The White Sox have announced that they will not retain hitting coach Todd Steverson, as James Fegan of The Athletic was among those to cover on Twitter. Assistant hitting coach Greg Sparks will also not be brought back.
Steverson has been in his position since 2014, representing a rather lengthy run for a hitting coach. He has previously coached with the Athletics. Sparks had a three-year run as Steverson’s assistant.
Otherwise, the staff under manager Rick Renteria will remain unchanged. The White Sox had to be thrilled with the strides made by some hitters — Tim Anderson, Yoan Moncada, James McCann — but the overall offensive output fell below league average. That’s certainly not the sole fault of Steverson and Sparks, but the organization obviously decided those weren’t the right people to drive future improvements at the plate.
Ray Durham would be awesome.
I think we need someone that can speak Spanish along with English
The BIG HURT
I didn’t know he went into coaching.
They really need to get away from the nepotism hires.
They trend is to find coaches from college, since they have a much greater hand in development. I hope they look outside the system for this hire.
Last I checked manager Rick Renteria was an outside hire, a respected bi-lingual developmental coach and manager in the Marlins and Padres system who was hired to finish the Cubs rebuild before the White Sox signed him to be Robin Ventura’s bench coach where he then went on to perform a similar role on the southside of Chicago when the latter departed following the 2015 season.
Todd Steverson, the hitting coach who was let go today was an outside hire from the Oakland A’s organization. Even former White Sox SS Ozzie Guillen got his coaching experience outside the organization which culminated in a 2003 World Series title on Jack McKeon’s Marlins staff before becoming the Chicago manager in 2004.
Most of the White Sox organizational hires have been from outside the organization. That said, there’s nothing wrong with bringing in former players provided they are qualified for the jobs they are hired to perform. Clearly Ventura was not, but more often they have been.
Stop playing dense.
The White Sox routine for years has been to find internal solutions, either through people within “the family” or through internal promotions for years. And in recent years, notably the Hahn era, its led to a number of questionable hires and weak efforts to find replacements.
Renteria was hired without interviewing any candidates.
Hostetler was promoted to a new role in pro scouting even though he wasn’t particularly accomplished as the draft expert.
He was replaced with an internal candidate.
In fact, while Steverson had his flaw, a very strong argument can be made that he did his job much better than Hostetler and Chris Getz, another nepotism hire, and that the failures of those two made his job much more difficult.
No. I do not want to see another hire based on the person’s affiliation with the White Sox. Find a guy with a more analytical background from a franchise with a track record of success.
Anyway we can resurrect Charlie Lau!
Can we show them clips of, “Max Dugan Returns”?
BRINK BACK Walter Hriniak!
THANK YOU JESUS
ozzie coming back.
Hopefully not to become a manager again and certainly not as a hitting coach.
Ozzie Guillen would bring nothing to the table to help Tim Anderson become a more patient hitter since the former White Sox SS rarely ever drew walks himself. That said, Guillen could make for an excellent infield instructor and potentially take the E6 out of T7’s game. Frankly, I don’t see Guillen settling for that as a former manager and would just assume see the White Sox promote AA Birmingham Baron skipper Omar Vizquel to Rick Renteria’s coaching staff in that capacity.
This is good news. But really only matters if they get a quality replacement from somewhere else.
Being the White Sox, I expect them to announce the promotion of their AAA hitting coach just after the WS,
They wouldn’t understand it’s the juiced ball and the park creating the “sccess” at the dish down there.
Frank Thomas if guy of his means wants it. Knows how to hit and be patient from Walt H.
Often times great hitters don’t make the best hitting coaches. So much of their ability is natural which is something that can’t be conveyed to others.
That said, Frank Thomas was a remarkable all around hitter who knew the value of patience in producing Hall of Fame BA/OBP/SLG numbers. As you said, the Big Hurt was an ardent student of Walt Hriniak’s hitting philosophy, one that preached patience, hitting the ball up the middle, swinging down while also releasing the upper hand off the bat at the end of a swing. That teaching method was not only shunned by former Red Sox slugger Ted Williams when Hriniak coached in Boston but would also be frowned upon by today’s analytical geeks who prefer exit velocity and launch angle to produce power over more contact and hitting for average.
As an older White Sox fan, I was a huge fan of Hriniak’s philosophy as well as that of his predecessor and mental Charlie Lau. No one would argue about Williams acumen as perhaps MLB’s greatest hitter but he never became a full-time hitting coach and was a mediocre manager with his impatience toward players with lesser abilities and his disdain towards pitchers.
Along with Thomas, the White Sox also employ another highly regarded HOF hitter who was a patient slugger in Jim Thome. I can see definitely see either as future hitting instructors if their heart is into that particular calling.
Long overdue- Steverson never had the White Sox offense out of the bottom 3 in any offensive category. It was disappointing to see him there this long, but this is how a Reinsdorf run organization is.
If the FO really wants to put together a contender they will hire from outside of the organization and not promote one of their minor league hitting coaches. But expect the latter from this poorly run organization.
I think it’s ludicrous to blame a hitting coach for an overall weak lineup, especially if you consider the success of Andersen, Eloy and Abreu this year. Maybe the Sox saw an opportunity to upgrade at a few coaching positions. I don’t think it’s an indictment of the previous coaching staff. They simply need more everyday players than they have right now (CF, RF, 2B).
Not to mention the adjustments that Yoan Moncada made from his first full season in 2018 to the numbers he posted this past year. The article also pointed out James McCann’s breakout season at the dish.
That said, the White Sox probably felt it was time for a new voice as the team transitions from rebuilders to contenders while also welcoming 3 more great hitting prospects to their active roster over the next couple of years with CF Luis Robert, 2B Nick Madrigal and 1B Andrew Vaughn.
The fact that it took Steverson a full year to tell Moncada to take the bat off his shoulder is not a point in his favor (assuming it was even Steverson that helped him, which is a big assumption).
Frank Menechino?
I mean, half the team just worked with him.
Steverson’s “selective aggression” philosophy was used by Royals and Cubs to win championships. He completely turned around Tim Anderson, James McCann, and Yoan Moncada. The Sox are in a rebuild with players who wouldn’t even start for them next year, yet they blame Steverson and not the personnel on the field. A hitting coach cannot turn replacement level players like Yolmer, Yonder Alonso, John Jay, and Adam Engel, players without star pedigree, into superstars. Terrible move by the Sox. Comments to bring back Lau or Lau disciple Hriniak will not raise slugging percentages as they promoted the art of hitting .300 at the expense of power.
Leury Garcia was getting his pre-game video work by watching YouTube videos on a self-bought iPad. And there are many stories coming out of the clubhouse even more embarassing than that.
BABIP turned around Moncada, Anderson and McCann.
So what. I doubt he’s the only player in the MLB that does this.
That’s a pretty lazy analysis of Moncada’s season. If you think BABIP is the only thing that changed, you haven’t been paying attention.
Paulie, it’s always been clear that you have bee an avid proponent of advanced analytics over traditional hitting methods. You continually poo-poo BA’s, SB’s ans SAC’s while favoring HR’s and OPS. What’s so wrong with being proficient at all of these stats?
Fortunately the White Sox are one organization that hasn’t fallen into that trap. In recent years the have been targeting domestic and international players who can achieve high BA and OBP numbers who also hit to all fields and with more contact as well as those who can run and steal bases. They are also finally drafting and acquiring players with higher baseball IQ’s rather than just being great athletes. They are looking for a proper balance with their offense, one that can produce the long ball while also winning with small ball when needed. Their model is based on the one that the Astros and Dodgers have perfected and not solely based on the two outcome approach of HR’s and SO’s.
@pplama
Using a silly stat to come up with a silly statement.
So Yoan, TA, and McCann’s success was simply due to being lucky. That’s about as silly as judging McCann’s ability behind the plate by using pitch framing as the only standard. Let’s throw common sense out the window when using sabermetrics.
In Yoan and TA’s case, their BABIP is helped by their speed. They can beat out infield grounders most others can’t. As for McCann, he’s the mostly likely of the 3 to be a fluke offensively, though he may be one of those players who thrive with a change of scenery and a bigger role with his new team. But I’m sure it’s just luck, because BABIP suggests it is.
@pplama
One additional thing about McCann. Even if his offensive regression is that bad, he still holds value behind the plate, with the way he calls a game and handles pitchers, especially Gio. Oh wait, there’s no sabermetric for the way a C handles a P or calls a game, so we should just dismiss those valuable intangibles for something silly like pitch framing.
Both the Red Sox and White Sox are apparently getting rid of their big-headed hitting coaches.
Is there some advanced analytic metric about head size that I’m too old school to know about?
The Giants let Bochy go, too.
What gives?
Bochy retired
If the White Sox FO really wants to make this team a contender they will get rid of the completely outdated pitching coach Don Cooper. He hasn’t had a good pitching staff in over 10 years.
He hasn’t had much to work with, either.
A team that has to start Dylan Covey year after year isn’t doing much to improve their rotation.
He and his staff have recently (very belatedly) embraced analytics. Although not enough to utilize an opener.
He gets one more year.
Why does he get one more year? He must have some compromising photos or something in the higher ups
The opener? Seriously?
Screw the opener. Thank goodness MLB is finally shunning multiple bullpen changes beginning next year. I’ll take more Justin Verlander’s, Gerrit Cole’s, Max Scherzer’s and Lucas Giolito’s over openers and LOOGY’s any day of the MLB season.
@Aaron
Amen! Openers are going to be ridiculed 10 to 20 years from now much like barefoot kickers in the 80’s are in the NFL.
I can see using an opener in an emergency (like with the Cease scenario last week), but if you’re using an opener every 5th day, that should raise a serious red flag about the state of your rotation. Not to mention it’s a bullpen killer having 6 or 7 RP pitching an extra game most probably wouldn’t be pitching if a legit SP were pitching in that spot.
As for the LOOGY’s you mentioned, I’m glad MLB fixed that starting next year. Now we can call them L3OGY’s.
I don’t like openers as a long-term solution (and I don’t think most teams do), but when a team has no viable starter, it makes sense to piece together a rotation.
The team got 32 starts from Cease, Detwilder and Banueols, and none of them had an ERA under 6.50. Then there was Despaigne and Santana.
If you don’t have a legit starter, it makes sense to find ways to piece together starts using an opener, backed up by long relievers.
Cease’s name does not belong in there. This season was about his development, not his ERA. You use an opener to work around the bums, not a young pitcher that struggles during a developmental year.
You are correct. I mixed up my Dylan’s lol.
It’s not Coop’s fault the. The Sox have been signing really bad pitchers for years to eat innings and not do much else. At least put some thought into why a coach deserves to be replaced other than, “we suck”.
Cooper blows. It is his fault. He is the most overrated pitching coach in the game.
More transparency with Coop’s plans and goals would be a good. Having watched nearly every game this year, Coop had a pretty tough job. After losing Rodon and Santana, pitching shifted to emergency mode. The only relief from a pretty stressful pitching season came from Bummer, Giolito and Colome. Couple that with FO not making a strong attempt to resolve our SP woes (which is wise, but cost the record this year) and it’s difficult to place too much blame on Coop.
Without transparency, Coop remains a mystery. Is he hand-holding too much? Was it just a bad year? Can we give him some credit with Giolito’s success? What about the rehabs? Is now a good time for a change or is Coop’s responsibility sneakily hidden behind some unpredictable veil?
Somebody finally hit the nail on the head! Coop needs to go.
Nah. Hector Santiago, Dylan Covey and Ivan Nova need to go.
Why does it take the White Sox so long to figure out what most people know in half the time. Cooper is next, please!!!!
I haven’t seen such an empty batting average since Chris Johnson .321 in 2013.
How is TA’s batting average empty? (I assume you’re talking about TA and not Yoan, which would make it an even worse take)
Let’s see 18 HR, 32 doubles, .865 OPS, 129 OPS+, 4.0 bWAR or 3.5 fWAR (your choice).
Not sure where you’re going with the empty batting average angle.
Meh.
He needed to go, but he is being used as a scapegoat.
It’s not his fault the team has consistently brought in hitters with poor plate discipline and poor hit tools.
They need to not only change approach to hitting, they need to do a better job of people identifying players who can actually hit via the draft and pro scouting.
Although I agree with you on the need for better pro scouting, the success of too many players pre and post white sox is more than a little damning for Steverson.
BS
Hawk Harrelson anyone?
I’d rather hear him call a game than the cubs announcers. Talk about a snooze fest.