Prince Fielder says Rick Peterson is “a cool dude.”
Ryan Braun’s review of the new Brewers pitching coach: “Extremely impressive.”
Not that it really matters what the two key hitters in the Brewers lineup think of the guy in charge of turning around the worst starting rotation in baseball. But if the Brewers are going to get back to the playoffs after a one-year absence (which followed a 26-year absence), then Fielder and Braun need to count on Peterson and his pitchers to be cool and at least mildly impressive.
There are other new coaches around the game who come in carrying expectations (notably new Cubs hitting coach Rudy Jaramillo). But there might not be any other new coach who holds his new team’s fortunes in his hands as much as Peterson does.
Think about it this way: The Brewers scored 35 more runs in 2009 than they did in 2008. They won 10 fewer games, and instead of making it to the playoffs, they finished 11 games behind the division champion Cardinals (and even further behind the wild-card Rockies).
With CC Sabathia and Ben Sheets gone through free agency, the Brewers rotation had a 5.37 ERA (worst in the majors, and a run-and-a-half higher than in 2008). Brewers starters threw only 891 innings (15th in the National League, and 92 fewer than in 2008).
The Brewers responded to all that by shifting some payroll around so they could sign Randy Wolf and Doug Davis as free agents. They also responded to it by signing Peterson, who had been out of baseball for a year-and-a-half after he was fired by the Mets (along with manager Willie Randolph, now the Brewers bench coach).
The Brewers expect Wolf and Davis to help. They expect Yovani Gallardo and other young pitchers to improve.
And they expect Rick Peterson to make an impact.
“I think Rick’s going to make a difference,” general manager Doug Melvin said. “And also, the guys who didn’t pitch as well last year will pitch better. Rick will help. But I don’t expect him to come in and be a miracle worker.”
Peterson can be a polarizing figure, and when you bring his name up among baseball people, you’re sure to get a strong response. But the response from Brewers people so far seems to be overwhelmingly positive, from the pitchers to the position players to the baseball operations staff.
They’ll tell you that he can talk forever. But they’ll also tell you they see already he’s making a difference.
“Everybody’s buying into his program,” Braun said. “I could even see it in live batting practice, with pitchers concentrating on throwing low in the zone.”
Peterson talks about low strikes almost as much as he talks about biomechanics, and the importance of a consistent delivery. He quotes statistics (”The average batting average in the big leagues of every ball put in play at the bottom of the strike zone is .220 for the last decade”), and then makes it Brewer-specific (”For Yovani, it’s about .160, and for [Manny] Parra, it’s about .170, at the bottom of the strike zone.”)
The idea of emphasizing low strikes isn’t exactly new, but Peterson’s emphasis on the delivery, and his use of biomechanics, makes him different.
He’s doing in Milwaukee what he did with Tim Hudson, Mark Mulder and Barry Zito long ago in Oakland, and what he did with Oliver Perez and others with the Mets more recently. But he has also refined his ideas over time, and he spent some of the year-and-a-half since leaving the Mets turning the ideas into a company that focuses on pitching.
His website, 3psports.com, promises to help young pitchers “identify and fix the flaws in your pitching.”
The presence of ex-Mets pitchers Tom Glavine and Al Leiter, who are also part of the 3psports venture, shows that at least some of Peterson’s former pitchers still believe fully in what he’s selling.
And while there are stories of other pitchers who have resisted Peterson’s attempts to change them, he makes a point of saying he isn’t demanding that veteran Brewers pitchers alter their deliveries.
Even with Gallardo, who is only 24 years old, Peterson asked first before making changes. Gallardo, looking for help after walking 94 batters in 185 2/3 innings last year, was receptive.
Sleeper … Casey McGehee: Sure, he came out of nowhere, but his breakthrough began in spring training and continued throughout the season. If he was masquerading as someone else, he kept it going for a full seven months. Granted, he might hit .200 in April, lose his job and never again matter in mixed leagues, but surely the chance of him hitting 25 homers makes him a better late-round pick than vanilla options like Placido Polanco and Alberto Callaspo. Bust … Alcides Escobar: He might steal 30 bases, but those on their own don’t measure up to the well-rounded numbers an Asdrubal Cabrera or Erick Aybar can give you, at least not in Head-to-Head leagues. Of course, prospects of Escobar’s pedigree sometimes take big leaps forward, which makes him worth a late-round gamble. But with so many owners desperate to find that next great shortstop, someone will reach for him in the middle rounds. Breakout … Yovani Gallardo: Few pitchers have the talent to strike out 10 batters per nine innings, and considering Gallardo threw a career high 185 2/3 innings one year after barely throwing at all because of a knee injury, his command issues make sense. Now stretched out and rested up, he’s one of those top-25 Top Brewers Prospects (2010 destination) 1. Alcides Escobar, SS, Majors 2. Mat Gamel, 3B, Majors 3. Jonathan LuCroy, C, Triple-A 4. Brett Lawrie, 2B, Class A 5. Mark Rogers, SP, Double-A Brewers outlook | 2010 Draft Prep Guide
“I’ve listened to the things he had to say, and it’s great,” said Gallardo, who won 13 games last year and is the Brewers’ most promising starter. “His opinions might help me. Last year, I had a repeating my delivery.”
Speaking of Gallardo, Parra and others, Peterson said, “There’s a gap of untapped potential, without question.”
Peterson draws a triangle, with biomechanics in the middle, and fundamental skills, physical conditioning and mental edge. Then he tells you that Trevor Hoffman, the Brewers closer, “is an A-plus” in all three.
“Wouldn’t it be nice to have a black belt in pitching delivery?” Peterson asked. “Trevor Hoffman has his black belt. He’s a master.”
But Hoffman, who had a fine first season with the Brewers (37 saves, a 1.83 ERA) isn’t the reason Peterson is here. He’s here because the 2009 rotation was such a failure, and because that failure as much as anything was the reason the Brewers weren’t back in the playoffs.
It’s why Wolf and Davis are here, too. By trading J.J. Hardy and allowing Mike Cameron to leave as a free agent, Melvin created the payroll room to bring in two veteran starters.
By teaming Wolf and Davis with Gallardo and Dave Bush, he gave Peterson and manager Ken Macha enough depth that Parra and Jeff Suppan, who each took a regular turn in the Brewers rotation last year, are now part of a competition for the fifth spot in the rotation that will open the 2010 season.
But if the Brewers believed it was simply a matter of adding a couple of veterans, Peterson wouldn’t be here, and the biomechanics lab wouldn’t be part of the Brewers spring training camp.
That lab gets Peterson excited. He has believed in the science of pitching for more than 20 years, since he was the pitching coach in Birmingham, Ala., and got to know Dr. James Andrews (another contributor at 3psports).
He says the Brewers are the first team to set up a lab in spring training.
And he says, “I got emotional. We had eight major-league pitchers going to the biomechanical lab, in spring training. I said, ‘This is unbelievable. It’s a dream come true.’ To have an organization totally embrace this, to be able to take your life’s work and have it culminate with an organization do something that’s never been done in major-league baseball …”
He could go on, but we’ll leave the rest for later. If Milwaukee’s pitching improves, and if we’re talking about this team in October, there will be plenty of time to explain how Rick Peterson did it.
And if not?
Well, if not, here’s guessing the Brewers hitters won’t find him nearly as cool or impressive.
