Clint Hurdle | Wisdom from 45 years of Professional Baseball

Patrick Jones Baseball

Clint Hurdle is a former professional baseball player and manager. He played in the major leagues for 10 seasons and later went on to manage the Colorado Rockies and Pittsburgh Pirates. Hurdle is known for his expertise in Managing and hitting and was been recognized as one of the best-hitting prospects of all time. He has a wealth of experience as a coach and has worked with players like Todd Helton, Larry Walker, Vladimir Guerrero, and Josh Hamilton.

In this episode, he shares his insights and advice for coaches, drawing from his experience as both a hitting coach and a manager. He emphasizes the importance of building relationships with players and earning their trust. Hurdle believes that it's crucial for coaches to understand a player's strengths and help them develop their own unique style of hitting. He also discusses the impact of analytics on the game of baseball and the need for a balance between data-driven insights and the human element of the game.

• Building a strong relationship and earning the trust of players is essential for hitting coaches.

• Coaches should focus on a player's strengths and help them develop their own unique style of hitting.

• The use of analytics in baseball has brought valuable insights, but there is still a need for the human element and the ability to read players' emotions and body language.

• It's important for coaches to understand how each player learns best, whether it's kinetically, visually, through audio, or touch and feel.

• Coaches should prioritize getting players in a position to recognize pitches with a calm body and head, rather than rushing to hit the ball.

• "It starts with building that relationship and earning the trust of the player."

• "I try and help the player identify his strengths and his areas of improvement, but we focus more on strengths."

• "Coaching is about taking the player and getting them from point A to B in a different type of mode of transportation or a different thought that they couldn't do on their own."

Timestamps:

[2:45] Reason why Clint is now active on social media

[16:27] Preparing our future through our past

[23:23] Clint’s advice to grow the game

[28:18] We get more of what we focus on

[43:32] Coaching and trust go side by side

[44:43] Pivotal points of Clint’s coaching journey

[50:14] What’s behind the numbers and expectations

[56:17] Coaching advice as a manager

[1:01:00] Best players Clint has coached

Follow Clint on Twitter: @ClintHurdle13

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