T. J. Large
Terry W. Large (born May 28, 1983 in Largo, Florida) is a relief pitcher In Minor league baseball who plays for the Boston Red Sox organization. Listed at 6′4″, 185 lb., Large bats and throws right-handed. He attended University of Alabama.
Large became a prospect playing for Seminole High School in Florida, throwing his fastball 91 miles per hour consistently and topping out at 94. He was selected by the San Francisco Giants in the ninth round of the 2001 draft but chose college on unsound advice. A year later, he lasted until the 32d round. The Arizona Diamondbacks chose him, but they offered him less money than a scholarship represented. Large went to Alabama, where his career zigzagged again. In 2004, he tore a latissimus dorsi muscle, but that was a small part of the reason his professional stock continued to dwindle. His arm wore because he threw too many breaking pitches at the behest of his college coach. He wanted Large basically to throw curveballs, and Large did to a high degree, as many as 90 a game. As a result, the wear diminished his best fastball to 86 m.p.h.
After his lat injury healed, Large needed an operation to remove a cyst from the top of his right wrist. When Large began throwing again six weeks after the surgery, he started with basic four-seam fastballs. Something odd happened, because his middle finger pulled on the outside of the ball, which forced it to cut from right to left across the plate. He lasted until the Red Sox chose him in the 46th round after college in 2005, when he finished 7-4 with 92 strikeouts and a 3.46 earned run average in 96 ⅔ innings of work.
From 2005 through 2006, Large pitched for Class-A (ss) Lowell. He later spent parts of two seasons with Class-A Greenville (2006-2007), Triple-A Pawtucket (2006), Single- A Lancaster (2007), Double-A Portland (2008) and AFL Scottsdale (2008), putting up a 11-12 mark with a 3.70 ERA and 34 saves in 137 appearances. While in Portland, he worked on a two-seam fastball to keep batters from diving across the plate, but his main pitch remains the cutter. In July 2009 he was promoted to Pawtucket.
Large is the only pitcher in the Red Sox organization who features a cutter, which he throws about 80 percent of the time. He studies Mariano Rivera, the cutter's most successful and prolific practitioner in the majors.