Pitcher C.J. Nitkowski has logged just shy of 500 major league innings in an 18 year professional career. While the journeyman never truly created a name for himself in the bigs, some of you probably recognize his name from the 2012 Mets, where he briefly attempted a comeback in our minor league system. While his pitching legacy may lack sustenance, Nitkowski gained a great knowledge of the game, shown on his truly information Twitter feed. C.J. wrote a guest post this morning for Baseball Prospectus on the importance of coaching in baseball. I think it’s a fantastic must-read piece that every baseball fan should check out. Here’s your link! And a quote to get you interested:
“What really befuddles me, though, is when a sabermetric scribe plays down the value coaches can have at the big-league level, with doubt about their usefulness dripping from every sarcastic word.” – C.J. Nitkowski for Baseball Prospectus
4 comments
Stick
11/20/2012-9:35am at 9:35 am (UTC -4)
Well, there are certain venues that I can think of where that statement might create just a smidge of a debate…
In my naive little world, I always thought of saber stuff as more relevant to historical evaluation (picking players), and to some extent for decision making along the way (platoon splits say), but really had nothing to do with the day to day operations of the team (coaching, and actually playing the game).
Donal
11/20/2012-10:51am at 10:51 am (UTC -4)
I think there is a little strawman creation there.
I’m of the opinion that a manager has little influence during the game. That isn’t to say he has no influence on the team in general, but just than deciding when to bunt (which is almost never) is a very small part of it. He still has to monitor a player’s health, deal with media, handle the egos, and just keep things together over a grueling 162 game schedule.
None of those are easy tasks and are just what I can think of off the top of my head.
Over all, I agree. I think this should be read by both sides of the “sabermetrics debate” (which I still contend doesn’t actually exist).
srt
11/20/2012-11:06am at 11:06 am (UTC -4)
Excellent read, thanks for sharing Prismo.
I especially got a kick out of the last comment left on that article. Specifically:
‘Coaching at all levels seems to me to be one of the game’s inefficiencies’
Hmm….the new Moneyball theory for 2013? Hire great coaches and get the edge on your team improving?
Stick
11/20/2012-12:26pm at 12:26 pm (UTC -4)
I think that has a much better chance of working in Football, or basketball.