Bats, stats, formats

Last year, while Andover baseball coach Don Gawreluk was watching a Texas Rangers playoff game on TV, he couldn't help but notice a large banner pinned across the inside of the dugout heralding what the organization considered a successful at-bat. ¶ "They wanted people to know it could be a lot of things," Gawreluk said, "instead of what you see from numbers." ¶ The concept struck a chord with Gawreluk and this spring he set out to essentially instigate some new numbers for his team -- namely, their own interpretation of a quality at-bat.But the Huskies coach is not alone. Across the Twin Cities, high school coaches are reacting to a baseball world that is becoming increasingly analytical, and they have begun searching for statistics that fit their needs. While coaches have their limitations -- many have other jobs, families and low budgets for staff to help them calculate advanced statistics -- several have chosen one or two metrics to latch onto because they highly value the results.

Aside from quality at-bats, coaches are looking at other things -- individualized pitching goals such as first-pitch, offspeed and fastball strike percentage, percentage of times the pitcher is in a particular count, batting average on balls in play and batting average in various pitch counts -- as tools for building players' confidence and helping them better understand the game, and a means to exercise some control in an uncontrollable game.

"We're talking about what we can do to make the player feel as confident as they possibly can," Minnetonka coach Paul Twenge said. "That will breed success for them, and that lends itself to a successful outcome for the team."

'Us' and 'Them'

Next to the lineup chart in the Andover dugout hangs a simple poster that says "Us" and "Them" at the top. It's there every game, home or away. After each plate appearance that fills Gawreluk's criteria for "quality" -- a hit, a walk, a hit by pitch, an eight-pitch at-bat, reaching on an error, a sacrifice, moving a runner over or scoring a runner -- someone on the Huskies bench will scribble a mark on the appropriate side. For Gawreluk, the theory behind the marks is as plain as the poster itself.

"We try to keep it simple, just got up there and do your job," he said. "And your job is to have a quality at-bat. I can tell the ebb and flow of the game, just by taking a quick glance at the chart."

The sermon he's preaching has rung true: entering this week, with the exception of one game, every time Andover's offense has netted at least 15 quality at-bats in a game (their goal), they have won.

And statistical proof such as that, many coaches agree, has helped further disentangle the game for their players.

"Baseball is not a simple game," said Phil Almeroth, coach at Legacy Christian Academy in Anoka, who keeps track of "positive at-bats," batting average on balls in play and pitching goal percentages. "This can help [your players] learn the game and it will reinforce the philosophy. It's not just a number -- there's a reason behind it."

Coaches say they often use these statistics as numerical justification of what they have their players do in practice.

"There's no need for them to say, 'Why are we doing this?'" said Lakeville North pitching coach Eric Gassman, who keeps an elaborate spreadsheet charting numerous pitching goals. "They can't argue with statistics. Instead of saying, 'Hey, your offspeed [pitch] wasn't so good,' you can say 'Last time out you threw 29 offspeed pitches, but just 15 were strikes.'"

Furthermore, defining a quality at-bat can better outline goals for players that aren't likely to accumulate high averages or extra-base hits.

Building confidence

A year ago, Minnetonka's Twenge had a bone to pick with his critics.

"People were saying, '[The team is] not hitting,'" he said. "Well, I got mad and I came up with a chart and said, 'We're going to find out.'"

What he found startled him. The Skippers were, in fact, putting bat on ball, but they weren't making great contact. Twenge attributed this, at least in part, to confidence issues.

So he came up with a system. For every player, he went through and found their average per pitch in the pitch count. For instance: Perhaps his leadoff guy was hitting .500 when he swung at the first pitch, .700 on the second and third pitch and .300 on the fourth, but was averaging below .200 for any pitch after. It could be just the opposite for, say, a batter in the No. 7 spot.

In general, coaches say statistics they are utilizing help them give a positive boost to players in a game full of negative reinforcement.

"Lots of times, they would be out there thinking, 'I hope I don't screw up,'" Gawreluk said.

Added Totino-Grace coach Mike Smith: "Everybody's seen guys pound balls all over the place and end up with zero hits, or nub three in a row and end up 3-for-3. ... You can't always control the outcome, but you can sure control a lot of things leading up to it. So we look at that."

While many coaches are getting more involved in new statistical measures, they are quick to point out the often rudimentary nature of their calculations.

"You've got to understand, there are a lot of holes in this," Twenge said of his pitch-count sequencing. "If I was doing my master's degree on frequency of successful hitting in relationship to pitch sequence, I'd be shot to death."