Nolan Ryan chat
Adam: Could you clarify what the organization's stance is in regards to pitch counts, particularly for players in the minors?Nolan: We basically have a pitch count for our kids that are 18 and 19 years old where we have them on a lower pitch count than our older kids in the minor league system. That is somewhere around 100 pitches for starters. On our kids that are in AA and AAA, we expand that number and can go up to 110 or 115, could go to 120 at AAA. Then what we try to do on the ML level is let the pitching coach, manager and pitcher's ability plus whatever his personal situation is (how many innings he's worked, what he did in his last start, performance that night as far as where his pitches are distributed and whether he had an easy time or if he struggled) that would impact how many pitches he might throw in that game.
over 2 years ago
Adam J. Morris
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Consternation was mentioned, too.
"[Font} doesn't turn 19 until the end of May and his heater can already hit 99 on the gun. That's baseball porn." - Jason Parks
by hightowersmith on Jul 20, 2009 3:43 PM CDT up reply actions
Was the original front page thread about this not enough?
Bryan Smith (12:17:17 PM PT): Justin Smoak and Josh Hamilton. The AL West might just have found their Bash Brothers, v. 2.0.
Well
I don’t think everyone is going to go read the chat session. And I think the excerpt I quoted is significant enough to warrant being highlighted on the front page.
by Adam J. Morris on Jul 20, 2009 1:44 PM CDT up reply actions
Fair enough
It was just the very first post in the other thread and there is other good discussion going on
Bryan Smith (12:17:17 PM PT): Justin Smoak and Josh Hamilton. The AL West might just have found their Bash Brothers, v. 2.0.
Didn't know this needed clarifying
Elvis Andrus - 2009 AL Rookie of the Year
Mitch Moreland - 2009 Rangers Minor League POY
Ryan is pretty frank,
lots of good stuff in there. I found this snippet about the draftees interesting:
Should both of our first round draft picks be signed, where would they be assigned initially?
11:50 Nolan Ryan: The latest on negotations is that they are out of slot kids that we have to get permission to sign and that won’t happen until right at the deadline. If they would have signed in slot, Purke would have gone to Arizona and Scheppers would most likely have gone to Hickory or Bakersfield. They would go to instructional league if they sign in August.
Sigh. Stupid draft deadline slot crap.
G G G E-flat_______ F F F D__________....
"have to get permission to sign"?
That is an interesting use of words. The way I would read that is that since MLB is helping Hicks, the Rangers can’t just go way above slot without Uncle Bud’s approval. Because the Rangers wouldn’t be beholden to any slot “recommendations” otherwise. Strictly speaking, they should be able to just give them a big fat check today if they wanted to.
Go Rice Owls!
Gammons (iirc it was Gammons) reported last week that a team had an over-slot deal in place for a 4th rounder, but Uncle Bud wouldn’t sign off on it.
The world will be a better place once Selig’s out of office.
Look at the comments under Jeff Wilson's blog post on dallasnews.com. What a bunch of rocket scientists.- Keith Law
by Keynes on Jul 20, 2009 1:57 PM CDT via mobile up reply actions
Above slot players
Sure, I guess any team can agree to an above-slot deal with their draftees right now. However, I’m still under the impression they have to wait until the deadline to get it approved by Bud to make it official, regardless of the team’s financial situation.
I imagine
Teams consult with the commisioners office about how much “above slot” they can go with their draft picks. Then they go and negotiate with the player and come to an agreement that falls within the guidelines the commisioners office has approved. They then go back to the commisioners office and let them know and are told they will approve the deal but not until the 15th, or 17th in this years case.
Bryan Smith (12:17:17 PM PT): Justin Smoak and Josh Hamilton. The AL West might just have found their Bash Brothers, v. 2.0.
I don't think that's the case
From what I understand, you do need the commish’s office to sign off on any deal above slot (maybe all deals in general) and Bud won’t sign off on any significantly above slot deal until near the deadline.
By 2028, Mark Teixeira will be in the HOF.
"I am one of the biggest Texas Ranger fans out there but I'm also one of the smartest. Deal with it."
-The Outlaw
Really
Who are these people you are referring to?
I’m aware of two camps – the “Nolan is a genius for pushing his pitchers to not be wusses” camp, who read into Nolan’s early statements what they wanted to see, and the “When we actually look at what the Rangers are doing, we can see that Nolan isn’t actually ruining pitchers” camp, to whom this statement validates. However, I had thought that most people in that latter group were just amused about the people in the first group.
Go Rice Owls!
That first group
is a small (but vocal) minority here and other Rangers blogs, but my guess is that there’s a lot more of those people out there in the casual fan as well as most of the media figures who are only aware of the “We’re doing away with pitch counts” part.
By 2028, Mark Teixeira will be in the HOF.
"I am one of the biggest Texas Ranger fans out there but I'm also one of the smartest. Deal with it."
-The Outlaw
Since we haven't seen any 150 pitchcount games this year
was there really any confusion about what Nolan intended from the get go?
Well...
…based on the number of stories out there saying “Nolan Ryan has eliminated pitch counts!!!”, yes, there apparently was.
by Adam J. Morris on Jul 20, 2009 2:54 PM CDT up reply actions
I think the common sense crowd knew what he meant from the jump
It was only a combination of media, bloggers, and sentence-parsers who didn’t.
The Texas Rangers have been synonymous with explosive firepower ever since they emptied 130 rounds into Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow in 1934. - Alyssa Milano
Put another way..
Most of us didn’t need to hear Nolan say “we’re still going to be sensible” to know that they were still going to be sensible.
The Texas Rangers have been synonymous with explosive firepower ever since they emptied 130 rounds into Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow in 1934. - Alyssa Milano
Well
I think there was a valid fear that guys would be overworked. And we have seen that on several occasions this year where it is pretty obvious watching the game that the starter just doesn’t have it anymore and is struggling but is left out there and ends up getting rocked with a big hit or something. Of course on the flip side we have also seen several times where the starter looked gassed early on or was struggling and ended up pitching 7 innings and throwing 110+ pitches.
Bryan Smith (12:17:17 PM PT): Justin Smoak and Josh Hamilton. The AL West might just have found their Bash Brothers, v. 2.0.
Which is not much different than any other team in any other year...
Pulling the starter at the right time, neither too early or too late, is one of the toughest calls a manager has to make.
I don’t think our decision process has changed, other than less reliance on an arbitrary number and more on what they see.
The Texas Rangers have been synonymous with explosive firepower ever since they emptied 130 rounds into Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow in 1934. - Alyssa Milano
I think there have been times
Where they have been left in longer as opposed to last year and with our improved bullpen over last year I can only imagine the Nolan-edict has some effect on that
Bryan Smith (12:17:17 PM PT): Justin Smoak and Josh Hamilton. The AL West might just have found their Bash Brothers, v. 2.0.
Maybe I wasn't clear..
I meant that the results you mentioned were just like any other team. I agree that HOW we decide to go pull a guy has changed, but my point was that the decision is just as tough and the result often just as unpredictable.
I do, however, think that basing the decision more on when a guy “seems not to have much left” as opposed to “he’s reached a count” is much more likely to yield the right result.
The Texas Rangers have been synonymous with explosive firepower ever since they emptied 130 rounds into Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow in 1934. - Alyssa Milano
I was never under the impression that pitchcounts
had been eliminated. Instead, my understanding was after last year when the Rangers bullpen logged a MLB high of 572.2 IP, Nolan simply wanted the starters to absorb more innings. To do that, he knew they would have to get in better shape (mostly legs) to make that happen. Wasn’t rocket science, just necessary.
Rob Neyer finally got around to linking here this morning.
Which is what I thought you were hoping for. And what I figured would happen, but didn’t. but now has.
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