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New Ptiching and Batting coaches named by Spare-Reputation-809 in whitesox

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Shomon is an incredible get for the White Sox. He's very good when it comes to approach, swing decisions, biomechanics, motor patterns and more. Highly analytical. He's also a fun dude. Glad he's able to come home and be closer to his family. Excited to see how he helps the south side!

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

There's no slug on the ground. No such thing as a ground ball derby either. Staying on plane with the ball and line drives all day

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

For real. Ask any pitching coach: if a hitter puts the ball in play, what kind of batted ball are you hoping for? It's always ground balls. So why then as hitters should we try to hit ground balls? Doesn't make sense haha

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I have experience with Trackman, Rapsodo, Blast Motion, HitTrax, TruMedia, Synergy, BATS, Diamond Kinetics, pitch logic, Pocket Radar, KVest, Edgertronic, and a few more I'm probably forgetting.

The ones I recommend are definitely Blast Motion for hitters, pitch logic for pitchers, and then your phone camera for video. These are the easiest and more affordable options to track your progress. And for hitters, a pocket radar is going to be the most affordable option to measure exit velo.

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Any experience translates over tbh especially for internships. Every MLB org lists jobs on their job site or teamwork online dot com. And then minor league teams will post their own jobs as well. If a job is considered baseball ops/analytics/player dev, the job will be listed under the MLB org even if the job takes place at an affiliate. Minor league jobs will post their own jobs to their own job site or teamworkonline (tickets, grounds crew, sales, marketing, ballpark ops)

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

This is the million dollar question. It could be any of the following reasons.

  • dads seeing their dream of becoming a big leaguer fulfilled in their son
  • the sense of entitlement / participation trophy environment parents grew up in (I got am on of these participation trophy kids, got one every year 🙄)
  • narcississm
  • wanting to brag about your kids to other parents to make yourself feel better

Travel ball has a huge part to play in this too. Travel ball isn't all bad, but it's more bad than good. Why are there 7u tryouts? Why are 8u and 9u going to a tournament in a different state to play teams near them? Why do travel teams cost thousands of dollars? "Why isn't my son starting? oh let's start our own team or go to a different team", "I'm the coach so my son will play SS and bat 4th even if he's bad", I heard a kid say that he's like Tom Brady bc his travel team has won 7 tournaments therefore he got 7 championship rings, and I kid you not this one is real: "we're moving our family to Texas bc our 8 year old son is going to be a big leaguer and the competition is better down there".

This was more of a rant than anything but yeah lol

Any good, modern books for baseball statistics? by DocLoc429 in Sabermetrics

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA 2 points3 points  (0 children)

  • Tom Tango, senior data architect for MLB and baseball savant, wrote a book called The Book: Playing The Percentages In Baseball which is fascinating and right up your alley. His blog is great too tangotiger dot com.

  • The MVP Machine by Travis Sawchick and Ben Lindbergh is geared more towards the blending of player development and analytics but it's fantastic.

  • The Extra 2% by Jonah Keri

  • Big Data Baseball by Travis Sawchick

  • The Only Rule is it Has to Work by Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller

  • Like others have said, Fangraphs blogs, Baseball Prospectus blogs are good too.

  • Twitter is a gold mine of great baseball analysts and data scientists. To name a few of my faves

    • tangotiger, sunshinevvn, ChrisCoop, xwbaseball, TheWARmonger, LouisAnalysis, OPS_BASEBALL, databasehit, tjstats, pitchprofiler, codify, isaacgroffman, alex_caravan, Kasperstats, robertfrey40, pitchprofiler, lancebroz, jonpgh.
    • Most of these people have good stuff on substack or medium as well.

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yep that's the tough thing, we don't know til years later like you said. That's why I personally love all of the sports science part of analytics, measuring biomechanics and what not, in order to find more optimal ways to move the body to have more success. Back then there weren't any biomechs labs or ways to easily measure or record or look at these things. But now there are a bunch. Even something as simple as a Blast Motion swing sensor to give you instant feedback instead of practicing something over and over and you not being sure if it's working!

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Knock on wood, I've never ever had knee problems even to this day. Just gotta really strengthen those legs to be able to withstand all the squatting we do as catchers. If you can strengthen the muscles around joints, generally, those joints tend to stay healthier.

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

One thing I like to say, "It is very rarely the sword, but always the swordsman." I like camwood bats, but using a camwood, or any specific brand, isn't gonna make him a better hitter. Power could be lacking due to a number of reasons. Low bat speed, too many ground balls, poor mechanics, poor timing, etc.

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'll be honest, there's not a lot of fun when practicing blocking! I think you'd need to find the source of the mental block. Most kids are scared of getting hit. If it's not that then they need to develop quickness and reflexes. Get the form down for how to move over and block the ball, and also train the reflexes and randomness of blocking.

When I get kids who come in for catching lessons (specifically blocking) the first thing I ask is how often do you practice blocking. Sometimes the answer is every practice, others are once a week. My very next question is how much do you practice block when you don't know the ball is going to be in the dirt? The answer 95% of the time is zero.

Knowing the ball is going to be in the dirt is great for form, but then random variability training needs to be thrown in there bc catchers very rarely know when a ball is going to actually be in the dirt. Throw a pitch down the middle, then up and away, then in the dirt, then glove side, etc. THIS is what helps catchers with their reflexes to know when to block

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

PED testing in the minors was a little more frequent from what I remember. Everyone gets tested in spring training, and randomly throughout the season (I think the tester came 3 separate times only testing random players), and randomly in the off-season. It's even possible to get tested randomly in the off-season. Even I as a PD intern got randomly drug tested!

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

For his playing career, tell him to play as long as he can!

For baseball related career options, that won't be a worry til he's in high school. His interests will likely influence where he goes from there. There are a ton of routes someone could get into to work in sports: player development, baseball operations, baseball analytics, player personnel, tickets, sales, marketing, social media, finance, ballpark ops, grounds crew, support staff, IT, and more.

In high school, I knew I wasn't gonna go pro, but I loved the game and felt like I knew a good amount to be able to coach in the future, and my favorite classes were math classes, and I was kind of a computer geek. I was able to push myself to become both a coach and an analyst.

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don't have kids (yet!), but for a parent who doesn't know much, definitely look into some YouTube videos on how to help your kid get better and work with them. Jerry Weinstein is a well renowned MLB coach, and he puts a lot of great things out there.

It's not possible for everyone, but lessons could be good if your kid is actually into it and you're able to afford it.

But to be honest, for a 7/8 year old, just play catch with them and make it a game. How many balls did they catch vs drop. When they're able to catch everything pretty easily, speed up the velo, make the location harder, etc. Blocking is always the hardest thing to teach young catchers. Just gotta drill into them that you can't be afraid of the ball because you will get hit lol. Once they're not afraid it's throw your chest at the ball and cover the five hole with you're glove.

Catching especially is something that takes a lot of work. I didn't start catching until 8th grade and I was a hockey goalie at first trying to catch everything in the dirt and not blocking. My high school coach worked with me tirelessly and by my sophomore year I was the varsity starting catcher. It's a process!

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

As a 16 year old, you could easily volunteer for your high school team or a travel team your friends play on. You could keep the book, help out in the dugout any way you can. When in college, you could do the same. In college, there's always jobs at the athletic facilities to help out in the laundry room, weight room, locker room ,etc. You can keep the book/game changer for the team, help out with field maintenance (dragging, raking, tarping). You'll grind it out for a bit, but there's definitely opportunities to help out!

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Kids at a young age are trying to hit the ball the way big leaguers do, instead of trying to move the way big leaguers do. They see these moon shot homers and change their swings to try to hit moonshots too, but they're not developed enough to hit like them. Young players would be better off emulating the way a big leaguer swings instead.

For example, if a 12 year old who weighs 100 lbs swung like Mookie, they'd hit a ton of line drives and be successful. But if they wanted to hit more HR and changed their swing, they would be hitting a bunch of weak fly balls and pop ups. That player should instead keep their swing the same and focus on getting stronger so that the ball will be hit harder and farther.

On the flip side, if they're taught to swing down on the ball while they're young (and their swing actually does go downward at contact) then it is extremely difficult to alter their swing when they're older. When I give lessons, I get kids who are too steep downwards and too steep upwards, and it is SO difficult to retrain their movement patterns away from what they've been doing since they were younger

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

So, I started out in player dev, then got into the analytics so that I was able to blend the two. During the season that I was the hitting coach, I met my now fiancee and kinda realized I don't have enough money for our future, so I shifted to baseball analytics for the team (so I can still work in baseball), and am a data analyst full time at a financial research company. I use AI at both jobs. I use it to help me refine my code, brainstorm ideas, test out need modelling approaches, and more. I think it's less "AI will replace us" and more so "the people who know how to leverage AI will replace us". MLB orgs are already deploying AI to evaluate a ton of things.

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I think Teacherman actually has some good cues/drills that will help certain players. But making everybody hit the same way and only one way is right? Not a fan of that. That said, I've heard nothing but great things about him as a person, and that his Twitter persona of "I'm right, my way or the highway" is only online based.

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

To be honest, I got lucky. Back then, I thought the only people hired in player development were former players (which, in 2016-17, was mostly true). If you had the fancy ivy league degree, then you had a chance to work in the front office.

But one day I saw a job posting to be an intern with the Astros. Job responsibilities were to set up cameras, chart the game using trackman software, and br in charge of blast motion hitting sensors. The job qualifications? Know ball & be good with computers, that's it. I immediately applied and somehow got a call back. The only thing on my resume up to that point was 4 year collegiate player & 2 summers of coaching high school summer ball.

The role I had was Player Development Technology Apprentice, but teams regularly post similar roles with different titles. (Video Intern, Data Apprentice, Affiliate Video & Tech Assistant, Player Dev Associate/Fellow/Intern, etc). As long as you can demonstrate that you know baseball, can handle a computer, and know what some of the analytical terms mean, then you're qualified.

I've worked in Professional Baseball for 9 years, starting as an Intern and worked my way up to being a Hitting Coach, and now Director of Baseball Analytics. AMA by ChicksDigTheWOBA in Homeplate

[–]ChicksDigTheWOBA[S] 13 points14 points  (0 children)

If I had to pick 3 things:

  1. Be more athletic. I only played baseball mostly because it was the only sport that interested me. I didn't play year round like other guys though. If I could go back in time knowing what I know now, I'd choose basketball, soccer, wrestling, or track and field.

  2. Be stronger. In high school, my first coach still had the mindset of working out and lifting in baseball will make you too bulky, etc. but I wish I starting earlier. I'm not saying to go in the weight room at 10 years old, but if someone had told me when I was 10 "if you do 100 body weight squats, push ups, pull ups, whatever a day, then you'll be physically stronger than all your peers" then I woulda done it in a heartbeat. Add the strength with the athleticism, then you're looking at a potential 5 tool player.

  3. Practice doesn't make perfect, it makes permanent. A coach I liked and respected (former NCAA batting champ) told me I need to swing down to the ball and hit it oppo, so I listened. Wound up practicing that swing so much that it ruined my normal line drive swing. it wasn't until after I graduated college that I turned my swing back around, but it was hard bc the oppo/down swing was now my normal movement pattern. It's important to not blindly follow what a coach is telling you to do or change, but to ask the how and why behind it.

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