‘He’s come back a different guy’: Erick Fedde is finding success after revitalizing pitching career in Korea

CHICAGO — For Chicago White Sox right-hander Erick Fedde, it’s been more than a journey of a thousand miles to find his way back atop a big-league mound.

In fact, it’s been more like 13,692 — the distance it takes to travel from Washington, D.C., to Changwon, South Korea, and back to Chicago.

This time last year, Fedde was a day out from making his 10th start for the NC Dinos, who are based in Changwon of the Korean Baseball Organization (KBO).

Fedde, a Las Vegas native, was a first-round draft pick (No. 18 overall) of the Washington Nationals in 2014 out of his hometown college, UNLV. He pitched in six MLB seasons with the Nationals, making his debut in 2017, but suffered from shoulder inflammation in 2022.

Things didn’t look promising for Fedde at that point.

He was coming off a season where he went 6-13 with a 5.81 ERA as a starting pitcher, putting him on the precipice of seeing the clock run out on his major-league career.

Over his final seven starts of 2022, Fedde saw his ERA balloon by nearly a run — from 4.88 to 5.81 — with his final start of the season being the penultimate moment that necessitated a change.

After making it through just 2.1 innings and giving up nine earned runs in New York against the Mets on Oct. 5 of that year, Fedde was beaten up — physically and mentally — and in need of a reset to help preserve his MLB career.

He was granted free agency in November 2022, meaning he was out of the only MLB organization he had ever played for.

Going to Korea

Shortly thereafter, that reset came in the form of a conversation that charted a course for Fedde to the other side of the world.

“When I made that decision, I was talking with my agent, he said, ‘Go over there and work on (your) stuff,'” Fedde said after Sunday’s game, in which he pitched into the ninth inning as the White Sox finished off a weekend sweep of the Tampa Bay Rays at Guaranteed Rate Field.

And so he did.

On Dec. 20, 2022, Fedde signed a contract with the Dinos and made the nearly 7,057-mile journey from D.C. to South Korea, where the right-hander could finally tinker around with his pitches, find out what works, and then work toward getting back to the big leagues.

“Sometimes it’s hard to work on things in the big leagues. You’re trying to get outs, and that’s what really matters,” Fedde said. “But (I went) over there and could throw my changeup 25 times and figure it out, and throw my sweeper 25 times and figure it out. And, you know, it’s tough when you maybe get through the minors and you haven’t done that enough.

“Now, I had a year to reset and figure it out.”

On April 30, 2023, Fedde gave up one hit and struck out 11 batters in seven shutout innings against the Hanwha Eagles. It was a part of a season where he went on to finish 20-6 with a 2.00 ERA and 209 strikeouts on his way to the KBO pitching triple crown and a league MVP award.

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At that point, the ability to tinker with his pitching arsenal and the success that came with it in Korea led to the restoration of Fedde’s belief he could pitch again in MLB.

“I feel like most of us that are in the big leagues have had times where we feel like we’re the best pitcher on the field,” Fedde said. “Getting back to that can sometimes be tough when you’ve been beat up.

“But I think I gained a ton of confidence, and like I said, when you feel like you have the tools to get people out, it leads you to that sense of confidence again.”

Signing with White Sox

On Dec. 5, 2023, Fedde and the White Sox agreed on a two-year, $15 million contract to bring him back stateside and rejoin the ranks of MLB.

In the time since, the man nicknamed “Feddecini” has found a way to serve up a dish of pitches that have consistently kept batters off-balance through the first month of the 2024 season.

Fedde has posted a 2-0 record with a 2.60 ERA and 39 strikeouts, while walking only nine batters, over 34.2 innings pitched in his first six starts with Chicago.

When asked about what’s enabled such an impressive first month back in the big leagues, Fedde attributed being able to pitch quickly, adapt and attack both sides of the plate as important ingredients in his recipe for success.

“Just the ability to have weapons to both sides of the plate,” Fedde said after Sunday’s masterpiece. “I mean, I saw a lineup that was strictly lefties against the Twins (on April 23), and I had a changeup, sinker and a cutter, and then today, I just could lean on a sweeper in a righty-heavy lineup.

“It makes it tough for other teams to pick who they’re putting in the lineup and can’t just stack me. I think that’s probably the biggest difference.”

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Fedde threw six innings of one-run ball on three hits with a big-league career-high of 11 strikeouts against the Twins on April 23. Then he followed it up with his longest-ever major-league start five days later against the Rays, an 8.1-inning performance where he gave up two runs on seven hits with nine strikeouts and no walks.

When extended back to his April 17 start against the Kansas City Royals, Fedde has given up only three earned runs in 20 innings of work, with 25 strikeouts compared to just three walks.

“He’s come back a different guy. Knowing the league, knowing what you needed to adapt and adjust to and … coming back and executing is a part of development and a part of the process,” White Sox manager Pedro Grifol said. “He’s really reliable. … He’s the guy that comes in and competes every single day.”

White Sox outfielder Tommy Pham, who got his first experience of seeing the new-look Fedde on the mound Sunday, said his pitching contributed toward the team getting into a rhythm that helped them complete a three-game sweep of the Rays, doubling their win total for the entire month of April in one weekend.

“It was nice. He worked quick, pounded the strike zone,” Pham said. “That’s what you want as a defender, someone out there (filling) up the strike zone and getting us back into the dugout.

“… Time of possession is a real thing in baseball. If you can get us off our feet out there and back into the dugout, it makes it easier for us.”

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Moving forward, Fedde said it’s all about keeping things in perspective and taking it one day at a time, but he looks forward to keeping the good times rolling the next time he’s on the mound.

“Looking back a couple years ago, if you told me I was striking out close to double digits and going deep into games, I’d probably chuckle a little,” Fedde said. “But you know, (this is) what I’ve dreamed to do, and now it’s just, keep going.”

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