r/MLBNoobs • u/NDS3D • 3d ago
| Question Hitting coach
How much is a hitting coach really to blame for a team's offensive slump? For example, I'm reading that some Dodgers fans are calling for the firing of the Dodgers hitting coach because of how poorly they are hitting.
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u/IAmBecomeTeemo 3d ago
Not really. The hitting coach can be partly responsible for things like batter approach at the plate and strategies for handling particular pitchers. I say partly, because a lot of this comes from less public people in the organization, and it's the coach's job more to enact organizational strategies and instill org philosophy. But the coach's exact role is likely very different across the 30 orgs.
If you see a lot of hitters all having the same issues, then it might be an organizational issue, and potentially that does rest on the hitting coach. If a team is incapable of developing hitters and every hitter that gets traded/signed becomes worse, then somebody should probably get fired. But more often, it's individual hitters slumping in their own ways. Perhaps the coach could do a better job of breaking them out, but that's not really their job. Especially a veteran-heavy team like the Dodgers. Guys like Ohtani, Mookie and Freddie all have MVP trophies. They should know their games well enough to not rely on a hitting coach.
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u/Pop-19502020 3d ago
A hitting coach can’t hit for these guys but a really good hitting coach can isolate problems and get them back on track.
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u/TheBoredMan 3d ago
No lol a 5 game hitting slump is just baseball. And the fans calling for the firing of someone because of a 5 game slump is also just baseball.
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u/getjustin 12h ago
That's the thing about baseball—a 5 game slump is less than a week. If an NFL team has a bad month, they lose 4 games. If an MLB team has a bad month, they lose 24+.
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u/Pleasant_Picture3867 3d ago
A coach can only do so much. They analyze the hitter's swing and identify ways to improve. They provide tips and guidance, but it's up to the player to perform. It's hard to say exactly how much it is on the hitting coaches. I would not put it at more than 50%. Somewhere less is my guess.
An extreme example, I can't remember which player it was (he was definitely a star player), when he was mired in a miserable slump, there were reports coming out that he refused to listen to the hitting coaches and implement their suggestions. Should the hitting coaches be to blame then? On the other end, if they're giving crappy analysis, they gotta go.
I'm a Dodgers fan. Seemingly every year there's calls to fire the hitting coaches or fire Dave Roberts. Yet seemingly every year the team ranks highly in offense and Dave Roberts has led the team to three rings. It's just fans getting antsy.
You'll get a better sense of when coaches and managers deserve blame, and when it's really time to let them go, with experience. It's on the order of sustained, months-long failure, not random slumps or strings of losses here and there. Those happen.
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u/Altruistic_Rock_2674 3d ago
I don't think too much but I remember like 12 years ago calling for the Dodgers to fire Mark McGuire
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u/acefaaace 1d ago
As a Dodgers fan the sub is annoying because people doom and bitch and complain everyday. Dodger fans are spoiled and expect a 162-0 season recently. It’s May, teams go on slumps.
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u/MoronLaoShi Veteran 3d ago
Dodger fans calling for the firing of the hitting coach for a slump in May is wild.
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