One gray day in April 2012, Oregon State’s Matthew Boyd was playing catch with his pitching coach at the tail end of a rain delay when, out of some combination of boredom and curiosity, he asked a fateful question: “How do you throw a slider?” One quick lesson on proper grip and mechanics later, Boyd, a then-21-year-old lefty reliever with a fastball/curve/change-up arsenal, unleashed the first slider of his life, a devilish missile with a sharp left to right break.
“I was like, ‘Oh, my gosh,’ ” Boyd, now the ace of the Detroit Tigers‘ rotation and one of the top starting pitchers in the American League, recalled recently.