Congrats to Matt DeSalvo for his first major-league win. Very economical, worked fast all night, and showed pretty good movement on his pitches.
However, and this isn't intended to be a knock on the kid's performance thus far, I'm a bit concerned about his walk total. The M's have drawn the fewest walks in the AL and are an extremely free-swinging team that don't take a lot of pitches.
Despite that, he still walked six hitters in his two starts against Seattle. A patient team would have drawn even more walks and forced him into many more 2-0 and 3-1 counts.
DeSalvo is also a fly ball pitcher who won't have the benefit of throwing in pitcher's yards like the Stadium or Safeco in his next start at Chicago or any start he gets away from the Stadium over the next few weeks while Clemens and Hughes are unavailable.
Of course, DeSalvo's job isn't to be the savior of this team. It is to keep his team in the games he pitches until the cavalry returns to the rotation.
Again, my intention isn't to rain on this kid's parade after two great outings. I just wanted to highlight an area of his game that probably won't work as well against more patient teams in hitter-friendly ballparks.