R4V4G3D_SKU11S
TRIBE Member
Jays hire Kevin Seitzer as hitting coach.
Why Kevin Seitzer got fired:
Why Kevin Seitzer got fired | Judging the Royals with Lee Judge
Power vs. contact: what a hitter does to improve one can hurt the other. Hit a ball out in front and it improves the chances of hitting a home run. Ball parks are shorter in the corners, so pulling a pitch allows a hitter to take a shot at leaving the yard. But to hit a ball out in front, also means starting the swing earlier and that means a hitter can be fooled much more easily. Increasing your power can reduce your average. Reducing your average can increase your power.
And there you have the difference in hitting philosophies at the center of Kevin Seitzer’s firing.
Seitzer teaches hitting the ball back up the middle. That’s the big part of the park and it’s easier for a hitter to get a ball to drop because the centerfielder has more ground to cover. That’s a high-average approach and Seitzer’s hitting philosophy has kept the Royals team batting average near the top of the American League in hitting. Letting the ball travel deeper also makes the Royals hitters harder to fool and they proved that by having fewer strikeouts than any team in baseball.
But hitting the ball back up the middle means it’s harder to hit the ball out of the park. A routine fly ball caught near the warning track in centerfield would be halfway up general admission in left.
So here’s Ned Yost’s argument: the Royals were near the top in batting average, but near the bottom in runs scored. Ned believes a high-average, opposite field approach often means having to string three singles together to score a run. (And if Billy Butler is the lead runner, it might be four singles.) Ned would like to have more opportunities to score quickly: a walk, a bloop and a blast and—boom—three runs are on the board.
A power-hitting approach might also increase walks: smart pitchers go right after singles hitters unless there’s a runner in scoring position. Why not? Kauffman Stadium is huge and if a guy is only going to hit a three-hopper for one bag, be aggressive in the strike zone. A pitcher is still two singles away from damage.
A power-hitting approach might also decrease walks: if hitters are swinging sooner, their pitch selection will get worse. The hitters will be pulling the trigger before they know where the pitch is going.
But can’t we all get along? Isn’t there a middle ground? Sure; many hitting coaches (and that includes Seitzer) teach a hitter to take a high-average approach in certain counts and look to pull the ball in others. (Usually 2-0, 2-1, 3-0 and 3-1 counts.) I don’t think Ned wants his hitters to pull the ball all the time either, so it’s a matter of degree. When do you look to pull and when you do try hit the ball out in front, do you have the right hitting mechanics to make it work? But combining hitting philosophies is kind of like wanting a hot wife who can cook: nice if you can get it, but often hard to pull off.
Part of Seitzer’s argument is that the Royals hitters are very young and would eventually learn to do that: go for broke at the right time. But Kevin has run out of time. If that happens, it will happen on someone else’s watch.
___________________________________________________________________
Thoughts?
Why Kevin Seitzer got fired:
Why Kevin Seitzer got fired | Judging the Royals with Lee Judge
Power vs. contact: what a hitter does to improve one can hurt the other. Hit a ball out in front and it improves the chances of hitting a home run. Ball parks are shorter in the corners, so pulling a pitch allows a hitter to take a shot at leaving the yard. But to hit a ball out in front, also means starting the swing earlier and that means a hitter can be fooled much more easily. Increasing your power can reduce your average. Reducing your average can increase your power.
And there you have the difference in hitting philosophies at the center of Kevin Seitzer’s firing.
Seitzer teaches hitting the ball back up the middle. That’s the big part of the park and it’s easier for a hitter to get a ball to drop because the centerfielder has more ground to cover. That’s a high-average approach and Seitzer’s hitting philosophy has kept the Royals team batting average near the top of the American League in hitting. Letting the ball travel deeper also makes the Royals hitters harder to fool and they proved that by having fewer strikeouts than any team in baseball.
But hitting the ball back up the middle means it’s harder to hit the ball out of the park. A routine fly ball caught near the warning track in centerfield would be halfway up general admission in left.
So here’s Ned Yost’s argument: the Royals were near the top in batting average, but near the bottom in runs scored. Ned believes a high-average, opposite field approach often means having to string three singles together to score a run. (And if Billy Butler is the lead runner, it might be four singles.) Ned would like to have more opportunities to score quickly: a walk, a bloop and a blast and—boom—three runs are on the board.
A power-hitting approach might also increase walks: smart pitchers go right after singles hitters unless there’s a runner in scoring position. Why not? Kauffman Stadium is huge and if a guy is only going to hit a three-hopper for one bag, be aggressive in the strike zone. A pitcher is still two singles away from damage.
A power-hitting approach might also decrease walks: if hitters are swinging sooner, their pitch selection will get worse. The hitters will be pulling the trigger before they know where the pitch is going.
But can’t we all get along? Isn’t there a middle ground? Sure; many hitting coaches (and that includes Seitzer) teach a hitter to take a high-average approach in certain counts and look to pull the ball in others. (Usually 2-0, 2-1, 3-0 and 3-1 counts.) I don’t think Ned wants his hitters to pull the ball all the time either, so it’s a matter of degree. When do you look to pull and when you do try hit the ball out in front, do you have the right hitting mechanics to make it work? But combining hitting philosophies is kind of like wanting a hot wife who can cook: nice if you can get it, but often hard to pull off.
Part of Seitzer’s argument is that the Royals hitters are very young and would eventually learn to do that: go for broke at the right time. But Kevin has run out of time. If that happens, it will happen on someone else’s watch.
___________________________________________________________________
Thoughts?
