If Geoff Hartlieb looks like a different pitcher for the Pittsburgh Pirates this season, it’s entirely by design. He’s made adjustments head to toe, from his approach and arm angle to fixing his footwork.

All of the changes have led to a more confident Hartlieb, who is embracing his newfound role as a middle reliever for the Pirates instead of one whose purpose was to eat innings in meaningless moments.

Hartlieb is 1-0, with a 3.00 ERA and 1.58 WHIP in 12 innings over 10 appearances this season, a stark contrast to his 9.00 ERA and 2.00 WHIP in 35 innings over 29 appearances last season.

“I’m hoping I can keep pitching well and establish myself as someone who does earn a role in the near future,” Hartlieb said. “It is nice to get in those games where they really matter. The outs are big. The adrenaline comes along with it. It’s fun, no doubt about it. Everyone goes through pitching mop-up innings, cleanup sometimes. You have to do it when you do come up. But it is a lot more fun pitching when the outs matter.”

Prior to Sunday’s game against the Milwaukee Brewers, Hartlieb was doing just that. He had stranded eight of 10 inherited runners and had been scored upon only once in the past 5 1/3 innings.

Hartlieb showed what he could do — good and bad — when he relieved JT Brubaker with no outs in the fifth after Omar Narvaez hit an RBI single to tie the game at 2-2, and immediately got Orlando Arcia to ground into a double play. After allowing an Avisail Garcia single, Hartlieb struck out Christian Yelich to end the inning. But Hartlieb served up the go-ahead, two-run home run to Justin Smoak in the sixth.

The Pirates are focusing on the improvements. That started in October with surgery on his right foot, where Hartlieb had an extra bone outside his fifth metatarsal that caused a fracture on the inside. Hartlieb realized that the pain from the injury was causing him to pitch without pushing off his right foot. Now, he’s strengthened it to the point where the 6-foot-5, 235-pounder is getting close to doing single-calf raises.

“Not having pain when you’re walking is a good start,” Hartlieb said. “There’s definitely some confidence that comes from that. Just the fact that, now I know what it feels like when you do feel healthy — I don’t think I understood it necessarily last year that I was feeling that bad with the foot — I wasn’t able to sit back on my foot and really push.”

After a meeting with Pirates coaches, Hartlieb decided to ditch the two-seam fastball that was favored by previous pitching coach Ray Searage instead using a four-seamer with sinker- and slider-heavy approach.

The idea was to put pitches in the strike zone and allow hitters to attack it. What Hartlieb found is that he’s attacking the strike zone with those pitches, trusting that his pitch angle will force ground balls. That trust, in himself and the defense behind him, has borne confidence.

“It has been fun to just go out there and know what I’m doing before I get on the mound,” Hartlieb said. “I’m gonna rip sinkers. I’m gonna rip sliders. Get ground balls. Get strikeouts. And yeah, no four-seamers this year. Put those in the bag. For now, anyway.”

That allowed Hartlieb to adjust his arm angle, dropping the slot so that he could find movement and mimic the arm path of the two-seamer and slider in an effort to better disguise the two pitches.

“It’s harder to get when you’re at a higher arm slot. It’s easier when you’re around 2 o’clock or 2:30 with the wrist, and you can really pronate through it,” Hartlieb said. “Then it was finding the slider out of that similar slot. Not from a higher arm slot. Closer those two are, the harder it is for a hitter to pick it up. That’s what we’re going for. It was fine-tuning that. It was figuring out what it felt like when the slider was playing well and if the movement wasn’t what it was supposed to be or what I know it could be, it’s understanding what’s probably happening to try and get back to where it comes out right and they play well off each other.”

The arm slot, however, wasn’t quite ready for the start of the season and Hartlieb was optioned to the team’s alternate training site in Altoona during training camp. He was recalled a week later and earned his first career victory after pitching two scoreless innings in the 8-6 win over the Brewers on July 28.

Since then, Pirates manager Derek Shelton has been impressed by the consistency of Hartlieb’s high-90s fastball and the difference he’s shown in being aggressive and decisive.

“I think we’re seeing a kid that’s starting to grow up on the mound,” Shelton said. “You’re seeing confidence, you’re seeing the aggressiveness and the ability to go after guys. That’s a teaching point for him, and that’s something he’s been challenged on, and I think we’re starting to see that happen.”

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