Chris Young out as pitching coach

[Philsmania]

Not surprising

https://www.philliesnation.com/2019/10/chris-young-wont-return-as-phillies-pitching-coach-in-2020/?fbclid=IwAR2se_DGObsNz11vRY00wu7iiMLfF0kiaHRCsQ0-QJMXsfrHnKIXFC_8yng

[Austinfan]

Analytics are good, necessary but not sufficient.
You also have to understand that each pitcher is different, and cookie cutter approaches don't work.

[fish]

Analytics are good, necessary but not sufficient.
You also have to understand that each pitcher is different, and cookie cutter approaches don't work.

The Phillies analytics department feels akin to to "stealing" the technology from a crashed drone or something. You may build something that looks just like it but have no idea how to make it work.

[zambonir]

We really don't know anything about the Phillies analytics department. I mean, we know it was actually started under Amaro, very belatedly. We know Klentak hired a lot of guys. But neither he nor his assistant GMs were necessarily the point person with a thriving analytics-based team, and they didn't hire anyone who was either. It's actually Ned Rice's job, but Baltimore was like the Phillies, they didn't actually have an analytics department. Beyond that, our top two guys had little to no baseball experience - came from Google and VSCO.

Now, that is also true of nearly every person who has thrived in baseball analytics, including Luhnow. But they worked in baseball and worked their way up. We basically have no analytics people in who are baseball executives and no baseball people who are analytics executives, so no wonder the data is either bad or being applied badly.

[allentown]

Two comments:
1. I've read that Kapler is the guy who really wanted Kranitz gone and replace by Young. The word 'defiant' even came up in Kapler's description of Kranitz. I think Klentak likely demanded an analytics-focused coach. Is this a ding on K&K, which could impact whether or not they are retained for next year. Seems strange to gut the coaching staff (apparently only 4 of 9 told they will return, and keep the manager. I think strange to not also lose the GM and let new GM pick a compatible manager and that manager have a lot of input into picking compatible coaches.

1. I have read Young's primary skill/requirement as interpreting the analytical data provided by our analytics department to the pitching staff. That would seem to be a communications-intensive job, but Young has admitted to media that he didn't give enough attention to communication and getting on same page with buy-in from his pitching staff.

2. We adopted a new pitching philosophy this season. Does that philosophy go into the same trash bin into which we have deposited coach Young?

[Philsmania]

A little known fact about me is that I tried teaching for a year after college. Long story. I was a disaster in the classroom. I learned that being an educator wasn't for me. Teaching and coaching is its own unique skill set and not everybody has it. Moral of the story, teaching and coaching isn't for everyone. Judging by some of these comments from Young, he may have come to a conclusion similar to mine about teaching/coaching and whether or not it is for him.

[zambonir]

For sure not everyone has those skill sets, just like very few managers are simultaneously good at strategy, clubhouse chemistry and public relations.

The focus on Young reminds me of the old joke - "the food is terrible! and the portions were too small!" Nola aside (who also gave McLure a lot of credit, as did Charlie Morton) Kranitz got often mediocre, occasionally good results from an average rotation and overworked bullpen. Young got occasionally good, sometimes mediocre and outright bad results (Pivetta) from an average rotation and a decimated bullpen. He lost his job on merit and for what appear to be good process/philosophical reasons (albeit, correcting a mistake) but he didn't really make our pitching worse and Kranitz hasn't made the Braves' pitching better really. It was already better.

[Austinfan]

I think Eflin is a good case for why Young is gone, instead of working with what Eflin had, he tried to remake Eflin into a power 4 seam thrower (same way Houston destroyed Appel). It wasn't until Eflin went back to his 2 seamer as his primary pitch that he got out of his funk. Now using the 4 seamer to set up his 2 seamer (changing eye level for hitters) made sense, but Young seemed to be stubborn in his insistence that Eflin change, rather than refine, his approach.

[zambonir]

I think even that is wildly overblown. Eflin was doing just fine. Then his body began to be "heavy." It's hard for me to believe that simply throwing more four seam fastballs wrecked a guy of his size and athleticism. It's not like Young said, "let's take this guy who threw two complete games and change what he's doing." It was only after he cratered that he pushed back against Young's approach, they worked it out, and he bounced back.

The thing is, the argument can still be made (if not by you) that Zach Eflin is no better than a 5th starter doing what he's comfortable doing, and that if he was actually physically capable of doing what Young wanted, he'd have more upside. Eflin was 4-6 with a 5.79 ERA in the second half of 2018. That wasn't because Kranitz made him throw four-seamers.

[tom81]

I think Eflin is a good case for why Young is gone, instead of working with what Eflin had, he tried to remake Eflin into a power 4 seam thrower.

I think even that is wildly overblown. Eflin was doing just fine. Then his body began to be "heavy." It's hard for me to believe that simply throwing more four seam fastballs wrecked a guy of his size and athleticism.

GDT 4/23/19 Philadelphia Phillies (Eflin) @ New York Mets (Wheeler)

GDT 4/23/19 Philadelphia Phillies (Eflin) @ New York Mets (Wheeler)

Not worried about Eflin, his stuff looked fine. Bad calls, bad defense.

GDT 4/23/19 Philadelphia Phillies (Eflin) @ New York Mets (Wheeler)

Eflin has lost about 1.0-1.5 mph from last year. His K rate is falling after that one outlier game. He really does not miss a lot of bats which is why at the moment he is a back end 4th/5th starter.

I'm a bit concerned by Eflin's lost speed on his 4 seam FB and his decrease use of it. I'm also concerned that his change-up has up-ticked in velocity a bit so his separation has changed about 2.5 mph for the worse. On the other hand he looks like he really likes his cutter and it is working better, I think he is doing things differently and maybe is somewhat a work in progress. Hopefully warmer weather will help.

I don't think Eflin put in the work off-season last year as he did the previous two years. I think he hints at it here https://www.mlb.com/phillies/news/zach-eflin-final-start-2019
“I think the most important thing would be to get on a pretty good workout routine and really kind of try to make some gains this year. Maybe increase my weight a little bit, lose a little body fat and be more conditioned going into Spring Training. Not that it affected me at all this year, but just getting on top of that."

I think this resulted in his diminished 4 seam velocity and the use of it resulted in his "heavy" feelings. Eflin can be a good MLB pitcher with just using his 4 seam FB as a show me pitch, which he reverted to at the end of the year. I think he needs it to be more than a show me pitch for him to be an elite MLB pitcher. I think he is capable of being elite but who knows if he wants it badly enough. It kind of reminds me of Curt Shilling early in his career and how Curt credits Roger Clemens for letting him know to be elite he has to work for it.

I hope the team has dangled the carrot of a long term deal for Eflinm, if he reaches some conditioning goals going into spring training. I think it makes sense for the team to try to buy out some of his free agent years now while he is entering his arbitration years.