Rays' Chris Archer: Remains confident in his process despite struggles

Archer feels that his struggles this season stem mainly from his performance in small stretches within games, and that he is still throwing the ball well overall, Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times reports.

Analysis:

Despite a major league-worst 10 losses, as well as a 4.70 ERA and 1.43 WHIP, the young right-hander remains confident in his ability to turn the season around. Archer is trying to remain focused on his process more so than the results and in executing enough of his pitches to give his team a chance to win each time he takes the mound. While some of the 27-year-old's metrics appear to corroborate his belief that he's firing away as effectively as ever, such as a 10.57 K/9 rate that is the second-highest of his career, his BB/9 and HR/9 rates, ERA and WHIP, along with the aforementioned losses, are on pace to be the worst he's ever generated in those respective categories. Rays pitching coach Jim Hickey doesn't necessarily disagree with Archer's assessment, but also seems to feel that a thoroughly frank self-appraisal is needed at this point in the season. "But the process has not been good overall either. You may walk a guy leading off an inning you have no business walking and he ends up coming around and scoring, that is not a good process," said Hickey. "I guess you have to identify what the process is and be a good, solid, honest evaluator of whether or not you actually executed what it is you set out to do. I think wins and losses, they count very much, especially at the end of the day."