Why is Skaalen getting a free pass?

[WisconsinSportsRule]

It appears as though they're are many people to blame for the crew's recent hitting woes, and there has been no mention of Skaalen. Skaalen's so called laid back approach may have to go by the wayside. It seems as though he should challenge these guys a little more. He gets lots of credit when the crew is hitting well, but he's not mentioned when there's blame to be spread around.

[danzig6767]

Because the importance of hitting coaches is overrated by many fans

[jazzytrav]

I think if you look around here, Skaalen's name has come up plenty of times. There were a few pages in one of the threads discussing how Skaalen will probably go before Yost.

[Oldcity]

Yeah, maybe you just haven't read many threads around here. Many are expecting him to be canned.

[bjkrautk]

Honest question: is the hitting coach at fault when players don't do what he says?

 

 

I find it hard to believe that he's teaching the hitters to try and pull everything, take poor approaches at the plate, and to tense up whenever you start to slump. That said, whatever it is he is teaching the Brewers hitters doesn't seem to be taking hold anymore. (I had high hopes in the beginning of the season, when the Brewers were playing A-B-C baseball, but the past few weeks have been discouraging.)

 

When does a new voice saying the same old things actually induce better performance?

[jazzytrav]

When the new voice actually requires the hitters to follow directions. If everyone is just ignoring Skaalen, what does that say about how much respect they have for him?

 

That said, I don't think getting rid of Skaalen is any kind of fix. But I think it will most likely happen before Yost goes because they'll try to pin it on Skaalen and take the blame off Yost.

[Brewer Fever]

I know exactly why Skaalen isn't getting a heaping amount of blame. You can only change coaches so much before even the casual fan starts to get the feeling that it might be the manager who is to blame.

[BrewCrewForever]

Ah they can fire him to I could care less.

[RockCoCougars]

Great question. Even though it can be argued that hitting coaches really don't factor into the equation much, maybe it's time to can him to shake things up a bit. This offense is pathetic.

[dfourni]

Wow would it be Skaalen's fault? Haven't you heard Bill Schroeder gush about the world class instruction these hitters are getting? Also, what about brian telling us about how Skaalen never shows emotion and that somehow is a great trait for a hitting coach to have.

[RightFieldCoder]

Why did we get rid of Butch Wynegar? Because the team struck out too much, didn't draw any walks, and didn't have a good approach at the plate. After a little more than a year on the job, Skaalen is getting the same results. Maybe it's the clay and not the sculpter. But Skaalen might be fired simply because we can't fire the clay.

[billyhallfan]

i think hitting coaches are almost worthless, i just think they are overrated, but in the long scheme of things, i don't think they have much bearing on anything...

[Ennder]

July and August is the time to discuss the hitting coach, it is way too early in the season to blame anyone for the bad start. I know people will freak out over calling this early but it is still true. April is a pitchers month and the summer is when hitters really take off as a whole. If you look at NL OPS by month last year you get

 

april - .732

May - .726

June - .754

July - .758

August - .782

September - .784

 

There are loads of players off to terrible starts all over the league, we just happen to have more than our fair share of them. I'd be much more concerned with the pitching since this is when they are supposed to overproduce and they have been pretty terrible so far.

[jwill535]

You can lead a horse to water......

[pitchleague]

I think robin hit it pretty squarely (hey, you should be the batting coach!) by saying that it seems to be the same thing no matter who the coach is. The coach can't program the players like a robot, to use my wife's term, to hit the ball squarely and only swing at good pitches. It takes discipline from the hitters.

 

Whacking batting practice pitches all over the place does not make a hitter. He must do it in game situations. The hitting coach can't go out there and do the hitting for him. He can, however, remind the player of what they've worked on. He can watch video and point out flaws. He can work on things during BP with the player, either on the field or in the cage below the stands. But once the game starts, the onus is on the player to do the job. If he can't then you maybe need to do more drastic changes (trade, bench, demotion, etc.). But I don't know what else the hitting coach can do. Getting rid of him, I don't see, is part of the solution. Sure, that's what teams have done throughout baseball history but does it really accomplish anything? That'd be an interesting study to see.

 

ennder, I appreciate those statistics that you posted. Is it possible that the August and September numbers are maybe inflated a bit not just because of the warmer weather but also because of the diluted pitching staffs throughout the NL when rosters expand and teams bring up marginal pitchers to work games? It would make sense to me. The numbers rising with the warmer weather makes perfect sense and I believe that I've seen stats similar to that posted here or I read them in an article. I would think that the numbers have to be skewed just a bit, though, due to teams bringing up AA and AAA lifers (34-year-olds, etc.) and young guys that just don't have it and get their cup of coffee and depart into baseball obscurity with a career 6.75 ERA.

[DrWood]

I've always thought batting coaches have little value other than helping players out of a slump. Unfortunately, none of our players have gotten out of a slump yet. So, yeah, I guess I'd put blame on the batting coach.

[Weirdos19]

Right now, it looks like everybody had a career year last year. The odds of that happening are slim to none.

 

If I see Weeks, Hall, or Hardy take another 2-0 fastball down main street, I'm gonna scream. You get to 2-0 to get a pitch to drive, not to pray that the pitcher can't find the strike zone. Then it gets to 2-2 and they chase a slider in the dirt, knowing two pitches earlier there was a 88mph meatball right down the middle.

 

The team was aggressive last year. This year, they are very passive.

[BuckyTuba]

I was talking to another board member and asked when this thread would show up... maybe 3 days ago.

[WisconsinSportsRule]

I am not saying we should fire him, but rather he should challenge these guys. I guess his laid back approach in not so rosy times doesn't sit well with me.

[Ennder]

I think most of the problem is a combination of playing a lot of hot teams and a lot of games on the road. We are still towards the top of baseball in SOS and we have still played more road games than any other team. Give it a month and I just don't see the struggles being as pronounced.