A CHANGE WILL DO YOU GOOD

by Holly Horning

If you’re a Tiger fan, then you’re familiar with all the stories about players who did not do well in Detroit and then performed much better when they moved to other teams.

Now there’s proof that there was substance to those tales.

Several young players have discussed their early development with Detroit as a factor in their struggles to progress in the system.

There is Spencer Torkelson who was rushed up to Detroit last year out of desperation to validate the rebuild.  He did not do well, even after returning from a refresher in Toledo.

You may remember that Tork was drafted by the Tigers as a third baseman, despite never having played that position.  That move raised eyebrows within most MLB Front Offices.

The Tigers then actually put him at 3B so he could learn the position.  It did not go well and he was moved back to first base.

But when you make significant changes, it sacrifices some of the focus needed in a player’s development and progress.

Spencer had to make positional changes and work on his offense at the same time.  And the Tigers gave him only 1 year in which to master it all.

That’s a rather tall order.

But then they also tried to change his swing.  This was all before the Player Development department was overhauled and before Ryan Garko was hired.

We know how well that worked out.

Since last year, Torkelson has been adamant about returning to the swing he used in college.  Many of us thought he was just being young and stubborn.

It is now appearing that maybe he was right.

After working with the new hitting coaches over the winter, we’re hearing that his swing potentially may be returning to what got him to the majors. Albeit with potentially a few minor tweaks after Dr. Lund does a full analysis of how his body moves most efficiently.

Earlier this week, I blogged about the changes to Eric Haase’s set-up behind the plate that is also being tweaked in order to allow him to become a better defensive player.  He’s been with the Tigers for 3 years but no one, until now, has been able to diagnose the issues because the team didn’t have the right equipment or specialists who could figure it out.

And now there’s Alex Faedo.

Faedo recently gave an interview where he talked about how the Tigers, when he was signed, changed his pitching mechanics.

Then he revealed that the change is what created his hip injury that required surgery last year.  He has now gone back to his former delivery style on the advice of the new specialists.

Alex credits all the new people for getting him back on track.  He gave a shout out to Director of Pitching, Gabe Ribas, pitching rehab coordinator, John DeRouin, rehab specialists Corey Tremble and Duncan Evans and strength coaches Francisco Rivas and Ryan Maedel.

What do these 3 players have in common?

They were getting old, outdated advice from an organization that lacked the tools and skills to guide and develop the best performance from its talent.

Until this year.

The Tigers now have added to their technology which allows them to break down a player’s movement into milli-seconds and then feed the info into super computers.  They also have new coaches like Dr. Robin Lund who can then take this info and apply their expertise in kinesiology to ensure that any movement performed will not create injury.

Not having these resources could also be a factor in the number of other pitchers who have ended up on the IL going back quite a few years.  How many of them had (now) former coaches change how they pitched?

It’s the same process that they are undoubtedly using to assess Spencer Torkelson’s swing mechanics and also Eric Haase’s positioning behind the plate that will improve his pitch framing and lessen the number of balls in the dirt.

It would appear that the Tigers have finally moved into the 21^st Century and successfully embraced technology while hiring specialists.

It also looks like they finally have people who are capable of accurately interpreting the data and advice.

It’s being reported that while Al Avila brought analytics to the Tigers, he did not create a system in which data was correctly interpreted, nor did he create a system in which the information was communicated efficiently throughout the organization.  Their analytics department, along with their infrastructure and technology, was considered to be outdated within MLB even when it was new.

The rest of MLB savaged the Tigers for their antiquated approach.  Ken Rosenthal reported that a number of other GMs questioned “whether Avila (was) creative and savvy enough to build a consistent winner” and stated about Detroit “Not like they had a lot of cutting-edge ideas.”

Enter Avila’s polar opposite, Scott Harris, who is considered to be creative and forward-thinking.  He has now brought the Tigers into modern times.

You won’t read much about it.  It’s not sexy or exciting.  And the eyes of readers will roll into the backs of their heads if they have to read in-depth descriptions of how the technology works.  But much has been done to overhaul and modernize the team’s infrastructure, personnel and technology. 

Harris has gotten Chris Ilitch to invest tens of millions in the newest systems, video and computers.  Not to mention the hiring of a significant number of specialists and coaches to advise talent especially in the areas of biomechanics and kinesiology.

All of this is contained in 1 of Harris’ 3 tenets:  the culture of development.  That top priority was singled out by Scott because he didn’t see it existing in the Tigers’ organization.

He said: “An area of focus for us is helping players get better.  We’re introducing a lot of new things to the players that they’ve never seen before. And with that comes huge opportunity to help them get better, to find those small gains up and down the roster that can net huge returns for the team. That’s going to be our path back to contention and I feel we are off to a good start.”

So why are we just reading about the poor advice given to players in the past like Faedo, Haase and Torkelson?

Because the previous regime didn’t know what they didn’t know.

There’s now a new coaching staff, brand new training, conditioning and medical groups and a new technology system that is creating new and better data.  Updated development concepts are being taught and new training tools are being used.  And this blogger is overjoyed to finally read that players are taking yoga and pilates classes to address the repeated core injuries that were ignored under the former regime. 

It’s about time.

Bu all of this won’t create an immediate fix.  We won’t see instant results.  It will be a gradual process.  Like all things in life, players need to buy in, adjust and get comfortable with all the new information being thrown at them now.

So far, it’s promising.  Harris stated:  “They’ve responded to it very well.  But there is an adjustment period and it takes time for these new concepts to gain traction and produce results.”

Fans as well will need an adjustment period. 

This was an outdated organization for decades that previous owners ignored.  One covered up the problem by throwing vast amounts of money at the roster by buying talent from other teams.  But that only masked the problems.  It was a superficial fix.

What’s going on now within the office walls of Comerica isn’t as exciting.  But it’s much more promising.  And it’s finally digging down to the root of the problem.

And hopefully, we’ll start to see positive results trickling up to the surface. Soon. Hopefully very soon.

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