This story was excerpted from Steve Gilbert’s D-backs Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

D-backs third baseman Josh Rojas has long had the itch to pitch, lobbying manager Torey Lovullo to let him be the one to take the mound when a position player is needed to mop up the final outs of a blowout game.

On Tuesday, Rojas finally got his chance, when Lovullo summoned him to pitch the ninth inning of what would be a 15-3 loss to the Phillies.

Rojas had thrown off the mound before, sneaking up there during infield work to throw a few pitches and get a feel for what it would be like.

“So, it wasn’t a big deal when I was warming up,” Rojas said. “But when a hitter stepped in the box, I was like, 'I am way too close to this guy. This is dangerous. If I make a mistake here and he hits it back up the middle, I'm toast.'"

Rojas wasn’t worried so much about the right-handers, because he figured they would for sure pull his lob pitches to the left side. But when the left-handed hitting Bryce Harper stepped into the box, that was different, because he knew Harper is adept at hitting balls back up the middle.

“So when he stepped in the box, I actually pointed to him and was like, ‘Hey, just pull this thing, please don't hit it back to me.’ So I threw that one sidearm, and as soon as I let it go, I knew I left it outside and I was bracing for impact, but luckily he pulled it. But it is too close. It seems dangerous to be that close to the hitter, especially when you’re throwing meatballs.”

When players first get to the big leagues, they will often talk about the game “speeding up” on them as their nerves get the best of them.

Rojas is a veteran position player, so that doesn’t happen to him anymore. Or at least it didn’t until it came to pitching.

“The crazy part was I was talking so much about the things I wanted to do when I got out there, and in the moment it all happened so fast that I just went up there and was lobbing stuff in there. I had some more in my repertoire. I have a little cutter that I had been throwing, I have some sinkers. I probably should have spun a couple, thrown more sidearmers, more heaters harder, but I just panicked out there and lobbed them in there.”

Rojas’ stat page will always include a spot for his pitching numbers. That’s a point of pride for Rojas, although he would rather his ERA did not read 36.00.

“That was my main concern,” Rojas said. “I wanted to pitch but I also want to have a zero ERA.”