It is Time for Jaramillo To Go

[Wesser]

I've said it all season, the time has come to look at whether or not Jaramillo is beneficial to the team. His philosophy just does not jibe with what Washington is trying to do. For years under Rudy, the goal has always been the big inning - extra base hits/home runs. If the Rangers are near the top in strikeouts, who cares?

Problem is that we don't have Gonzales, Pudge, Raffy, Palmer, or any of of other collection of 30+ HR badasses that we used to have and we have not constructed a team that way. We have built this team around pitching and defense and the offensive parts seem to complement that philosophy. Problem is that Rudy hasn't changed his approach any. We are terrible at situational hitting. How many times this season have the Rangers had a runner at 3rd with NO outs and can't get a fly ball to bring them home. Nope, we get two Ks and a ground out. Unacceptable, but it is a product of the "big inning" mentality - just making contact and getting a sacrifice fly isn't good enought - go for broke.

To me, Chris Davis is a clear example of the failure of Jaramillo. CD has always been hit for high average in AAA. yet, he struggled mightly in the early part of the season. Note that for the first time in his career, he worked with Jaramillo from Spring Training into the year without the use of any other hitting coach. Result, led the league in strikeouts and was hitting .200 upon demotion. He DID have 15 HR... once again, a product of the going for the downs philosophy. After CD went to AAA, the OKC hitting coach made one minor adjustment to his swing - opened his stance about 2 inches to allow him to see the ball better. He hit .330 at OKC and came back to the Rangers a new hitter in August. Why was stance closed? Probably to make sure that he had HR power to all fields. Note that after a month in Arlington that CD is starting to regress again. I noticed that his stance is starting to close again. Note, 3 strikeouts last night. The cycle continues.

I am not saying that Jaramillo is a bad hitting coach. Clearly he isn't. I just think that he is a bad fit for our team now. There are teams with mashers on it that would be great fit for Rudy, including NYY - Nolan, Wash and JD have taken a different path, it is time to stop pushing that square peg into that round hole.

 

[orangecat]

Agree, earlier in the year I felt like that Rudy was the home run coach, but what we really needed with all of the younger players was a hitting coach.

Another example, look at Kinsler's ridiculous home run swing.

 

[Dead Horse]

Is the big run inning really his mentality/system or was it just a product of the players we have had over the years? Gone are the Roided Rangers of yesteryear.

Regarding Davis, AAA pitching is a lot different than the bigs. It is very common for mechanics to get screwy when players start pressing at the big league level.

I'm not disagreeing with you about Rudy, I am just playing devils advocate. I am not sure what is going on with the bats this season but right now we are missing two All-Stars in the lineup, this team is built for defense which is not always conducive to offensive output, and there is a load of young players who could be hitting a wall since minor league seasons are about 20+ games shorter.

 

[Horns11]

It's nothing we haven't heard about Rudy before. Whenever the Rangers go through a hitting slump, we always get the "time for some hitting coach accountability" rants, especially from a certain sports radio station.

Then they hit .380 for the next month and all is forgotten.

If anything, I guess a change might be in order for some more consistency. Or just a general change of pace. But Rudy is probably the most well-liked hitting coach in the league by players, both current and former. I'm not sure that's a change I would be willing to make as a manager or GM, unless it was Rudy's own decision to look for jobs elsewhere.