Searching For LaRoche
After reading Dejan Kovacevic’s great article about Adam LaRoche at the Post-Gazette today, I got a bit concerned when I read:
"Tracy and hitting coach Jeff Manto have focused, in studying video, on LaRoche’s ability to pick up the ball late in its path rather than at the pitcher’s release point, as he seems to be doing now."
There are two basic adjustments a batter can make – timing or seeing the ball. Rarely, if ever, are mechanical adjustments made to a player like LaRoche.
Essentially, the Pirates are asking LaRoche to adjust his focus by attempting to guess the pitch type and eventual landing location late in flight. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing because LaRoche’s bat speed is fast enough to accommodate that.
But is LaRoche’s mind?
Some players can’t pinpoint rotation until it’s too late and can only handle a broad focus instead. These type of players are more commonly known as zone hitters.
For example, Craig Wilson was a zone hitter who couldn’t recognize pitch types. And he was run out of town because he was.
So I decided to ask a scout and a hitting instructor to review 10 reels of film I had on LaRoche that included games from 2004, 2005, 2006, and 2007. My goal was to see if anyone could pick up a difference in LaRoche’s approach at the plate.
Both parties immediately noticed LaRoche’s unwillingness to shorten his approach with 2 strikes on him in 2007, especially because he was getting behind in the count so fast. He was much better about that in 2005 and 2006 and significantly better in 2004. Why that has changed over time is perhaps due to his maturity in the game. But he’s watching too many quality pitches float past they said.
The more reels everyone consumed, the more obvious it became to both parties that LaRoche didn’t seem to have as much advance knowledge of the pitcher he was facing in 2007 (in other words, what to expect and where) as he did with the Braves. Reel-after-reel both parties agreed – he seemed naked at the plate with the Pirates.
Here’s a case in point.. there are a lot of smaller parks in the NLCD and therefore a lot of groundball/finesse type pitchers. That isn’t the case in the NLED where LaRoche had mostly played and important because a broad focus like LaRoche has will work. But more importantly, after three years in the NLED seeing the same general pitchers over and over and playing with the Braves veterans, he was more prepared at the plate.
And as the scout said, he most likely had the benefit of a lot more advanced video systems in Atlanta to study pitchers than he has in Pittsburgh today.
And it’s showing up at the plate.
LaRoche loves pitches middle/out and middle/up and has never really done much with low stuff away which he is going to see over and over in the NLCD. But lately he isn’t even catching up to 90 mph fastballs and that drove the hitting instructor nuts the more he watched 2007 film.
No matter where you play, no matter which hitting instructor you have, no matter what type of hitter you are, your approach will always be the same at the plate.. focus on the ball. But first and foremost, you have to learn the release point of the pitcher, and that is what the hitting instructor felt LaRoche was having a problem identifying.
He felt that the Pirates might be taking him to step two before they allow him to learn step one in the NLCD, and then the problem becomes LaRoche gets confused at the plate. Which he certainly is.
The scout said why don’t the Pirates just leave LaRoche alone. If he is more comfortable being a zone hitter, let him be one. The hitting instructor immediately shot back that the Pirates don’t want just contact from LaRoche, they want power and it was obvious from his approach at the plate the Pirates are going to let him flounder to see if he can develop the recognition so he can become the power hitter they want.
That blew me away. Is LaRoche Littlefield and Manto’s sacrificial lamb this year?
What I mean is, Dave Littlefield has uttered numerous times he is looking to 2008 and 2009 – not 2007. There is no question they need power from LaRoche to make 2008 a reality. So are they going to force him to sit in that box swinging a long bat to see if over 500 AB’s he can finally make the adjustment?
It seems so. At least, that’s our conclusion because the way LaRoche is swinging the bat right now. He seemed to be attacking the zone well early in the season, but now his timing is so disrupted, even his trademark timing mechanisim of bouncing the bat above his shoulder is missing a beat. And this has resulted in poor quality swings and being late in the zone.
He simply isn’t focused — the very thing they are attempting to get him to make adjustments on.
We just heard that LaRoche is being benched in favor of Ryan Doumit at 1B tonight. None of us believe that is the answer. As Bill James mentioned in Bucco Blog’s interview, the Pirates can’t platoon him – they have to play him. And let’s be serious, we’re starting Gorzelanny who loses his composure with poor D and we’re playing Doumit at 1B???
That doesn’t make sense.
The hitting instructor had a better idea for the Pirates rather than sitting LaRoche – have him and Manto go to the bullpen and work on tracking pitches before every game if they are insisting he make the adjustment to seeing the ball later in flight.
And respect LaRoche’s true style. Some players just can’t focus on the ball to the plate as well as others can and they learn to attack the zone where they know their strength is using other methods like a broad focus and speed of the pitch.
Perhaps all they need to do is just back off and let LaRoche be LaRoche and then place him in the lineup based on who he is, instead of trying to remold him into what they want him to be so they can place him on the card where they want?
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