explained. “I grew up home schooled, so I never really went to a bigger school. It was close to home, and the baseball program had done really well. They had gone to a super-regional and then a regional the year before. It was a good fit.”

“College was a lot of fun, but I had some ups and downs,” he continued. “Freshman year was a grind. I was kind of surprised, especially after that senior year (of high school), when I felt like I was better than everybody I was facing. All of a sudden, college was like—hey, you’re going to need to work on some stuff because hitters can see that. It was a big learning curve for me. I kind of figured it out slowly. Dealt with an injury during the middle (sophomore year) and then was lucky enough to get drafted.”

Lucas is a Southern California native. Photo Credit: Brian Frank, The Herd Chronicles

In the summer of 2018, Lucas pitched for the Wareham Gateman in the Cape Cod League, where he had a 2.28 ERA in 23 2/3 innings pitched and was named a league all-star.

“Cape Cod was awesome,” he said. “I went to the Wareham Gatemen. We were nasty. A good team. We ended up winning it all that year. I think I had a good summer. I’d had good summers in the past. I was supposed to go the year before, but I had gotten hurt, so I didn’t go. Then they were nice enough to offer me a contract instead of the year before. They said, we’ll just give you one this year. I got to go and I pitched well, and it was a lot of fun.”

During his senior year at Pepperdine, Lucas had a 3.87 ERA in 13 games (12 starts) striking out 71 batters in 76 2/3 innings pitched. He was then selected by the Miami Marlins in the 14th round of the 2019 MLB June Amateur Draft. After pitching in one game in the Gulf Coast League, he reported to Batavia to pitch for Miami’s Low-A affiliate at the time in the New York-Penn League.

“Batavia was cool,” he remembered. “Being in professional baseball is very different from college, but I feel like that team had a lot of college guys on it, so it was kind of similar vibe to college baseball. It was just a lot of fun. Guys playing baseball and hanging out. I like Batavia — I didn’t have any issues there. It was a good experience.”

That offseason, Lucas was traded to the Baltimore Orioles for infielder Jonathan Villar. He worked his way up through the Orioles’ system, and in 2023, when he was pitching for their Double-A affiliate, the Bowie Bay Sox, he was involved in yet another no-hitter, finishing off a combined no-no against the Altoona Curve. Lucas worked a perfect two innings, fanning current Pittsburgh Pirates catcher Henry Davis for the final out.

“That was exciting, obviously,” Lucas beamed. “Chayce McDermott was our starter, and he was really good through five innings. Then Nolan Hoffman — who just debuted (in the major leagues) a couple of weeks ago — he did really well for the second two. Then I came in. I almost lost it because Davis, the pitch before I think, hit a line drive that hit probably six inches foul off the wall in right field. Then I froze him with a fastball down and in. It was super cool.”

The no-hitter caught Lucas by surprise.

“I didn’t actually know (it was a no-hitter) at the time,” he chuckled. “There’s a video of me looking a little confused while everybody is running out because it was a combined no-hitter, and I actually wasn’t paying attention to the hits column. Just kind of going after guys.”

On the Sahlen Field mound. Photo Credit: Brian Frank

Later that summer, Lucas was traded to the Oakland Athletics for pitcher Shintaro Fujinami. In September, he made his major-league debut for the A’s against the Texas Rangers, allowing one run in an inning of work and recording his first big-league strikeout — fanning five-time All-Star Corey Seager. Tehe Rangers would go on to win the World Series that season — and Seager would win his second World Series MVP Award.

“I think everybody’s debut is a bit of a whirlwind, but it was just a lot of fun,” Lucas remembered. “I was kind of fortunate to get called up, I think it was two days before. It was a day game, and they called me up and said we’ll try to get you in there, but we’re not going to throw you into a crazy situation in your first appearance. I didn’t get in that day, and then we had an off day which sort of helped me acclimate a little bit easier. Then I got to go in there. That stadium (Globe Life Field) is cool. It was pretty much brand new. That team (the Rangers) was good. Getting Corey Seager out was awesome. My brother-in-law is a big fan of his, so when I struck him out, I was smiling a little bit, and he was laughing. It was a good time.”

This season, Lucas made his first-ever major-league start, firing five scoreless innings and only allowing one hit, in the Blue Jays’ 4-2 win over the Washington Nationals during an April game at Rogers Centre.

“That day was awesome,” he said. “I didn’t know until that morning. They weren’t sure because I was there, kind of as a long relief/starter, where they were going to use me if they needed me out of the pen but then they didn’t for a day or two. So, then they were like, you know what, let’s have him start this one and see how it goes. Obviously, it went really well. It was a lot of fun. That was just a super cool experience to finally get a start.”

Lucas was also dominant in his next start, firing 5 1/3 shutout innings and recording eight strikeouts against the Red Sox in a 6-1 Blue Jays’ win at Fenway Park. However, he struggled in his next few starts with Toronto.

“I think those first few I was locating really well, kind of by accident,” he said. “Obviously I’m trying to throw the ball where I want to every time, but I’ve had issues where… my fastball works well at the top of the strike zone, I’ve always known that, but sometimes I’ll try to throw it down and away, which is a traditionally good pitch to throw to guys. But because of how my fastball works, it doesn’t really work well down and away. So, I’ve had that issue. Figuring that out, figuring out how to locate my cutter up and in to righties. So, that’s kind of what was happening. I was almost accidently doing that really well in those first two starts.”

"Then the next two — some of it was bad location, some of it was just good hitting. I threw probably the best slider I’ve probably ever thrown in my life to Austin Riley, and he hit it 114 miles per hour to right-center and I was like — all right, you just tip your cap. It was kind of a mistake to choose that pitch in hindsight, where he was just looking for a fastball and that pitch was close enough to being a fastball that he was able to adjust. But that’s kind of what I’ve taken away. I was executing really well in those first ones, throwing my fastball to both sides of the plate and then executing off of that. That was a big one.”

Lucas uses five different pitches. Photo Credit: Brian Frank, The Herd Chronicles

Lucas uses five pitches, including a four-seam fastball, cutter, sweeper, slider, and changeup. It all starts with his four-seamer.

“I have a four-seam fastball that’s a carry fastball that sneaks up on guys,” he said. “It’s not super hard, but I can get it up there hard enough to get by guys.”

“Then my secondary pitch is normally a cutter,” he continued. “That’s just kind of a traditional cutter. It mirrors Chris Bassitt’s, or a traditional cutter, but because of my four-seam it normally gets in on guys’ hands and under their barrel as opposed to Bassitt, who tends to get swings under it because his sinker is so good. So, that’s kind of my secondary pitch. I try to throw that in to righties.”

He then uses sweeper, slider, and changeup to mix things up and keep hitters off balance.

“My next one is a sweeper,” he said. “I’ve thrown those three pitches for the longest, I’d say. The sweeper is just kind of a weird pitch out of my arm slot. I’m a little bit of a higher arm slot than average. Most sweeper guys are trying to go sinker, sweeper, go left to right, but mine kind of comes from over the top and goes right, so it gets some bad contact most of the time. It’s a good pitch to lefties for strikeouts and stuff.”

“I’ve got a bullet slider. So, like a gyro, traditional slider that just kind of goes straight down. That one’s new. I added that one this spring training. That one is still kind of a work in progress. When I am where I want to throw it, normally it’s down for righties, and for lefties I’ll try to throw a sweeper first and then throw that one — so it looks almost like it’s supposed to be a sweeper, and then it just never goes right, it just goes down instead. They’ve seen the other breaking ball, so they’re not sure — like that was different.”

“And then a changeup that’s like a circle-change grip, but you hold it a little different than a traditional circle-change, so that you try to get the seam-shift affect and try to cut that a little bit — and because of how the seams start moving, it goes down and to the left. That one is also a pretty new pitch. I was experimenting with that one last year. This year has been more of focusing on throwing it more and getting it in better locations. That’s been a big deal for getting righties out, which has helped me be a starter. Because before it was a lot of stuff that all goes the same direction, besides my fastball. So, that’s something that is very different, and it helps me out.”

The 28-year-old southpaw used his five-pitch arsenal to have a tremendous season for the Herd. In 17 games (13 starts), he had a 3.78 ERA and 68 strikeouts in 64 1/3 innings pitched.

“Biggest takeaway (from the season) is probably just having gotten the experience of going up and having some success and then some not success,” he said. “Just seeing the difference between what I was doing in those different games. That’s part of the game plan that I’ve kind of figured out what I need to do to have success. So, I can go into this offseason with an idea of what exactly I need to do and knowing that just focusing in on getting as good at those things as I can.”