Results tagged ‘ coach ’
Former Pirates skipper Russell will always cherish time in Pittsburgh
Former Bucs Manager John Russell spent six years in Pittsburgh . He endured some of the worst seasons in Pirates history, including a 105-loss 2010 season. He made coaching gaffe’s that sometimes made you scratch your head. He was often criticized for his lack of emotions both on the field and with the players. But despite the blowouts and the base running mistakes, Russell has no regrets.
“I’ll never forget my (six) years in Pittsburgh as a coach and manager. It’s a great city with great fans. I’ll never regret it. I wish I could still be there as a manager. But I’m very happy where I am now. I’m looking forward to this season and what the future holds for me.”
“I thought the last quarter of the (2010) season we played pretty good baseball,” Russell said. “Guys started to come on a little bit. I thought it was very much headed the right way. But you can’t negate the losses.”
Just three weeks after being fired by the Pirates, Russell was hired by the Baltimore Orioles as their third base coach and catching instructor.
The Bucs and Orioles face each other five times during spring training, as well as a interleague series this season.
“People say to me, ‘Oh, you probably don’t want to go back there,’ ” Russell said. “It doesn’t affect me. It was a part of my career that I’ll always remember and cherish. I have a lot of friends over there.”
Russell also believes the Pirates can turn thing around and end those consecutive losing seasons.
“There’s hope for any franchise,” Russell said. “The biggest thing is patience, and that’s tough in Pittsburgh because of the number of years they haven’t won.”
If he could do it all over again, would he second guess anything?
“You can always second-guess,” he said. “But you have to believe in what you do. That’s the way I tried to approach it every day in Pittsburgh. I tried to do what’s right not only for the players but for the organization to make sure we stayed on track with the major plan. We knew it was going to be tough. We knew we were going to have to be patient to make it work. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out for me.”
Big difference in the game today; pitch counts
Former Pirate Doug Drabek, who is now a pitching coach for the Arizona Diamondbacks minor league system, sees differences in the game from when he used to play.
“The game has changed a little bit,” Drabek said. “But it is still, basically, that you show up on time, you go out and play hard. The fundamentals, the basics are all the same. It is still throw strikes, catch the ball, hit the ball. It is the same game.”
The big difference he says, is pitch counts.
“There is a pitch count that I had to learn,” he said of when he transitioned to a coach. “At first, I didn’t believe in it. I figured that you’d go until you get tired, and hitters will let you know if you are tired or not or if you are just stinkin’ that bad.”
“But I saw how [throwing too many pitches] affected some. Where you could tell, toward the end [of a season] that they weren’t used [to throwing so many pitches].
“A lot of guys were asking, ‘Why does my fastball not feel like it normally does?’ … I see where it is best, now, for these guys to give their arm, and their body, a little break.”
Kristy Robinson
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