Interesting article on Don Slaught and Video
Slaught swings players over to study
Tigers hitting coach putting new video system into practice
By Jason Beck / MLB.com
LAKELAND, Fla. -- Need a good baseball flick to watch? Talk to Don Slaught.
The titles aren't very exciting. "Brandon Inge, Feb. 28" wasn't up for anything at the Oscars last Sunday. "Chris Shelton, March 7" wouldn't make it to Sundance next year. But titles like that would make up a must-see list for Slaught, now showing on his laptop.
The involvement of coaches in video work isn't anything new. Most Major League teams have a video operations coordinator who takes game footage, sorts it by pitcher or batter and divides it up to show in the clubhouse before games. What Slaught is doing in his new job as Tigers hitting coach goes beyond that.
Manager Jim Leyland had Slaught in his mind as soon as he took over the Tigers because of the work he did with swing analysis and a computer video program. These last few weeks have been Slaught's chance to put what began as a tool for high school and college teams into practice in his Major League job.
It's taken up his time to the point where he seemingly lived in the batting cage some days. But he wouldn't change it for anything.
"I love this," he said last week as he watched Inge hit off a pitching machine in the indoor cage. "This is what I do, whether it's here or in Little League or in high school."
What he does is a detailed route toward a simple goal: Put every hitter in their best position to hit, whichever way works for them.
Most of Slaught's previous work involved amateur, high school and college teams. His company, RightView Pro, developed a computer program that allows users to look at four different swings at one time, compare them in different phases, measure angles and track the plane of a swing. It became a popular item with baseball and softball teams all over, including some Major League teams already.
Slaught himself used it heavily in his teaching work with amateur teams. Now he gets to take his computer system and build an organizational system around it.
When Tigers position players began taking swings at the start of Spring Training, Slaught started collecting footage. He and Tigers video operations coordinator Jeremy Kelch took a laptop and camera out to one of the back fields for batting practice. They set it up in the cages for extra work. They mapped out a strategy to add in-game footage once the game schedule began, both here in Spring Training and at Lakeland.
Slaught has not only collected footage for every player, he's done it just about every day. Between his computer and external hard drives, he has enough space for about 100,000 swings if he needed it.
"We'll have good looks at things we need to look at," Slaught said. "You can't just take one swing out there, because they can say, 'Well, that was a bad swing.' You have to show them it happens every time."
He has a lot of ways to show it. With all that footage, different angles and four different split screens, he can compare a player's swing one day to what he did yesterday or the day before. He can compare a player's swing to that of three other players, whether they're Tigers or All-Stars whose footage he has permission to use.
"It's instant feedback," Shelton said. "You can see things right away. You can put a bad swing on top of a good swing, and you can compare."
Where it goes from there varies from one player to another. With some, he'll delve into analyzing what puts a player in a good position to hit. If a hitter can put the bat in the strike zone long enough to attack an offspeed pitch while still being able to foul off a fastball, for instance, it could be a good swing for a two-strike approach.
For other players, the comparison works best against their own work. Take a player's swing one day and compare it with his swing on another one, and figure out how he got out of a groove and into a slump.
"A good hitting coach isn't necessarily someone who is dead set on one type of swing path," Inge said. "A good hitting coach is someone who's going to say, 'This works for you, but it might not work for this guy. And as long as you're confident doing a swing that may not even be right, if you're getting results with that and you feel comfortable with that, if you get the most productivity out of that swing, go with it.' That's him."
Hitting coaches have looked for tendencies for years that way, first with the naked eye and later with video. The program just helps out the process. The sooner a hitter can realize what he's doing wrong, Slaught said, the better chance the hitter has of ending a slump early. Take 30 or 40 at-bats off a slump, he continued, and the difference is pronounced.
"It's kind of fun with big leaguers," Slaught said, "because they make adjustments very fast. But at the Major League level, you're dealing with a lot of muscle memory."
Finding whichever way helps that for each individual player is Slaught's job. When Inge was struggling with a certain pitch during a hitting session in the cage, Slaught brought him over to the computer to watch the swing. But he knows Inge isn't much for a video.
Still, even if Inge won't watch his swing, Slaught will. He'll look for tendencies, then he'll try to explain it.
In some ways, the system bridges that gap, whether it's a difference of terminology or technique.
"'Now I understand.' That's what you get a lot [from players]," Slaught said.
Eventually, Slaught said, he hopes to have this system in place throughout the farm system. Roving instructors can watch footage of hitters wherever, and Slaught can take a look at someone in the Minors that he might have worked with in Spring Training.
At any level, it could be big for the Tigers.
"You get instant feedback from it," Shelton said, "because you can see things sometimes that you can't normally see. I'd never seen that before. It's going to be a good thing to have around."
Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.
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"I don't believe a manager ever won a pennant. Casey Stengel won all those pennants with the Yankees. How many did he win with the Boston Braves and Mets? I've never seen a team win a pennant without players. I think the only thing the manager has to do is keep things within certain boundaries."
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