Radar observations

[scorekeeper]

(Royals director of player development J.J. Picollo) approached Moore with an idea — what if the Royals, in the lowest rungs of the minor leagues, did away with radar guns? He suggested the Royals not clock their pitchers during the rookie league seasons. Piccolo explained that this way those young pitchers would not even think about how hard they were throwing and might, instead, think about more important things like commanding their fastball and developing good change-ups.

Another advantage: coaches and scouts might judge their pitchers on effectiveness rather than looking to see whether their fastball was up or down 1 or 2 mph.

Moore loved the idea. The Royals are trying it. There are no Royals radar guns now in Burlington, Iowa, or Idaho Falls, Idaho. This is not to say the Royals are going away from radar readings — they still plan to clock their rookie league pitchers at the end of the season to see where they stand. But it’s at least one step away from radar-gun dependence.

“Look, in the end, pitchers with stuff will be more successful than pitchers without,” Moore says. “It’s very useful to know how hard a pitcher throws, how long he can maintain his stuff through a game, how fast his change-up is compared to his fastball and all that. But the radar gun is just a tool.”

He then said that baseball teams are supposed to use their tools. The tools are not supposed to use baseball teams.

http://thesoulofbaseball.blogspot.com/2007/07/royals-sox-kason-point.html

http://www.sportsfilter.com/comments.cfm/8897

[chd66]

Glad to see this. At a much lower level, I was the coach of a team led by two pitchersto our league's first undefeated season. Everyone kept saying the pitcher throwing heat was incredible. No one could come close to beating us with him on the mound. At first, I believed it too, but as the season progressed, the stats showed differently. By season's end, the hurler gave up twice as many hits, roughly 2X walks, and more runs than the control pitcher armed with change up #1 and change up #2. Of course the hurler had over 3X the K's. The biggest difference I found was the # of pitches thrown by each. Teach the kids to pitch now, so that their arms are able later.

[Jake Patterson]

He then said that baseball teams are supposed to use their tools. The tools are not supposed to use baseball teams.


Great post- great idea!!
Vindication!!

[scorekeeper]

Great post- great idea!!
Vindication!!

Isn’t amazing how wonderful we think someone is when they agree with out basic philosophies? ;)

What I liked about all of it is, at least the “carved in stone” dogma about numbers on a gun is being questioned a bit more by a few more people.

Personally, I never cared that anyone would use whatever measuring tools they could find to help them. What’s always bothered me is, people who refuse to consider anything else, as though nothing else has any meaning what-so-ever, when they know full well it does!

I don’t know how many times I’ve seen, read, or heard Ted Williams say he would look for a pitcher’s curve because he knew no matter how fast the FB was he could hit it.

[TG Coach]

Taking the gun away during the season is probably a good idea. The gun becomes a distraction. But don't fool yourself into thinking these pitchers weren't gunned before a draft decision was made.

[jamesh23]

I think they should get rid of the gun completely cuz I've seen a few cases where this kid could get anyone out averaged like 13 strikeouts a game and less that 5 hits and had like a 1. something era cant really remember anyway he played like 3 or 4 years back, but cuz he didnt throw about 85 he didnt get any looks he threw about 80.

[scorekeeper]

I think they should get rid of the gun completely …

Sometimes its difficult to understand that the arguments pro and con for Radar guns, are pretty much the same as the arguments for regular old shoot ‘em up guns.

By themselves they are neither good nor bad. It isn’t they get into the hands of users that they take on any kind of “personality”. If everyone using radar guns completely understood them, understood all other aspects of the game, understood how those things related to each other, and all agreed on how they should be used, there wouldn’t be any problems with them. Unfortunately, its tough to find any two people to fit that description, let alone everyone in the game and at all levels!

As long as there are so many people who equate physical size and/or velocity with skill, things will never change.