It's not 1963 anymore. The best teams in the sport don't have defensive specialists who are black holes at the plate playing everyday.
Also, he's not THAT good a shortstop. He's an above average defensive shortstop. He is not Andrelton Simmons. The idea that it's ok to be the worst hitter in baseball because you are 12th out of 34 SS in defensive WAR is just stupid. SS Ranks - 34 qualified that played 500 innings at SS 19th in DRS 12th in OAA 13th in FRV 8th in Defensive WAR Spare me the idea that we just have to play a guy who has an OPS of .600 because he's a "top 1/3 defensive SS in baseball".
Man. These are some deeply concerning answers from AA. Im going to try not to overreact and hope some of this is just press conference window dressing, but it sure as shit sounds like the aw shucks approach is permeating from all the way at the top of our organization and we are about to see recycled garbage in 2025
I am guessing AJ Minter probably won't be back next year. I think he could get a pretty decent deal on the free agent market assuming the health issues have been resolved.
His biggest point in his discussion of things, to me, is not even "hitting home runs" vs "old school". It's pointing out that new age true 3 outcome baseball is not JUST hitting home runs. It's hitting home runs AND getting on base. We had horrid at bats this year, rarely walked and did not get on base. My old ass baseball feels do not enjoy watching baseball teams walk, strikeout and hit home runs, but I do understand the logic behind it. But it only works if you do the WALKING part, too. When you strip that part out, you turn into what we saw this year. A bunch of scattershot solo home runs, tons of strikeouts and no baserunners.
blaming injuries for “having” to hit arguably the worst player in baseball at 5th really is something
And nevermind the fact that he was probably even worse in the 9 hole. Him hitting 5th for some short amount of time this year is a strawman excuse for the inexplicable decision to continue playing him
Great work, Snit. Hopefully AA is looking at his comments about coaching next year with the same angle of Snit claiming no coaching changes
(a) I absolutely think the Chipper stuff resonated in the front office (if at the very least by how much is resonated with the fan base), and I think he knew it would and that's why he decided to say something. When Chipper talks hitting people listen. (b) I'm not sure I completely agree that this means a "shift". Like we discussed over and over, they want guys to be 3 true outcome.........the other positive outcome beside a home run is a WALK. This group doesn't WALK. They don't have good at bats. They don't get on base. The organizational approach to hitting is based around GETTING ON BASE and hitting home runs. We were awful at that aspect of things this past year and at the biggest moments of the postseason the last 3 years. Seitzer wasn't able to make any changes with that, so they are going to look for someone who can. There are certain guys on this roster who have shown the ability to have good at bats and walk (Ronald, Murphy, Olson, Riley, Soler, Ozuna) but we also have some guys who just kind of are what they are - hackers (Ozzie, Mike, Arcia). So, the roster composition kind of is what it is.
If I’m remembering Chipper’s interview correctly, he didn’t actually place the blame on the coaches, but moreso the organization as a whole. From the front office to the analytics department, he said it was an organizational philosophy that they valued the HR over anything else, by far.
Welp, kinda feel bad about Seitzer now finding out his wife was diagnosed with colon cancer during the season.
Absolutely. So tired of watching low-patience 0-2 counts turn into 2-2 on two trash pitches before they swing and miss on a borderline pitch they could have avoided if they’d just taken one of the first two strikes.
“It was the hardest season of my life, because guys were trying so hard and couldn’t get going, and I couldn’t get them to (not press),” Seitzer said. “If they can find somebody to get these guys to not try so hard, that needs to be the guy they hire. You can talk about mechanics until the cows come home, but this (struggles this season) was all between the ears.” https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/58...zer-fired-reaction?source=user-shared-article