You really don’t have to talk to anybody. Coming up through the minor leagues, you can just watch other teams. You can watch their pre-game, what they do as opposed to what we do, as far as how extensive—sometimes it can be annoying. Sometimes it can be a little ticky-tack, what we do as an organization. But in the long run, it helps us. It helps us defensively, and even the things we do in batting practice. In our second round of BP, we go through situations like getting guys over. Coming up, I used to be like, "Man, why do we have to take infield when other teams never take infield—or outfield,"or "Why do we have to do this? Why are we taking all this fungo when the other team didn’t?’"But when you get up to the big-league level, you see how it paid off.
Denard Span from BP, on the Twins expectations for young players. He also talks about how the Twins tried to turn him into a slap hitter and only when he gave up on that did he become a major leaguer. So, some good, some bad.
about 2 years ago
afh4
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If Span is accurate, a big “if”, it’s pretty baffling. Why wouldn’t you make minor leaguers take tons of infield practice? What possible explanation is there for not just making them practice all the time?
Perhaps today there is a greater emphasis, and thus more time devoted to conditioning, than on actual baseball skills. Additionally, fundamentals aren’t as important when balls are flying out of the park as they have in recent years, although that trend seems to have returned to more normal levels.
I would add that this is a symptom we see in other sports. I’m speaking of the decline in fundamentals. For example, in basketball passing, defense, and free throws have suffered. In football, form tackling is rare and an effective block is now in many instances just getting in the defensive players way. That is why I enjoy watching the teams like the Angels or Twins ( I know, not a popular sentiment ’round these parts). My personal favorite model is the old “Oriole way”- pitching, defense, 3-run HR. I really admire Earl Weaver. I believe he was one of the pioneers in utilizing stats beyond just the basics, like batting avg.
I’m speaking of the decline in fundamentals. For example, in basketball passing, defense, and free throws have suffered.
I don’t think that’s true. I know that’s the conventional wisdom you hear from many fans, especially older ones, that fundamentals aren’t as good now as they used to be, but there is just no evidence to that. Free throw shooting has not declined over the past few decades in the NBA — actually, it’s gone up slightly. Here’s a link from a NY Times article that discusses why free throw shooting percentages have remained relatively constant at all levels of basketball, pro and college.
Passing and defense are harder to judge because the game has changed over the years. There are high-scoring eras and low-scoring eras in basketball just like in baseball, so it’s hard to judge that defense is worse now that in used to be. Most NBA people would probably argue that defense is better overall because players are more athletic so offensive players just don’t get the open looks that they used to decades ago, which is part of the reason why teams don’t score in the 110’s and 120’s as frequently as they did 20 to 30 years ago.
I know that goes against the common perception of the NBA — and all sports, really — by many fans today that players don’t try as hard and don’t care as much as they used to, but there really is no evidence to this. I’m sure if you look back at tape of games in the 70’s and 80’s you would see just as many examples of bad fundamentals as you do now.
by Buckeye Brad on May 11, 2010 1:15 PM EDT up reply actions
Definitely agree with this. Rule changes are actually more responsible in styles of play than anything when it comes to basketball.
Or football. Since they’ve outlawed the bump and run, can anybody actually cover a wide-out? But then again, there’s just no excuse for the poor tackling in the NFL – or the Big 10 either.
Resident LGT results-oriented boob.
It could also be a symptom of having much larger, stronger and athletic RBs and WRs than ever before which make tackling that much harder?
by jakesinger777 on May 13, 2010 5:49 PM EDT up reply actions
Sure, I can see making a choice between drills and conditioning. But the dichotomy Span creates is between having guys stand around and having guys take infield. If I’m a minor league coordinator, I use downtime around the complex to have these guys practice bunting or whatever. Winning at sports is hard and most everything counts.
The concept of the Twins trying to turn somebody into a slap hitter slightly deflates the theory that David Ortiz clearly did roids when he left the Twins. Slightly.
There’s long been an assertion that the Twins squandered Ortiz by not allowing him to be a dead pull hitter. I’ve always thought that if he was as good a pull hitter while in Minnesota as he was when he left, and the Twins didn’t notice this, well, I’ve always thought that sounded ridiculous.
by afh4 on May 12, 2010 5:43 PM EDT via mobile up reply actions
I don’t think it’s necessarily not allowing him to pull the ball, but rather emphasizing staying inside the ball and using the opposite field. A number of hitters come up to the big leagues and have an inside-out swing…the ones that learn to turn on the inside pitch are the ones that can develop big power. Examples of this are Thome and Hafner. A current example of a player that hasn’t quite figured out how to consistently turn on the ball is Choo.
Do we really want Choo consistently turning on the ball?
"Spring Training wins are good for the soul."
On balls on the inner half, sure, as long as he can maintain the overall approach. Of course, his overall approach is what makes him a good hitter, but it’s almost done to a fault. When he misses a pitch, it’s usually because he’s late on the fastball. Anyone with a good fastball can throw him inside without worrying about being taken deep.
It’s a very minor complaint, and it’s the last part of his evolution as a hitter. He did it in the last part of 2008, but not consistently since then. And someone with his power shouldn’t go 2 months without a home run to his pull side, as he did last year.
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