Reds Announce Alan Zinter as Hitting Coach

[The Operator]

Zinter? I barely know ‘er....

[Unassisted]

Will this be the most Zinteresting move of the offseason?

[JT Redlegs]

Cracking bats, are you listenin'?
When we swing, we ain't missin.
A beautiful sight,
The reds are alright,
Hittin' in a Zinter Wonderland.

[WrongVerb]

And the guy from Pittsburgh asked: "I like hitting. What are yin Zinter?"

[Griffey012]

Probably not easy being a hitting coach when half your games are in Petco. Kind of like being a pitching coach for the Rockies.

That's the equivalent to being the Reds pitching coach from 2016-2018.

[RED VAN HOT]

First, I apologize for not having a pun.

I applaud the apparent move away from 'a launch angle for everyone' hitting philosophy. Even more, I like the idea of getting all of the minor league coaches on the same page. It seems rather obvious to me. Makes me wonder if in the past minor league players were coached a little differently at each level in hopes that someone would make a beneficial change.

My question is this. How do you implement a standard approach at all levels? How do you get minor league coaches to recognize and implement a 'one size does not fit all' approach and still keep all the coaches on the same page? Do you have a coaches clinic before spring training begins? It seems like a difficult task to me.

[Griffey012]

First, I apologize for not having a pun.

I applaud the apparent move away from 'a launch angle for everyone' hitting philosophy. Even more, I like the idea of getting all of the minor league coaches on the same page. It seems rather obvious to me. Makes me wonder if in the past minor league players were coached a little differently at each level in hopes that someone would make a beneficial change.

My question is this. How do you implement a standard approach at all levels? How do you get minor league coaches to recognize and implement a 'one size does not fit all' approach and still keep all the coaches on the same page? Do you have a coaches clinic before spring training begins? It seems like a difficult task to me.

For starters you have to hire good coaches, and the people hiring those coaches have to recognize good coaching talent.

[mth123]

For starters you have to hire good coaches, and the people hiring those coaches have to recognize good coaching talent.

Meh. Coaches are more important when you are 12 years old. Get guys who can hit instead of trying to turn guys who can't into ones who can. I'm not a believer in the one size fits all philosophy. The approach that works for Ari Aquino won't work for Jose Peraza. Just go get guys who can already hit and don't mess them up.

[Griffey012]

Meh. Coaches are more important when you are 12 years old. Get guys who can hit instead of trying to turn guys who can't into ones who can. I'm not a believer in the one size fits all philosophy. The approach that works for Ari Aquino won't work for Jose Peraza. Just go get guys who can already hit and don't mess them up.

This is wrong. Every player who gets drafted/signed are either already really good at hitting a baseball or has the potential to be really good at hitting a baseball. The latter group is considerably larger than the group of those polished college hitters who have little development left to become impact big league hitters. Thus, teams who can maximize the development of that group of hitters who are unpolished, yet carry potential, will produce many more hitters who can hit.

The Reds don't have the budget to bank on just getting guys that can already hit, those guys are expensive and difficult to acquire. There might be 2-3 in any given draft, and they go in the top picks. Or they are very costly in through trades or FA.

I, for one, am certainly glad we have Derek Johnson, he has a lengthy track record of making his pitchers better. We went a got a solid pitcher, Sonny Gray, and with the help of Derek Johnson, turned him into a really good pitcher. I'd like to see that happen on the offensive side of things too.

The Reds can't just implement an organizational hitting philosophy if the coaches at the various levels themselves aren't capable of teaching said philosophy.

[klw]

First, I apologize for not having a pun.

Don't worry we will come up with a suitable pu... uh.. penalty for you.

[mth123]

This is wrong. Every player who gets drafted/signed are either already really good at hitting a baseball or has the potential to be really good at hitting a baseball. The latter group is considerably larger than the group of those polished college hitters who have little development left to become impact big league hitters. Thus, teams who can maximize the development of that group of hitters who are unpolished, yet carry potential, will produce many more hitters who can hit.

The Reds don't have the budget to bank on just getting guys that can already hit, those guys are expensive and difficult to acquire. There might be 2-3 in any given draft, and they go in the top picks. Or they are very costly in through trades or FA.

I, for one, am certainly glad we have Derek Johnson, he has a lengthy track record of making his pitchers better. We went a got a solid pitcher, Sonny Gray, and with the help of Derek Johnson, turned him into a really good pitcher. I'd like to see that happen on the offensive side of things too.

The Reds can't just implement an organizational hitting philosophy if the coaches at the various levels themselves aren't capable of teaching said philosophy.

We'll see. I think it's overblown. Guys in the big leagues rarely are morphed into something they aren't. It happens once and a while and it's big news, but if it happened as often as people think, well, it would be SOP and not big news. Trying to make a guy something he isn't can screw guys up as well.

Johnson is a good example. He's fine, but he seems to be getting a lot of credit for the Reds pitching turnaround. IMO, the turnaround is because they cut or back-burnered a lot of the chaff who were getting drubbed in the last few years and replaced them with real pitchers. Gray and Roark went a long way. Disco finally was healthy and was good again. All guys who were good pitchers on teams that didn't have Derek Johnson in the past. That's pretty much why the pitching was better. Had Johnson turned Sal Romano and Robert Stephenson into the starters that Tanner Roark and Sonny Gray were, then I'd believe, but this is just a case of going out and getting better talent IMO.

Not saying a coach can't spot something and can't help a guy work on something that made him good in the first place (which may have happened with Gray and Johnson deserves some credit there), but the idea that they are going to teach everyone to hit a certain way and turn garbage into gold seems like a problem to me. If they want guys who hit a certain way, they need to target guys who are already like that. The Coach can keep them on track, but they aren't turning Tucker Barnhart or Jose Peraza into prime Joey Votto any time soon. Wanna improve the production at those spots? Go get Grandal and Didi.

This sounds a lot like "Gully can fix him" and that didn't really work. Most of the guys they got with hope that could work ended up not getting fixed. The few that did probably would have developed anyway. If Nick Senzel becomes what we all have been dreaming on, I have a lot of doubt that it will have much to do with hiring Zinter. It will be about Senzel's talent stepping forward.

[Griffey012]

We'll see. I think it's overblown. Guys in the big leagues rarely are morphed into something they aren't. It happens once and a while and it's big news, but if it happened as often as people think, well, it would be SOP and not big news. Trying to make a guy something he isn't can screw guys up as well.

Johnson is a good example. He's fine, but he seems to be getting a lot of credit for the Reds pitching turnaround. IMO, the turnaround is because they cut or back-burnered a lot of the chaff who were getting drubbed in the last few years and replaced them with real pitchers. Gray and Roark went a long way. Disco finally was healthy and was good again. All guys who were good pitchers on teams that didn't have Derek Johnson in the past. That's pretty much why the pitching was better. Had Johnson turned Sal Romano and Robert Stephenson into the starters that Tanner Roark and Sonny Gray were, then I'd believe, but this is just a case of going out and getting better talent IMO.

Not saying a coach can't spot something and can't help a guy work on something that made him good in the first place (which may have happened with Gray and Johnson deserves some credit there), but the idea that they are going to teach everyone to hit a certain way and turn garbage into gold seems like a problem to me. If they want guys who hit a certain way, they need to target guys who are already like that. The Coach can keep them on track, but they aren't turning Tucker Barnhart or Jose Peraza into prime Joey Votto any time soon. Wanna improve the production at those spots? Go get Grandal and Didi.

This sounds a lot like "Gully can fix him" and that didn't really work. Most of the guys they got with hope that could work ended up not getting fixed. The few that did probably would have developed anyway. If Nick Senzel becomes what we all have been dreaming on, I have a lot of doubt that it will have much to do with hiring Zinter. It will be about Senzel's talent stepping forward.

This whole thing isn't really about the major league roster, major league player development/improvement is a small part of it. Ideally, your players are well versed in the organizational philosophy by the time they reach the bigs and all that is left is fine tuning. It is about player development and turning our drafted/signed players into useful major league players (something the Reds have not been good at). Getting those players access to coaching that can teach/implement a good organizational philosophy up and down the minors, is integral in the success of player development.

I don't know how you would expect the Reds to start producing more quality players from their minor league system if the players in the system are being taught a bunch of different philosophies by a bunch of stooge coaches.

Going back to the original question by Red Van Hot

how do you implement a standard approach at all levels? How do you get minor league coaches to recognize and implement a 'one size does not fit all' approach and still keep all the coaches on the same page? Do you have a coaches clinic before spring training begins? It seems like a difficult task to me.

What is your answer? Since coaching smoaching.

[mth123]

This whole thing isn't really about the major league roster, major league player development/improvement is a small part of it. Ideally, your players are well versed in the organizational philosophy by the time they reach the bigs and all that is left is fine tuning. It is about player development and turning our drafted/signed players into useful major league players (something the Reds have not been good at). Getting those players access to coaching that can teach/implement a good organizational philosophy up and down the minors, is integral in the success of player development.

I don't know how you would expect the Reds to start producing more quality players from their minor league system if the players in the system are being taught a bunch of different philosophies by a bunch of stooge coaches.

Going back to the original question by Red Van Hot

What is your answer? Since coaching smoaching.

Target hitters who already have that approach. Some of that coaching can work in rookie league or maybe even Low A, but a guy is basically what he is in AA or AAA. HE can be refined, but drastically revamping what got him drafted and promoted to the high minors in the first place seems unrealistic. If they haven't got it by then, deal them away for guys who do have that philosophy. Again, I don't think one size fits all. My philosophy is avoid outs and acquire bases. Maybe it's pitching, defense and three run homers. It's the same thing. I don't really care how they do it, as long as they do it.

So if you are more worried about that philosophy in the developmental leagues, why do you place so much stock in the big league hitting coach? By then its too late. I want somebody who can spot the difference between what a guy was doing when going well and what he's doing when not going well and make those adjustments to get him back on track. Its mostly looking at film and pitching a bunch of extra BP or watching while somebody else does.. I don't really care about philosophy on the big league roster. They aren't changing big leaguers into something different IMO. If we don't like a particular players approach, get him off the roster and replace him with somebody who fits. Changing him is going to fail the overwhelming majority of time and will take a long time for it to pay-off if it does at all.

I guess I just see this as a way to go cheap on players they hope they can fix as opposed to going out and getting what they need. Its about the players, not the coaches or the manager IMO.

[RED VAN HOT]

It may sound a bit sophomoric, but this would be my approach.

A player's value is realized by maximizing his strengths. Early on, rookie and low A, there should be an attempt to decide where he fits best in a big league batting order. Is he a top of the order (1 or 2) table setter? Is he a moderate power, good contact 2 or 3 hitter? Is he a slower runner, with excellent upside power that may still fit at 4-6 in the order? Is his defense good enough to enable him to still fit at the bottom of the batting order if his ability to hit reaches some minimum level?

The result of this evaluation during his first two years, that is, his perceived maximum value at the big league level, should determine how he is coached at the next three levels. The coaches at the first two levels serve more to evaluate the natural abilities the player brings to the table and help determine his best use.

[BCubb2003]

He is the one who zints. Maybe he can help the one who winks.