Full Interview: Former Atlanta Braves OF Todd Cunningham (Part 2)

Below is Part 2 of an interview with now former Atlanta Braves outfielder Todd Cunnignham. If you missed Part 1, double back and read that first here.

[This interview is lightly edited for length and clarity. When you finish here, you can also read a full screen-shots only version of our chat over at Modern Pastime]

Continuing where we left off yesterday…

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You very much have to learn to let go of certain controls in your life and enjoy the ride…

I

f you don’t mind I’d like to ask about the transaction that led to your current opportunity with the Angels.

Waiver transactions are something that many fans and writers have a general understanding of (depending on how recently we’ve googled it… again…), but the overwhelming majority of us have no insight into what that is like for a player. While I’m sure it hasn’t been your favorite pro ball experience, could you share what the process of being claimed off of waivers is like? For instance, are you monitoring the process or perhaps being contacted by teams that are considering a claim, or does the phone just ring and the deal is done?

Todd Cunningham: I don’t know how it is for everyone but my experience was much more like the latter. I figured some type of move would go down from the apparent writing on the wall. By the time I heard about what it was exactly through it was a phone call from the Braves front office that I had just been claimed by the Angels and that I should expect a call from them shortly. The rest has been conversations with the Angels personnel. Sorry I don’t have more to that story.

PTJ: Modern analytics seem to have pretty unquestionably assumed a more prominent role in the league during the years that you have been a pro. I just read a story about traditional scouts having a harder time finding work, while younger folks with less baseball-specific experience are finding themselves in influential roles. I think a lot of people would be very interested in players’ reactions to the role of sabermetrics in the game. Does there seem to be a general consensus among players that the hugeness of baseball data these days is good, bad, weird, useful, nerdy, etc?

"TC: I love the data when it falls in my favor and despise it when it says I should be out of the game haha. I feel like every player would agree to that. We all try to justify ourselves… compete with reason if you will, ha."

But as far as the number crunching goes in the game of baseball… I think there is a place for it. And I think it is a valuable tool for evaluating as all of baseball is built around the numbers. However, call me old fashion if you would like but there is no better compliment than a guy calling you a good teammate. That term, teammate, means so much more than a nice guy that I can sit down and have a coffee with. Being a good teammate means that the guy playing next to you, hitting behind you , or sitting by you in the dugout respects you… in far fewer words… to the point where they are proud to wear the same uniform as you. That’s much more important, to me, than any individual stat. It kind of encompasses them all when someone wants you on their team.

PTJ: I’m really glad I asked that question and I appreciate your take. I think that the best analysts from the Saber side of things also greatly appreciate the intangibles that come along with the game. Baseball is a mentally challenging game by nature (failure, failure, failure, hey, whoa, a hit!, failure, failure…), and having good people around you helps you keep at it, as far as I could tell. Alrighty, last question:

It also seems like sabermetrics is seeping into on-field strategy, in the forms of defensive shifts and less frequent use of some strategies like bunting and pitching out for some clubs. Do you have any opinion about how modern baseball data might be affecting the direction of the game?

Next: Todd Cunningham Interview, Part 1

Whelp, there you have it folks. Todd really was a sport to take all of my questions during his offseason, and he give me a lot of frank and interesting answers, as well. As I mentioned above, you can see the unedited Twitter conversation between us here, from my other writing habitat at Modern Pastime. Give Todd a follow on twitter, down there with the other buttons. He just posted a picture of a really cool walking bridge that he built over a gorgeous creek out in the woods somewhere, and a new water color! Spoiler Alert: it’s a fox. You don’t want to miss it.

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Offseason Original by Todd Cunningham