Andrew Abbott, who pitched for the UVA Baseball program from 2017 to 2021, was announced as a National League All-Star during Tuesday night’s game between Cincinnati and Miami.
For the Reds this season, Abbott is 8-1 with an ERA of 2.07.
After initially not being named an All-Star, Abbott was named a replacement for L.A. Dodgers pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto.
MLB got this right.
The last UVA Baseball player to be named to an All-Star team was Chris Taylor. He was selected as an All-Star in 2021 while playing for the Dodgers.
From the Archives
Andrew Abbott joined “The Jerry Ratcliffe Show with Chris Graham” on July 28, 2021, as he was beginning his MiLB career in the Cincinnati Reds organization.
After missing the first two weeks of the season, Abbott joined the Reds rotation in mid-April and has been fantastic since. Abbott has allowed zero or one earned run in 15 starts thus far in 2025.
Up until this season, Abbott has been a good starting pitcher, throwing 247 innings and working to a 3.78 ERA in 46 starts.
This season, Abbott has taken his game to a new level.
The difference maker?
According to Abbott, it’s his release point, which is now approximately two inches higher than in past seasons.
The result is that he’s releasing the baseball nearly a foot closer to the first base side of the mound than he’s done in past seasons.
Now, I’m not going to continue writing about how I understand all of this, other than assuming the ball is being delivered to the batter at a different angle, which is an adjustment Abbott’s made.
Baseball is a game of adjustments, as the old saying goes. Will the hitters be able to adjust to what Abbott is doing?
Time will tell.
At Virginia, Abbott became the second pitcher to surpass 300 career strikeouts, finishing with 327.
Danny Hultzen (2009-2011) is Virginia’s all-time strikeout leader with 395.
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