John Lackey not happy throwing a lot of strikes

12:24 AM ET

CINCINNATI — It’s not the first time Chicago Cubs starter John Lackey has intimated he might need to “pitch backwards,” or at least change up his sequencing with two strikes.

Lackey is a no-nonsense pitcher on the mound, but sometimes that can come back to bite him. That’s exactly what happened on Saturday, when he gave up six runs to the Cincinnati Reds in the Cubs’ 13-5 loss.

“Gave up some two-strike hits on some balls away that I’d like to have back for sure,” he said after the game. “Sometimes you can almost throw too many strikes. Need to make people a little more uncomfortable.”

Throwing too many strikes isn’t something you hear often from a major-league pitcher — or any pitcher, for that matter — but it makes some sense coming from Lackey. He gave up 211 hits last season, including a league-high 156 singles, but his ERA was just 2.77 with only 53 walks to go with those hits. Without watching a game you can imagine the type of season that he had: Minor damage here and there, but more often than not he made the right pitch at the right time.

“I …

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