The notion that Suwinski’s a broken hitter raises the question as to whether the Pirates not only aren’t developing hitters but are breaking them or making them worse. Hayes is another example of a hitter who’s beginning to look broken despite having been a good hitter in the past but now looks lost much of the time. Termarr Johnson’s primary tool was his ability to hit, but he’s struggling as are many others from the low minors to the majors. What’s going on?
Rowdy looked beyond broken and ready for the scrap heap for the first two months of the season but somehow turned that around. How did he manage to do that? Did it just happen or did he get some outside personal coaching on his own? I don’t know, but it sure seems like someone should at least ask the question.
Is it the players or the system? What is this organization’s “obsession with data” doing to these guys? Do any of them receive actual personalized hands-on coaching or do they just give them IPads and a lecture on analytics? Again, I don’t know the answers but quantifying performance without individualized teaching and guidance on how to improve it can never work. Analytics is a tool not a panacea. It measures things; it doesn’t fix them. It takes people who know what they’re doing to do that. The Pirates used to have people like that but supposedly gave them up to focus on analytics. Memo to Ben Cherington: it isn’t working.
I think it's clear this organization cannot develop hitters. They need to clean house with whoever is designing the hitting plans for the organization and I would go ahead and can all the hitting instructors and just start over with proven guys from other organizations. They fixed the pitching development side so it's possible they can do it on the hitting side. They just need the right people to lead it.
AM, NOLA, WTM: Lots of good stuff and more than enough to take my attention away from the MLB Pirates. I have been concentrating mostly on the talent in the FCL/A level and what we may see at A in 2025. My Top 15 with one included for good measure and their current positions and 2024 age - Jhonny Severino 3B, 19; YDLS, SS, 19; Esmerlyn Valdez, 1B, 20; Tony Blanco, 1B/OF/DH, 19; Carlos Caro, 2B/SS/3B, 19; Shalin Polanco, CF, 20; Axiel Plaz, C/DH, 19; Richard Ramirez, C/DH, 19; Estuar Suero, OF, 19; Edward Florentino, OF, 17; Cristian Jauregui, OF, 18; and for pitching Carlos Castillo, SP, 18; Zander Mueth, SP, 19; Michael Kennedy, SP, 19; David Matoma, RP, 18; Inmer Lobo, RP, 20. Put them out there and let them grow together right up through AA
Hard to figure what went wrong when you look at his stats since the trade in 2021. He was placed in AA after the trade and put up an OPS of .750 in 151 AB. In 2022 he started in AA and in 51 AB he already had an OPS of 1.107. Promoted to AAA where in 117 AB he had an OPS of .695, and the Pirates promoted him to the Pirates where he had 326 AB, an OPS of .709, with 19 HR, and the BB/K was a respectable 19/50, about 1BB for every 2.6 K. He started at MLB in 2023 and his year was 534 AB, an OPS of .793, 26 HR, and his BB/K numbers were 75/172, still respectable 1 BB for every 2.3 K.
How can anyone predict a kid getting better and better and then hit the skids like he has in 2024. Last thing I would do is leave him at AAA - he needs to be at the MLB level and he needs to feel that confidence and the team need for him to contribute at the MLB level. Just my opinion.
BA has a data-centered writeup on ten pitching prospects that raves about Bubba. Can't really reproduce it here, but a key passage:
"We see an electric plus to plus-plus fastball, with elite velocity (easy velocity I might add) that averages about 1.5 inches more ride than expected given his height and release point. He gets great extension at 6.8 feet, and averaged 97.2 MPH with the pitch. Chandler’s changeup often gets great depth, and we see the two pitches that got the most depth were the ones that generated whiffs. The pitch grades out very well in public stuff models."
I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a Jared-Jonesian spring next year.
It's really hard to think what I'd trade him for. They have a shot at a generational rotation. Which is actually the argument that persuaded me it'd be OK to draft Skenes, since I'm normally strongly opposed to taking pitchers early in round one.
It's ironic. The former regime insisted that starters had to throw a change, whether they were any good at it or not. I think that held some guys back, most specifically Keller. I kept wondering, why tf don't they try drafting somebody who already has a decent change.
This FO is OK with guys looking for alternatives, like a cutter, two breaking balls, whatever. So along comes a high-end prospect with a 70 FB and he has a plus change well before getting near the majors.
I once watched a bullpen of Tyler Glasnow in Lakewood, where you could be so close to the pitcher that you had to watch the throws back from the catcher. I'll never forget him telling the pitching coach that he could never throw a good changeup right after he throws his fastball. The coach, who I'm forgetting off-hand, asked him what he was talking about, then said "well you better learn to do it, or you'll never make it". So clearly there was a big deal made about changeups, but then....
I also once watched a game in the stands with Jameson Taillon, who told me that Kevin Decker had the best changeup that he's ever seen, all the other pitchers were jealous of it, and he wanted to learn it from him. He was gushing about the pitch for a good five minutes. Decker hit 93 MPH that night as a side note. He did well that year in Low-A, then the Pirates just released him. Seemed to me like the most ridiculous thing. He threw hard enough, had solid control and a "plus-plus" changeup. It felt like if he had those tools, the results and the other young pitchers looked up to him, that he should have stayed around.
It’s good that an organization has clear ideas about what they want to implement in a broad sense. But that organization runs into trouble when they try to shoehorn every player into that ideal.
Who was the pitching coach that monkeyed with Zach Duke after he came up and was lights out?
I am completely open to the possibility that some coaches actively ruin or undermine players through incompetence and stupidity, I just don’t how to judge when that is happening. John your anecdotes are great because you were much closer and could observe those interactions.
As a side note, I was friends with a guy who played at Univ. of Illinois and was drafted by the Reds. He played one year, was already married and had a child, and called it quits after that 1st year and went a different path. But he told me a story of a practice where they were going to learn how to hit with “power”! He said the coach teed up balls in the batting tee and told them to swing as hard as they could. He just rolled his eyes and said his college coaches were better than the guys in Rookie ball.
I learned that not every coach is great at the minor league level, but some are just good at making sure the club's process is followed. The best info I ever got from a coach was one who lasted just one year. They dumped him because he wasn't great at sticking to the slow progress program, but all of the players I talked to loved him, plus some other front office people said he did great work. I thought he would get promoted, but they found coaches who were more robotic to take his place
You also have cases like Joel Hanrahan, who wanted to remain old school coaching, when they were getting more into the technology side of pitching, so he got let go. People thought it was crazy that they allowed him to leave, but he was completely stuck in his ways and went to the only team that didn't embrace metrics at the time, which was the Nationals. They scooped him up right away because he was perfect for their old school ways
That is demoralizing. That is such a corporate bureaucratic mindset, clearly winning takes a back seat to being a “team player” and “following the process”. It squashes greatness.
Chandler is the great hope for the Pirates to have four high strikeout pitchers in the 2025 rotation. As disturbing as the Development staff's inability to nurture hitters, the opposite seems true for pitchers. If Solomento and Dotel show the magic dust does not work on everyone, the Dust does not work at all on hitters. I'm not in the habit of calling for anyone to be fired but the Development staff working with hitters need to go. They have ruined Shalin Polanco.
Yes, but how do we know it is the coaching? I guess we can conclude the coaching is NOT helping them, but guys in every organization fail. Hitting is hard. Are they instructing them to do things that harm their hitting ability? It actually sounds like Haines’ approach does this, at least with some hitters. As an outsider this is where I profess ignorance. Ex: Reynolds has been excellent since June 1. Is this because of Haines? In spite of Haines? Ignoring Haines? Some combination? I would be ecstatic if we hired a new hitting instructor, but coaching is very difficult to evaluate from afar.
It's pretty close across the board for prospects that have played for full season affiliates.
Johnson, Jebb, Brannigan, White and Polanco. Others as well.
Either BC is very bad at identifying hitting talent or something is wrong with the development side. The big league team is still waiting for a true breakout from a hitting prospect acquired by Cherington in year 5.
Two breaking balls. Piece was more restrained about them, said they need work but have potential. The thing that separates Chandler is that he's a phenomenal athlete, so the chances for progress are always high, as we've seen with his control. It was the same with Jones.
The notion that Suwinski’s a broken hitter raises the question as to whether the Pirates not only aren’t developing hitters but are breaking them or making them worse. Hayes is another example of a hitter who’s beginning to look broken despite having been a good hitter in the past but now looks lost much of the time. Termarr Johnson’s primary tool was his ability to hit, but he’s struggling as are many others from the low minors to the majors. What’s going on?
Rowdy looked beyond broken and ready for the scrap heap for the first two months of the season but somehow turned that around. How did he manage to do that? Did it just happen or did he get some outside personal coaching on his own? I don’t know, but it sure seems like someone should at least ask the question.
Is it the players or the system? What is this organization’s “obsession with data” doing to these guys? Do any of them receive actual personalized hands-on coaching or do they just give them IPads and a lecture on analytics? Again, I don’t know the answers but quantifying performance without individualized teaching and guidance on how to improve it can never work. Analytics is a tool not a panacea. It measures things; it doesn’t fix them. It takes people who know what they’re doing to do that. The Pirates used to have people like that but supposedly gave them up to focus on analytics. Memo to Ben Cherington: it isn’t working.
The only way Termarr Johnson is "struggling" is if you stopped paying attention after April.
I think it's clear this organization cannot develop hitters. They need to clean house with whoever is designing the hitting plans for the organization and I would go ahead and can all the hitting instructors and just start over with proven guys from other organizations. They fixed the pitching development side so it's possible they can do it on the hitting side. They just need the right people to lead it.
AM, NOLA, WTM: Lots of good stuff and more than enough to take my attention away from the MLB Pirates. I have been concentrating mostly on the talent in the FCL/A level and what we may see at A in 2025. My Top 15 with one included for good measure and their current positions and 2024 age - Jhonny Severino 3B, 19; YDLS, SS, 19; Esmerlyn Valdez, 1B, 20; Tony Blanco, 1B/OF/DH, 19; Carlos Caro, 2B/SS/3B, 19; Shalin Polanco, CF, 20; Axiel Plaz, C/DH, 19; Richard Ramirez, C/DH, 19; Estuar Suero, OF, 19; Edward Florentino, OF, 17; Cristian Jauregui, OF, 18; and for pitching Carlos Castillo, SP, 18; Zander Mueth, SP, 19; Michael Kennedy, SP, 19; David Matoma, RP, 18; Inmer Lobo, RP, 20. Put them out there and let them grow together right up through AA
Our crack (must be on) developmental team have done a great job with Suwinski.
Hard to figure what went wrong when you look at his stats since the trade in 2021. He was placed in AA after the trade and put up an OPS of .750 in 151 AB. In 2022 he started in AA and in 51 AB he already had an OPS of 1.107. Promoted to AAA where in 117 AB he had an OPS of .695, and the Pirates promoted him to the Pirates where he had 326 AB, an OPS of .709, with 19 HR, and the BB/K was a respectable 19/50, about 1BB for every 2.6 K. He started at MLB in 2023 and his year was 534 AB, an OPS of .793, 26 HR, and his BB/K numbers were 75/172, still respectable 1 BB for every 2.3 K.
How can anyone predict a kid getting better and better and then hit the skids like he has in 2024. Last thing I would do is leave him at AAA - he needs to be at the MLB level and he needs to feel that confidence and the team need for him to contribute at the MLB level. Just my opinion.
What in the heck would promoting a guy only to get his teeth kicked in do to positively impact his development?
Jack Suwinski, either with Pirate or private instruction, substantially altered his swing in the offseason.
Any time you undergo a substantial mechanical change it will affect your timing, and it is crystal clear that Suwinski has been off all year.
No different than Henry Davis, who spent all winter at Driveline reworking his swing and simply was not ready for Major League competition.
They both need to be away from games that count and get their shit together before EARNING their next big league opportunity.
Just my take but I believe he's not a major league hitter.
BA has a data-centered writeup on ten pitching prospects that raves about Bubba. Can't really reproduce it here, but a key passage:
"We see an electric plus to plus-plus fastball, with elite velocity (easy velocity I might add) that averages about 1.5 inches more ride than expected given his height and release point. He gets great extension at 6.8 feet, and averaged 97.2 MPH with the pitch. Chandler’s changeup often gets great depth, and we see the two pitches that got the most depth were the ones that generated whiffs. The pitch grades out very well in public stuff models."
I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a Jared-Jonesian spring next year.
Speak it into existence!
And this is why you do not trade Bubba Chandler, pitching depth notwithstanding, for anybody less than a young star.
It's really hard to think what I'd trade him for. They have a shot at a generational rotation. Which is actually the argument that persuaded me it'd be OK to draft Skenes, since I'm normally strongly opposed to taking pitchers early in round one.
First major Pirate prospect who fronts his secondaries with a changeup, right?
As of now, Harrington's change grades as his best pitch
It's ironic. The former regime insisted that starters had to throw a change, whether they were any good at it or not. I think that held some guys back, most specifically Keller. I kept wondering, why tf don't they try drafting somebody who already has a decent change.
This FO is OK with guys looking for alternatives, like a cutter, two breaking balls, whatever. So along comes a high-end prospect with a 70 FB and he has a plus change well before getting near the majors.
I once watched a bullpen of Tyler Glasnow in Lakewood, where you could be so close to the pitcher that you had to watch the throws back from the catcher. I'll never forget him telling the pitching coach that he could never throw a good changeup right after he throws his fastball. The coach, who I'm forgetting off-hand, asked him what he was talking about, then said "well you better learn to do it, or you'll never make it". So clearly there was a big deal made about changeups, but then....
I also once watched a game in the stands with Jameson Taillon, who told me that Kevin Decker had the best changeup that he's ever seen, all the other pitchers were jealous of it, and he wanted to learn it from him. He was gushing about the pitch for a good five minutes. Decker hit 93 MPH that night as a side note. He did well that year in Low-A, then the Pirates just released him. Seemed to me like the most ridiculous thing. He threw hard enough, had solid control and a "plus-plus" changeup. It felt like if he had those tools, the results and the other young pitchers looked up to him, that he should have stayed around.
Just thought I'd share two changeup stories
It’s good that an organization has clear ideas about what they want to implement in a broad sense. But that organization runs into trouble when they try to shoehorn every player into that ideal.
Who was the pitching coach that monkeyed with Zach Duke after he came up and was lights out?
I am completely open to the possibility that some coaches actively ruin or undermine players through incompetence and stupidity, I just don’t how to judge when that is happening. John your anecdotes are great because you were much closer and could observe those interactions.
As a side note, I was friends with a guy who played at Univ. of Illinois and was drafted by the Reds. He played one year, was already married and had a child, and called it quits after that 1st year and went a different path. But he told me a story of a practice where they were going to learn how to hit with “power”! He said the coach teed up balls in the batting tee and told them to swing as hard as they could. He just rolled his eyes and said his college coaches were better than the guys in Rookie ball.
I learned that not every coach is great at the minor league level, but some are just good at making sure the club's process is followed. The best info I ever got from a coach was one who lasted just one year. They dumped him because he wasn't great at sticking to the slow progress program, but all of the players I talked to loved him, plus some other front office people said he did great work. I thought he would get promoted, but they found coaches who were more robotic to take his place
You also have cases like Joel Hanrahan, who wanted to remain old school coaching, when they were getting more into the technology side of pitching, so he got let go. People thought it was crazy that they allowed him to leave, but he was completely stuck in his ways and went to the only team that didn't embrace metrics at the time, which was the Nationals. They scooped him up right away because he was perfect for their old school ways
That is demoralizing. That is such a corporate bureaucratic mindset, clearly winning takes a back seat to being a “team player” and “following the process”. It squashes greatness.
Was that this current regime or the prior one?
Chandler is the great hope for the Pirates to have four high strikeout pitchers in the 2025 rotation. As disturbing as the Development staff's inability to nurture hitters, the opposite seems true for pitchers. If Solomento and Dotel show the magic dust does not work on everyone, the Dust does not work at all on hitters. I'm not in the habit of calling for anyone to be fired but the Development staff working with hitters need to go. They have ruined Shalin Polanco.
Why do you think they have ruined Shalin?
He struck out less, walked more and got to his power more often in 2023 than in 2024 at the same level.
What really stinks it's kinda organizational for the hitting prospects.
Yes, but how do we know it is the coaching? I guess we can conclude the coaching is NOT helping them, but guys in every organization fail. Hitting is hard. Are they instructing them to do things that harm their hitting ability? It actually sounds like Haines’ approach does this, at least with some hitters. As an outsider this is where I profess ignorance. Ex: Reynolds has been excellent since June 1. Is this because of Haines? In spite of Haines? Ignoring Haines? Some combination? I would be ecstatic if we hired a new hitting instructor, but coaching is very difficult to evaluate from afar.
It's pretty close across the board for prospects that have played for full season affiliates.
Johnson, Jebb, Brannigan, White and Polanco. Others as well.
Either BC is very bad at identifying hitting talent or something is wrong with the development side. The big league team is still waiting for a true breakout from a hitting prospect acquired by Cherington in year 5.
What across the Board, getting worse?
Lonnie White Jr has never been able to hit a lick and Termarr has absolutely improved this year.
Yes, definitely a pattern…
Does he have a third offering? IIRC he was working on a slider, but Im not sure what the progress has been like
Two breaking balls. Piece was more restrained about them, said they need work but have potential. The thing that separates Chandler is that he's a phenomenal athlete, so the chances for progress are always high, as we've seen with his control. It was the same with Jones.