Brewers' Hoffman Not Wasting Any Bullets This Spring

PHOENIX -- Not many pitchers could wait till March 19 to make their first spring-training appearance, come out throwing 84 mph -- and not worry about making the team.

The all-time saves leader gets an exemption.

"Some guys have got 10 innings in already," Trevor Hoffman said Friday, "and they're like, 'When is this old joker going to get out there in a game?' "

He did that Friday, allowing a run on two hits and a walk in his spring debut for the Brewers against the Angels at Maryvale Baseball Park.

"I'm in a fortunate position," Hoffman conceded afterward. "They've been very good with this process."

The process for Hoffman, this spring, is just five games.

---

---

"He's been doing it a really long time, right?" Milwaukee pitcher Jeff Suppan said. "Obviously he knows how to prepare himself."

Yes, a really long time. Hoffman's first save came for the Marlins on April 29, 1993 -- almost four year's before Mariano Rivera's first save. Other pitchers who got a save that day, almost 17 years ago: Scott Radinsky, Mike Henneman, Lee Smith (his 365th), Doug Jones, Mitch Williams and Mike Jackson.

The Brewers medical staff came to Hoffman over the winter with the idea of doing more long toss early in camp to build arm strength and delay mound work -- with the downhill action that punishes the body -- for a couple of weeks.

Hoffman is, after all, 42.

"You talk to a lot of guys about this stage [of the spring]," he said, "and they're all kind of ready to go already. So the logic was not to have to tread water for maybe a week and a half, two weeks, here at the end of camp. You can kind of have that whole head of steam going into the season.

"Throws you're going to make here [in spring training], once you're ready to go, are kind of wasted throws. So hopefully we hit the ground running at the end of March, early April."

Hoffman knows about saving bullets. Last year he earned 37 saves (giving him 591) in just 54 innings, the fourth-fewest ever for a pitcher with 35 or more saves.

Has a healthy pitcher ever made more per inning than Hoffman, who was paid $6 million?

The Brewers got their money's worth. Conserved more than fossil fuel, Hoffman had a 1.83 ERA, blew just four save chances and held hitters to a .183 average.

All with that mid-80s fastball, a changeup, a curve -- and guts.

Hoffman was sharp early in his inning Friday but fell behind his final three hitters, allowing an RBI single, a four-pitch walk and a fly out. He wound up throwing 29 pitches, 17 for strikes.

"Knocking the rust off," manager Ken Macha said.

Hoffman has four more outings to tune up.

"Five outings vs. seven or eight -- it's not much of a difference," he said. "The key is just to come out of this healthy."

And when the games count, he'll need nine saves to be the first to 600.

"In this role," he said, "you can't look even one save in front of you. They're not easy to get.

"Nine saves away doesn't seem like a long number, but depending on how the opportunities show up, it could take a while."

Maybe with these two-week spring trainings, Hoffman can reach even more round numbers.

"I really haven't thought about leaving, to be honest with you," he said. "Ultimately the game is going to let me know when that time is."