Duane Underwood Jr. brought a five-pitch repertoire to the Pittsburgh Pirates bullpen, but the right-hander did so with a grudge. He remained a reliever who wanted to be a starter.

It took some convincing last year, when Underwood lasted 10 pitches on Opening Day before a strained hamstring sent him to the injured list, where he spent six weeks in the minors on rehabilitation assignments.

After working in long and middle relief, Underwood got an opportunity in high-leverage situations and earned his first career save by pitching a scoreless ninth inning in a 1-0 win over the Cincinnati Reds on Sept. 13.

Underwood has a new mentality about his role, whatever it may be.

“I’ve kind of done it all. My job is to go out there and get zeroes,” said Underwood, who avoided arbitration by agreeing to a $1.025 million contract for 2023 in January. “In my younger days, I would get caught up in that. Getting to know myself as a pitcher and as a baseball player, it’s about getting zeroes. That’s all you want. That’s what helps the manager get through the game. That’s what helps the rest of the team out. As a whole, if I do my job and everyone else does their job, we should get good results.”

Underwood returns to the Pirates after a standout stint where put up only zeroes, aside from two strikeouts, in three perfect innings for Puerto Rico in pool play at the World Baseball Classic. He pitched the final inning of Puerto Rico’s “perfect” game against Israel — which isn’t recognized in the record books because it lasted only eight innings before the mercy rule was invoked in the 10-0 win — and tossed a scoreless eighth in a 5-2 win over the Dominican Republic.

Despite being born in North Carolina and raised in Georgia, Underwood was eligible to play for Puerto Rico because his maternal grandmother is from Arecibo. After pitching two seasons for Criollos de Caguas in winter ball, Underwood felt like he fit right in. He even dyed his hair platinum blond during spring training.

“I love Puerto Rico, man,” said Underwood, whose family saw him pitch at Roberto Clemente Stadium. “It’s a super sweet place — the food, the music, the culture, the energy. It’s a great time over there. It’s just an incredible place.”

Underwood spent the winter trying to refine his cutter, the pitch that became his bread and butter last season. After relying on his four-seam fastball (36.1%), curveball (27.3%) and changeup (24.9%) in 2021, he leaned more on his cutter (27.1%) and sinker (26.1%) after making a midseason change to his pitch selection.

“I really wanted to dial in,” Underwood, 28, said. “It was something last year in the middle of the year that I picked up. I really just wanted to hone in and master it and get it as down as I can. That’s kind of my thing: If I can’t figure something out, I’m going to try my best to master it. I understand it takes time. Just that time period, I threw as many cutters as I could just to get a feel for it, get the direction and get the angle I wanted on it.”

The pitch changes came with mixed results, as Underwood allowed hits in 35 of his 51 appearances and runs in 22 games. He gave up multiple hits in 13 of his multiple-innings appearances and multiple runs in eight. Underwood also averaged 8.9 strikeouts per nine innings, which ranked behind only All-Star closer David Bednar (12.0) amongst Pirates relievers who pitched 50 innings or more. Underwood finished strong, recording three strikeouts against St. Louis in each of his final two appearances.

“I think it’s important to optimize your best pitches,” Pirates pitching coach Oscar Marin said, “and optimize what exactly needs to be done for a certain hitter.”

Underwood did just that in the WBC, when he threw strikes on 20 of his 33 pitches. He relied on the sinker, which had a 28.2% putaway rate last season, by throwing it 15 times and getting 10 strikes. Underwood was efficient in all three appearances, needing only 10 pitches to retire the side against Nicaragua and Israel.

Against the Dominican Republic, Underwood threw a 1-1 curveball to get two-time Boston Red Sox All-Star Rafael Devers to ground out to second, struck out Chicago White Sox slugger Eloy Jimenez on a 1-2 sinker and threw a full-count sinker to get Tampa Bay Rays emerging star Wander Franco to ground out to third in the eighth.

Underwood didn’t pitch in Puerto Rico’s loss to Mexico in the WBC quarterfinals. But his performance put Underwood in contention for a back-end spot, showing he had the ability to serve as a setup man to Bednar the way he did for Edwin Diaz.

Where Underwood came to the bullpen still wanting to be a starter, he’s now focused on doing whatever it takes to close out a victory.

“I have complete confidence in my ability, so I don’t think there’s an issue there,” Underwood said. “Whatever the skipper needs me to do, that’s what I’m here to do.”

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