ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – Red Sox rookie Richard Fitts didn’t pitch well for Triple-A Worcester in July, allowing 15 earned runs in 17 innings (7.94 ERA) in four starts.

“After July, I kind of hit a reset button,” Fitts said Tuesday here at Tropicana Field. “The Olympics started and that kind of brought out the competitive spirit in me a little bit.”

The 2024 Summer Olympics took place from July 26 to August 11.

Fitts, 24, posted a 2.54 ERA (39 innings, 11 earned runs) in six starts for the WooSox from July 27 to September 2 before being promoted to Boston, where he continued his dominant streak. With the Red Sox, he did not allow an earned run in 10 ⅔ innings.

“We’ve recorded pretty much every (Olympic) event,” Fitts said. “I still watch it every start day.”

Watching competitions before the start has become routine for him. The Olympic athletes have taught him to see things in a simple way – just go out and win.

“I just flipped a switch and thought, ‘Hey, let’s win a ball game,'” Fitts said.

He particularly enjoyed watching kayaking and canoeing, although he had not previously known that these were Olympic disciplines.

“That really captivated me,” Fitts said. “So that was pretty cool.”

He also enjoyed competitive speed climbing and competitive lead climbing.

“This is one of the ones I just finished recently,” he said.

He said he had followed the Olympics “a little bit” in recent years.

“But never like this year,” Fitts said. “I was really impressed with all the guys in Worcester. … We had Eddy Alvarez, a two-time Olympian.”

Alvarez, who played 115 games for Worcester this season and is now on the Mets’ active roster, has won Olympic silver medals in speed skating and baseball.

After winning a silver medal in the 5,000-meter relay as a short track speed skater for the United States at the 2014 Sochi Olympics, Alvarez won another medal with the U.S. baseball team in Tokyo in 2020, making him only the sixth athlete and third American in history to win a medal at both the Summer and Winter Olympics.

“The opening ceremony was on and we were sitting in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and all the TVs were showing the event,” Fitts said. “Eddy had his iPad with him. So I thought, ‘Okay, I think I’m going to watch everything this year.'”

Fitts struggled in both June and July, but July was particularly tough, as his opponents posted a .342 batting average against him.

“Obviously I was frustrated with the results,” he said. “It’s not fun to look at the scoreboard and see the runs on the scoreboard and stuff like that.”

But he met with the coaches the day after the launch and they assured him that the process was going well. They let him know that he was close to achieving the results he wanted.

“And then pretty much August came and then it was like, ‘OK, here we go. These are the results we’re looking for.’ So it all builds on each other. I don’t like months like July.”

He added, however, that periods like the one he is currently in are even more rewarding after frustrating months like July. He is throwing with a lot of confidence.

“You just have to have the confidence and the attitude to go out there, compete and compete,” he said.

He’s got it. In Worcester’s 3-1 win on Sept. 2, he recorded 20 swings and misses against Rochester’s batters. He managed 12 swings and misses on his slider, which he threw 40 times. He also recorded six swings and misses on his four-seam fastball, which he threw 25 times. His four-seam fastball averaged 94.2 mph and topped out at 95.3 mph.

He has made some adjustments this season, including to his changeup, which Baseball Savant registered as a split-finger fastball.

“Everything has changed a lot with my changeup as far as the motion profile and the way we throw it,” Fitts said.

He also changed his pitch usage percentages.

“I’m throwing my fastball less than I ever have in my career,” he said. “But I can still throw it in the counts I want. I can throw it in two-strike counts … but I’m also kind of putting it on the back burner and saying, ‘Hey, I throw my slider pretty well, so I can throw that in any count, too.'”