Chipper Jones - I'm Not Your Hitting Coach

Fans have been clamoring for Chipper Jones return as hitting coach. Today they got the answer. No.

If you ask the average fan this season how to fix the Braves’ hitting woes most would have said bring back Chipper as hitting coach. Chipper sort of fueled the rumors early on when he spent some time trying to raise the dead in the form of B.J. Upton’s bat, but he’s never given any indication that he wanted to do the job.

In an interview on MLB Network Radio’s Inside Pitch he said that the daily grind had taken its toll. He went on to say he was tired of living out of a suitcase and leaving fro spring training in February, being at the ballpark 10 hours day from April through at least September and missing time with his family. While he didn’t rule of special projects like roving instructor now and then he said that if coaching was in his future it wasn’t in his near future.

Today Carroll Rodgers reported over at the AJC that Fredi Gonzalez has called Chipper to measure his interest. He found that there was none.

Chipper is enjoying life on his ranch in south Texas too much to jump into that never ending round of traveling and 12 hour or longer days.

"“I’m not ready to get back in uniform yet. It’s too soon and I don’t know if I’d be dedicated enough to the job right now. …”“. . . It’s even more of a time commitment from a coaching standpoint than it is a player standpoint. I don’t want to be at the park at noon every day. I don’t want to be at the park until midnight every night. I don’t want to wake up at spring training and have to be there at 6:30 in the morning. It’s a huge commitment, and I don’t want to cheat the organization at this point because I’m not ready to put that kind of time commitment into it.”"

If not Chipper who?

The Braves search to fill that position continues and a former coach’s name came up last week as a possibility; Don Baylor, but that isn’t likely.

The 65 year old Baylor has had a run of bad luck with illness and injury but is currently hitting coach for the Angels and they led MLB in runs scored per game and finished with a slash line that was 6th/ 7th / 6th / 6th in the majors. He’s probably staying in LA.

I’ve heard Kevin Long’s name mentioned as well. Long was fired by the Yankees after their worst offensive season in seven years. Mitigating that is the fact that the Yankees roster was probably the most offensively challenged in the last seven years. I’m not sure what Long could have done to fix that. A name that’s not been mentioned for some reason is former Rangers hitting coach Rudy Jaramillo

Jaramillo was Astros hitting coach from 90-93 before joining the Rangers in 1995. While there the rangers were in the top five in the AL in team batting average, runs scored, slugging percentage, home runs, and hits from 96 through 2004. In 1999 they had MLB’s highest BA (.293) and slugging % (.479) and hits (1653). they were second in runs scored (945) and third in on base (..361) and second in runs per game with 5.83. In 2008 they were once again first in runs scored (901), hits (1619), and home runs (194).

While he coached Texas 17 hitters Silver Sluggers, three won home run titles and two were RBI champs along with a batting title. In thirteen consecutive season while he was hitting coach the Rangers scored 800 or more runs, the longest streak since Yankees did it 17 times – 1926 through 1942.

After the 2009 season he left Texas because they couldn’t agree on contract terms. Former Cubs GM Jim Hendry was willing to pay him more and signed him that October. At the time Hendry was fighting for his job as GM. In 2010 and 2011 the Cubs posted almost identical slash lines (.250/.320/.401 and .256/.314/.401) and runs per game (4.23 and 4.01) but the new front office ask him to do things differently and he balked at the idea according to the Chicago Sun Times.

"The move came about three weeks after the front office met with Jaramillo and ‘‘asked for some adjustments’’ in teaching emphasis. And team president Theo Epstein said it was about philosophy and ‘‘a new message,’’ not about results or anything Jaramillo did wrong. . . ‘‘It’s a nuance difference. It’s a point of emphasis.”"

". . .(Jaramillo) ‘‘might be the best in the world at the mechanics of the swing . . .but until we sort of embrace as an organization the right approach, mechanics almost have to take a back seat at times.’’"

Jaramillo seems to have the right credentials for the Braves. He seems to get the most out of free swinging hitters and has a history of getting high OBP and working well with all kinds of hitters. On top of that he can teach and communicate proper hitting mechanics to those players. With our inability to do some simple things right he might be the answer no one is looking at.

That’s A Wrap

While I am under no illusion that his statement will stop fans from wishing it were so, it sounds pretty definitive to me. Chipper is and has never been interested in riding to the rescue of the Braves hitters. Meanwhile the search continues amongst the usual suspects. Maybe it’s time to look elsewhere at men like Jaramillo or perhaps (you were expecting this weren’t you?) Julio Franco.

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Chipper Jones – I’m Not Your Hitting Coach

By Fred Owens | Oct 17, 2014

If not Chipper who?

That’s A Wrap