Kevin Burkhardt on Chip Hale’s preparation
Despite the unfortunate outcome of Friday’s rubber game against the Marlins, I loved hearing Kevin Burkhardt’s insight about what goes into Mets third base coach Chip Hale’s preparation for both team defense and base running.
At the top of the broadcast, KB ran a clip showing how Hale uses the computer to evaluate both the Mets and the opposing team. Watching how he can pull up individual plays with a click of the mouse was fascinating, and Kevin later explained how these plays are connected to lists. But let’s let him explain it, with this transcript from the bottom of the 5th:
“Chip Hale gets here at 1 oclock in the afternoon, and really one of the first things he does is go to the computer. He figures out how how this team is going to play defensively for the night. And how he does that, in this computer he can put in any split you can possibly imagine: left, right, how they’ve done the last month, anything you can imagine he puts it in. And not only that, they can pull up hit charts, and off those hit charts he can pull up highlights to see just about anything he wants to see to determine how he’s going to put together the defense.
When he does that he then puts together a sheet that each player gets on their bench when they come in for the day, and on that sheet it tells the players where they’re going to play against each batter. It’ll also have little nuggets about, ‘this batter likes to bunt on one strike,’ ‘this batter likes to steal 3rd,’ little tidbits of information that are helpful to the fielder. And then what Chip will do next, he’ll stay on that computer, and he’ll look at the outfield arms of the other team. Of course as a 3rd base coach, you want to know who’s doing what…He looks at what they’ve done lately. He basically will pull up the last month on video, and he can see any throw that these guys have made. So he’ll pull one up and watch where the opposing team’s runner is as a guy is getting the ball. So let’s say Raul Ibanez is making a throw home to get somebody out. He’ll watch where the runner is on the base pass when Ibanez gets the ball. So if it was a good throw home and the guy’s out, Chip has an idea, kind of comparing speeds, ‘alright I have an idea if my runner is here, I may not send him the way Ibanez is throwing lately.’ That all goes into this.”
Very cool stuff, KB. As always, the SNY broadcast offers great viewing even if the outcome of the game is…let’s use the word frustrating.
But last night was an impressive Pelfrey-led win, and who knows what tonight will bring? Let’s Go Mets!
Pick Me Up Some Mets! 
This is a really interesting article. Thanks for the insight on the behind-the-scenes stuff. Very cool!