Kevin Cash is in the final week of his first season as a big league manager. He’s had quite the learning experience. Working closely with one of baseball’s most progressive front offices, the 37-year-old former catcher has helped keep the Tampa Bay Rays competitive, despite several key injuries and one of the lowest payrolls in the game.

Currently the youngest manager in MLB, Cash was hired to replace Joe Maddon last December. Prior to coming to Tampa, he spent two years as the bullpen coach for the Cleveland Indians, where he worked under Terry Francona.

Cash touched on his first season at the helm – including the importance of communication and collaboration – last week at Fenway Park.

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Cash on what he’s learned: “I’ve learned that it’s a challenging task to stay on top of everything. The communication is a constant that never goes away – communication with the front office, communication with the players. That was a big goal coming in, for all of us – for the entire staff – and we’ve continued to evolve as the season has gone on. It takes time to build relationships. I think we all feel confident that we’re heading in the right direction in that regard.”

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Paul Janish is your classic good-glove, no-hit infielder. In parts of seven seasons with the Reds, Braves, and currently the Baltimore Orioles, the 32-year-old defensive whiz has slashed .215/.282/.289. Outside of 2010, when he had a .723 OPS and hit five of his seven career home runs, in 200 at bats, Janish has been a non-entity at the dish.

Like most glove-men of his ilk, Janish hit well enough in the minors to reach the big leagues. His bat hasn’t translated to the highest level, but success is often a byproduct of extended opportunities, of which he’s received a paucity. It’s a chicken-and-egg dynamic: you need to hit to stay in the lineup, but you need to stay in the lineup to hit.

That isn’t to say Janish would be a productive hitter if given a chance to play every day. He might not even be a league-average hitter. Janish realizes that. Even so, he can’t help but wonder if he maybe could have been more than he is: a vacuum cleaner bouncing between Triple-A and a big-league bench, essentially because he’s failed to flourish in 1.234 sporatic MLB plate appearances.

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Janish on getting labeled: “It’s been tough for me. From an early stage in my career, I was labeled as somebody who could play very well defensively, and if I could do X amount offensively, I could play in the big leagues. I kind of took that mindset, and it probably hurt me. I was a victim of circumstances in that respect. Read the rest of this entry »

Logan Forsythe isn’t sure he can explain his breakout. At least not definitively. The Tampa Bay infielder points to consistency, but that’s more byproduct than causation. He indirectly cites BABiP – “I’ve had some balls fall this year” – but it’s not as though his .323 mark is outlandish.

Opportunity might be a bigger factor. His high-water mark for seasonal plate appearances had been 350 – with the Padres in 2012 – and he’s already come to the dish 606 times. He’s taking advantage of the increased playing time. A .235/.343/.303 hitter coming into the campaign, Forsythe is slashing .282/.359/.446, and his 17 home runs are nearly double his career total. He’s been worth 4.1 WAR.

The 28-year-old second baseman was fielding a familiar question when I inquired as to why he’s having a good year. He’s been asked that a lot – not a bad problem to have – and his response suggests it’s largely the regular reps.

“The biggest thing is being consistent,” Forsythe told me. “That’s the recurring word I keep using. I expected to be that super-utility type again, but we had a few guys go down with injuries. That sucked, but it did give me an opportunity. I’ve had stints in my career where I’ve taken a simpler approach – I’ve just stayed in a routine – and the consistency of my play took over. This year reminds me of when I was playing every day in the minor leagues.”

It’s hard to say whether the Rays expected this type of production when they acquired Forsythe from San Diego in a seven-player deal prior to last season. His versatility was his calling card, but he possessed other qualities as well. Read the rest of this entry »

Chris Young, of the Kansas City Royals, is known for both his Princeton pedigree and his height. The 6-foot-10 right-hander is also known for getting outs up in the zone, with a slow fastball. Young’s four-seamer averages 86.4 mph, and he has the highest FB% (58.2) and the lowest BABiP (.217) among pitchers who have thrown at least 100 innings. The velocity and fly balls are in line with his career norms; his probability defying BABiP is even more striking than the .248 he’s registered during parts of 11 seasons.

Thanks in large part to his frame, Young has a deceptive delivery. He also has a high spin rate on his lukewarm heater. It’s not elite, but it ranks among the top 20% of hurlers and contributes to his above-the-belt success. The 35-year-old has appeared in 32 games this year — half of them starts — and has a 10-6 record to go with a 3.29 ERA and a 4.71 FIP. Read the rest of this entry »

Pete Mackanin had the “interim” tag removed yesterday from his job title. The rebuilding Phillies extended the 64-year-old skipper’s contract through next season, with a club option for 2017. Mackanin has been at the helm since Ryne Sandberg unexpectedly stepped down in late June. The team has gone 30-46 under his leadership.

This is Mackanin’s first full-time managerial job at the big-league level. Prior to Philadelphia, he served in an interim capacity in Pittsburgh (2005) and Cincinnati (2007). He previously interviewed for openings in Houston, Boston and Chicago (Cubs), only to be bypassed.

Earlier this month, Mackanin sat down to share some of his thoughts on running a ball club. Our conversation was by no means comprehensive – we only touched on a few of his philosophies – but it does offer a snapshot of Mackanin’s mindset.

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Mackanin on playing the kids: “When I make out a lineup here, I don’t necessarily make out a lineup that I feel gives us the best chance to win. I have to play players we want to get a look at. It’s part of the job right now. With the team we have, we need to find out about players – we have to see what some of these guys are capable of. For instance, Darnell Sweeney joined us recently and I knew nothing about him. If I’m playing for a division title, I probably wouldn’t have put him in the lineup, but under these circumstances, he’s playing. And he’s made a good impression.”

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The Milwaukee Brewers have reportedly hired David Stearns to be their new general manager. What that means for Craig Counsell is yet to be determined. The 45-year-old Counsell has been the club’s manager since May, and his contract extends through the 2017 season.

On the surface, Counsell and the Harvard-educated Stearns look to be a good fit. Counsell was an accounting major at Notre Dame prior to playing 15 big league seasons, and he spent three years as a special assistant to former GM Doug Melvin before moving into his current position.

Counsell talked about his decision-making process, and the collaborative relationship between a manager and the front office, when the Brewers visited Wrigley Field last month. Read the rest of this entry »

Mark Melancon has 47 saves this season – a franchise record – and 96 since coming to Pittsburgh three years ago. In 214 games with the Pirates, he has a 1.75 ERA and a 0.93 WHIP.

Those numbers must seem unfathomable to Red Sox fans. In 2012, Melancon came out of the Boston bullpen 41 times and put up an ugly 6.20 ERA. Torched in high-leverage situations early on, he subsequently took up residence in then-manager Bobby Valentine’s doghouse. He rarely pitched with a lead and logged just one save.

That winter, Melancon was sent to Pittsburgh in the six-player deal that brought Brock Holt to Boston.

Earlier this week, I asked the 30-year-old right-hander what has changed since his disastrous stint in Beantown. Read the rest of this entry »

To say Edgar Martinez knows hitting would be to state the obvious. The Seattle Mariners legend slashed .312/.418/.515 between 1987 and 2004, and he won a pair of batting titles along the way. He ranks 21st all-time in OBP and is 44th all-time in adjusted OPS.

Martinez is now entrusted with getting the most out of Mariners hitters. The should-be Hall-of-Famer took over as the team’s hitting coach in late June after beginning the season as a roving instructor. It’s a challenging job. Seattle ranks 11th in the American League in runs scored, and several players are falling short of expectations.

Martinez talked about the art of hitting — and how he evolved during his career — earlier this summer. Read the rest of this entry »

Ben Revere puts the bat on the baseball. His 4.0 swinging-strike% is fourth lowest among qualified hitters, with only Michael Brantley, Daniel Murphy and Ben Zobrist whiffing less often. His 97.2 Z-Contact% is topped only by Murphy’s 97.7.

Putting balls in play is working out well for the left-handed-hitting former Phillie. Revere is hitting .342/.390/390 since joining the Blue Jays at the trade deadline, and last year he led the National League with 184 hits.

Revere has a low walk rate – 5.5% – but not because he lacks discipline. His Z-Swing% is 58.4, which is 12th lowest among qualified hitters. Speedy and lacking power, he isn’t a hitter you want to issue free passes to.

“I’m not going to get pitched around,” Revere told me last weekend. “Pitchers are like, ‘Don’t let this guy get on with an easy ticket, ’cause he ain’t gonna beat you with the long ball.’ Whether it’s off-speed or fastballs, they’re going to go straight at me.”

Revere went deep yesterday for just the fourth time in over 2,500 big league plate appearances. He was told to hit the ball the other way coming up through the Twins system, and his approach has essentially stayed the same. Read the rest of this entry »

Cody Allen has had, in his own words, “kind of a weird year.” The Cleveland Indians closer has 30 saves and has given up just a pair of home runs in 59 innings. Meanwhile, his ERA (3.51) is nearly a run and a half higher than it was a year ago (2.07) while his FIP (1.96) is more than a full run lower (2.99). His .366 BABIP is exactly .100 points higher than it was in 2014.

Allen is aggressive. His fastball, which he throws 62.4% of the time, is averaging 95 mph. His spiked curveball, which he throws 36.7% of the time, is averaging 85.9 mph. The 26-year-old right-hander – now in his fourth season – has come out of the Cleveland bullpen 60 times in the current campaign.

Allen talked about his statistical season, and his two-pitch power mix, when the Indians visited Boston in August. Read the rest of this entry »