Isaiah Campbell has developed a new pitch. It’s an all-world type pitch, a changeup that dances to the plate at 88 mph, then the bottom drops out with the hitter off-balance with his weight on the front leg.
Campbell is the University of Arkansas junior pitcher from Olathe, Kan., coming off an up-and-down 2018 season that included two remarkable outings in the NCAA Tournament sandwiched between two short starts, including a six-out performance in the clinching game of the College World Series championship against Oregon State.
It would be appropriate that Campbell now has that all-world changeup. He began his life traveling the world as his father, Parry, worked in far-away places as an air traffic controller during a 20-year Air Force career. He retired as a master sergeant.
Campbell’s sister, Taylor, was born in the Azores Islands; Isaiah in Portugal. His family also lived in Italy, Germany and Turkey.
Parry Campbell now works for a civilian company that does air traffic control work in many foreign countries. Parry joked about working in Pakistan, Afghanistan “and the rest of the ‘stans.’” He was on a business trip in Virginia during a phone interview.
“We were traveling the world as Isaiah grew up,” Parry Campbell said. “He got to see a little bit of everything. We’d vacation in places like England, France, The Netherlands, Austria — about anything else you can think of close to there, we did. So we saw a lot of the world.”
It’s not like Isaiah recalls much of it.
“We were back to Olathe, Kan., by the time I was 8 and so I don’t remember a lot of it,” he said. “I do remember that we traveled in Turkey. I don’t speak any foreign languages, but my dad does.”
Not really.
“I can order food, or ask for directions in several languages,” Parry Campbell said. “That’s about it.”
What they speak best is baseball.
“I stopped playing sports in high school when my dad said I needed to get a job,” Parry said. “I was decent in baseball and basketball. I was playing football and baseball. He said, ‘You can work and have some spending money, or play sports and have no spending money.’ I chose work.
“Then, when I got into the Air Force, they had a base team. I got to be a pretty good catcher. I was probably Division II level. We traveled all over Italy playing games my first two years in the Air Force.
“I try not to be critical of Isaiah because he knows a lot more baseball than me. But, I am not allowed to sit next to my wife during his games because I make sounds. I mean, I don’t say anything, but if there is a pitch that’s not a strike, I make a little noise. She tells me to move away.
“Funny thing, they showed me on ESPN during the College World Series. People wanted to know why she wasn’t at the game. I had to tell them, she won’t sit with me.”
Back in Isaiah’s early years, Parry decided there needed to be more attention paid to recreation-level team sports on the air base when his children began to play games in the backyard.
“I asked the recreation staff to let me have camps for ages 3-5,” Campbell said. “They told me it would never work. That made me want to try. It was a big success.
“We had basketball, soccer and baseball teams. Our first session for soccer drew 40 kids. There were 75 at the baseball training session.”
Still, he’s not a coach and does not try to help Isaiah with the finer points of the game. He just listens and encourages.
“We talk three times a week,” Isaiah said of conversations with both his dad and mother, Deanna. “We do watch video together, my dad and I. He had the video of the Florida and South Carolina games in the NCAA Tournament and we watched them together this summer when I was home.”
Those were special outings for Campbell as the Razorbacks’ third starter behind Blaine Knight and Kacey Murphy. Against South Carolina in the NCAA Super Regional, Campbell allowed two runs on four hits in four innings, then turned things over to the bullpen in a rout of the Gamecocks that sent Arkansas to the College World Series in front of a packed Baum Stadium.
Against Florida, Campbell retired the first 14 batters he faced and earned the win that sent the Razorbacks to the national championship series for the first time in 39 years.
Campbell had lots of strong performances, but they sometimes fell apart once runners were on base. The root of the problem was unstable mechanics from the stretch.
“Isaiah is like a lot of our pitchers. It’s just harder to maintain your mechanics from the stretch,” said Dave Van Horn, the Arkansas coach. “Actually, you see it a lot. There are some who have gotten to where they just pitch out of the stretch to make sure they get something they can repeat.
“It sometimes falls apart when they go back and forth from the windup and the stretch. We’ve got two or three freshmen right now we are only letting throw from the stretch, just trying to get them to repeat their mechanics. There are guys like that in the big leagues who had to just pitch out of the stretch.”
There were appearances last year for Campbell that were terrific until runners got on base, like when LSU didn’t record a hit off him until the sixth inning of a game in the semifinals of the SEC Tournament. The Tigers singled to lead off the sixth inning, then homered to take a 2-1 lead, which wound up being the final score.
And that’s why Campbell made an early exit in the Dallas Baptist game in the NCAA Tournament when he loaded the bases with two walks and a single to start the game.
Campbell has been electric in his first two outings this fall. The changeup has some polish. Paired with a 95 mph fastball and two solid breaking pitches, Campbell has the perfect arsenal for a starter. He has four or five pitches that feature command. Blaine Knight referenced his stuff last season “as best on our staff.” It’s still true.
“I’ve really worked hard with our coaches on the changeup,” Campbell said. “I think it’s unhittable. I think I could probably just go with the fast ball and the change and make it through a whole game.”
Campbell looks terrific. He’s 6-4, 235 pounds and might pitch at 240. That’s closer to his weight of two years ago. He lost 15 pounds to 225 last year, but coaches want him heavier this season.
“From talking to my coaches, Wes Johnson and Colby Suggs, they think I’ll recover between starts at the heavier weight,” he said. “I’m in good shape at this weight. It’s 15 more pounds of muscle.
“I feel great. My elbow is great. It’s the first year that I can say I’m totally healthy in a long time.
“I’m stronger and healthier. I did Pilates and that has helped my athletic ability and flexibility. I did it all summer. By the end, some of the other guys were going with me and they saw a difference.”
Campbell stayed in Fayetteville to concentrate on weight lifting, agility and school instead of playing summer baseball. He was coming off elbow surgery in 2017 and there was some soreness during the 2018 season, especially for a short outing at Florida during the regular season.
“Everyone wondered what happened in that game,” Van Horn said. “Isaiah was hurt. You just erase that game. We didn’t know he was hurt or he wouldn’t have pitched.”
Parry Campbell said he was watching on TV and knew something was wrong.
“I asked him on the phone right after the game, ‘What’s hurting?’ I knew it was something,” Parry said. “He told me and I immediately said, ‘Why didn’t you tell your coaches?’ They just think they can’t let the team down by saying they are hurt. I understand.
“It was something the doctor who took out the bone chips told us would happen. Every now and then, expect some slight inflammation and soreness. It just comes with that surgery and Isaiah had it a few times last year.”
Campbell had terrific bursts the rest of the year, except when troubled by the inconsistency out of the stretch. But he sometimes opened with multiple perfect innings like against Florida in the NCAA Tournament.
“The changeup ought to help him,” Parry said. “I remember Isaiah calling home after they figured it out a few weeks ago.
“They wanted to adjust it and have a pitch that was at 88 or 89 (mph). He was throwing his change at 81, 82 and 83. Coach Johnson said, ‘Can you throw it at 88, 89?’ He couldn’t. So they had him spread out his fingers and try again. It was 87, 86, 87, then it just drops off the table. And, it feels great throwing it.”
That’s the perfect complement for the rest of his pitches, especially with the movement at the end.
“It’s electric,” Van Horn said. “I haven’t seen any of our guys touch it, or anything else he’s thrown this fall.”
Van Horn likes everything he sees about the big junior.
“He’s taken on a leadership role and is more vocal,” Van Horn said. “Our younger players listen to him.”
Campbell said that’s a little different because Isaiah let Knight or others do the talking in the past.
“I mainly just try to get my work in the right way,” Isaiah said. “But I know I need to help the freshmen get going in the right direction and show them how we do things. They listen.”
Campbell’s fall successes have excited Johnson. For scrimmages, no rules will apply as far as the windup or the stretch. He’ll be able to start innings from the windup. But there is intense detail being applied in bullpen sessions to smooth out his mechanics from the stretch.
“I’m going to let him go in scrimmages,” Johnson said, “but all of his bullpens, he’s working a ton out of the stretch and just getting his rhythm and comfort. He looks different than where he was last year. Isaiah has got weekend stuff and he should pitch on our weekend, and he’s going to have every opportunity to do that and prove us wrong in the fall and the early spring before we play games.
“He’s off to a phenomenal start. He’s come back and he’s different in the ways he needs to be different — the way he carries himself, the way he walks around, the way he works, his nutrition plan. Those young men typically have success when they do that. We’re really, really excited about where Isaiah is right now.”
Johnson said Campbell’s poise was evident in his first two scrimmages.
“He’s always had really good stuff; that’s never been a question,” Johnson said. “But coming out with confidence, poise, command on a consistent basis is where we’ve rode that roller coaster with him in the past.
“He’s a different young man now. He’s got poise about everything he does. Tip your hat to the young man. He’s always been an extremely hard worker, but now it’s like everything he does is purposeful. Instead of saying, ‘Oh, you want me to go jump 30 boxes? I’m going to jump 30 boxes as fast as I can.’ Now it’s like he understands why he’s jumping boxes, just to use that analogy.”
Campbell admits it was a blast to pitch in Omaha. He’d been as a youngster.
“I think we played a tournament there and went to some games at the College World Series,” he said. “I think I might have been 10 or 11.”
Parry recalls that his son told anyone who would listen that he would return some day “and pitch here.” There were other promises.
“Yes, there were,” Parry said. “He told his teacher that he’d pitch in the major leagues some day. The teacher told him he’d never make it.”
Campbell still has a ways to go before he can prove the teacher wrong, but an all-world pitch might be the clincher.
Remember this: if Campbell has the changeup working out of the stretch next spring, the Hogs may have a shot at returning to the College World Series. Campbell can be the ace of the staff with Matt Cronin, one of the nation’s best closers, waiting for the late innings.
“We have talent on this team,” Campbell said. “Coach Van Horn told us in our first meeting that we have a lot of talent. I know we have our position players back. We’ve got some young pitchers, too, that can make this a good staff.”
It will start with Isaiah Campbell.