Interesting Article About Spring Training

[ThatRogue]

The author feels that Spring Training is broken, and proposes ways to fix it: http://www.dallasnews.com/sports/tex...n-be-fixed.ece

[Hornsby]

It's an interesting article, but like almost all proposed "fixes" to a sport, it really buries the main point. And that is Spring Training has become all about money. It's a revenue generator for the clubs and the cities that house them, so to cut it back in any way cuts into the golden goose. I do like his idea of making the early parts of ST more about the kids and less about the vets, that's a feasible option IMO. But MLB is not going to expand the rosters and give up service time, or even pay out additional monies to aging vets...

[ThatRogue]

I agree that it's all about the money. But I also agree that giving the coaches the first two weeks to work with the minor leaguers, rookies, and NRIs...then having the regular players report later is a solid idea...as is the early emphasis on more stretching & conditioning.

[Hornsby]

I agree that it's all about the money. But I also agree that giving the coaches the first two weeks to work with the minor leaguers, rookies, and NRIs...then having the regular players report later is a solid idea...as is the early emphasis on more stretching & conditioning.

Hey, BTW, welcome back...it's always good to have your take on things. As always, reasonable and thoughtful...

[Kevin Seitzer]

I don't agree with the premise of the article. He throws out some vaguely defined problems--veterans get bored in spring, pitchers get injured--and assumes that the length of spring training is to blame.

Having minor leaguers report earlier would need to come with additional compensation. Right now it wouldn't, but it should. They're not getting paid for spring training. So asking them to report a month earlier and lose a month of offseason wages is a tough ask. But I also don't necessarily agree that it would be good for the instruction the way the author thinks. If he weren't a beat writer, it would make me wonder if he has spent much time over on the minor league side of his complex.

Just a weird, semi-out-of-touch article all the way around.

[Lucky]

Do our guys throw year round? I remember reading that Japanese pitchers threw all the time.

I think the article is more than semi-out-of-touch. I think it is a guy looking to grab a little bit of attention. As he admits, spring training has changed almost none over the years, except to add a week. Yet, after attending 23 out of the last 25 spring trainings, he is just now reaching the conclusion that it is not subtlely flawed, but obviously broken?

28 man rosters in April? Wow, that's a radical measure, sure to fix an institution as hopelessly screwed up as spring training.

I may have to send this guy a harsh letter.

[Kevin Seitzer]

Do our guys throw year round?

Most guys maintain some sort of throwing program in the offseason to keep their arm in shape, though it's not at game intensity, of course.

[ThatRogue]

I don't agree with the premise of the article. He throws out some vaguely defined problems--veterans get bored in spring, pitchers get injured--and assumes that the length of spring training is to blame.

Having minor leaguers report earlier would need to come with additional compensation. Right now it wouldn't, but it should. They're not getting paid for spring training. So asking them to report a month earlier and lose a month of offseason wages is a tough ask. But I also don't necessarily agree that it would be good for the instruction the way the author thinks. If he weren't a beat writer, it would make me wonder if he has spent much time over on the minor league side of his complex.

Just a weird, semi-out-of-touch article all the way around.

I did not read it as he proposed that minor leaguers report earlier, but rather that major league veterans report later. Anecdotally, I've heard hitters comment that it only takes two-to-three weeks of competitive at-bats to get their swing and timing back. Similarly, for many relief pitchers, they surely aren't throwing six weeks worth of competitive innings to prepare for the season. So I think that his premise to have veterans report later has some merit. The major league coaching staff would have more time with the top minor league talent and the NRIs, and could focus on instructing/evaluating them during that early part of ST. Again, it seems like an idea worth considering.

[Lucky]

Hitters say that, but what do the numbers show? It may be hard to tell, since the pitchers are also coming back from the offseason, but I'd be interested to know if hitters really have their strength and timing back in April. It always seems that my players suck in April.

[Kevin Seitzer]

I did not read it as he proposed that minor leaguers report earlier, but rather that major league veterans report later.

Minor leaguers report mid-March, so by necessity, if they are going to be playing games on March 1, they are going to be reporting at least three weeks earlier than normal.

Anecdotally, I've heard hitters comment that it only takes two-to-three weeks of competitive at-bats to get their swing and timing back. Similarly, for many relief pitchers, they surely aren't throwing six weeks worth of competitive innings to prepare for the season. So I think that his premise to have veterans report later has some merit.

I don't really disagree with that, but I don't think his suggestion of playing the games without the veterans is workable.

The major league coaching staff would have more time with the top minor league talent and the NRIs, and could focus on instructing/evaluating them during that early part of ST. Again, it seems like an idea worth considering.

We, and I know some other teams in Florida at least, already do something like this. We have a mini-camp where we invite 15 or so top minor leaguers or guys who need special attention or are new to the organization to come to camp a couple weeks early to get time with the major league coaching staff. So in and of itself it's not a bad idea, though it's already something that teams are doing. I don't know if the Rangers do it. But there are not enough guys like that to play spring training games. It's the limited nature of the mini-camp that allows special attention. If you expand it to have enough guys to play a full schedule of games, I think you considerably dilute the effectiveness of the coaching attention. These are mostly guys that the major-league coaching staff don't know and are getting eyes on for the first time. That's effective in limited and selected cases. It's not effective in "let's play a full slate of games with a full roster" mode.

[ThatRogue]

Minor leaguers report mid-March, so by necessity, if they are going to be playing games on March 1, they are going to be reporting at least three weeks earlier than normal.

I should have been more clear. I was thinking he meant the minor leaguers that get an invite to major league camp, plus the NRIs, reported at the normal Feb reporting date...and the major leaguers reported a couple of weeks later. But it sounds like that's what you already do, per your last statement. Perhaps formalizing such a process, throughout all of MLB would make sense...unless, as you've said, there aren't enough of these players to get in a full slate of games (though, with the various split squad games, it sure seems like there are tons of available players in camp, even after some players get reassigned early in ST).

[Kevin Seitzer]

I should have been more clear. I was thinking he meant the minor leaguers that get an invite to major league camp, plus the NRIs, reported at the normal Feb reporting date...and the major leaguers reported a couple of weeks later. But it sounds like that's what you already do, per your last statement. Perhaps formalizing such a process, throughout all of MLB would make sense...unless, as you've said, there aren't enough of these players to get in a full slate of games (though, with the various split squad games, it sure seems like there are tons of available players in camp, even after some players get reassigned early in ST).

I would guess you could probably reasonably play early spring games with a roster of 50 players. That's slimmer than what teams start with now, but you could probably pull that off if you were careful and really planned innings well. We invited 20 non-roster players to major-league camp this spring. So at least another 30 players are needed before you can think about playing games.