[610 Sports] Astros pitching coach Jim Hickey FIRED

I thought the fact that basically ALL of the young pitchers had difficulty adjusting to the big leagues was a big factor in this...

Buchholz, Nieve, Hirsh, Albers... they all hit some rough spots. Combine that with Wandy and Astacio failing to make any sort of impact last year... and it may have been Hickey's inexperience at grooming young pitchers that eventually led to his downfall.

I don't see what the big deal is... Oswalt was great before and after Hickey, Clemens/Pettite benefitted more from Ausmus than anybody else (and they both said as much).

 

Good they should have fired early in the season instead of the hitting coach Gary G.

Bring back Burt Hooten.

 

I like Jim Hicky. I think Jim Hicky was a good pitcher coach. Brad Lidge should be FIRED! HE is the worst pitcher ever! I am still tired of Albert Puhols hits homeruns EVERYDAY off Brad Lidge! MAybe Brad Lidge can be fired and we can promote HOward Spence. Howard Spence is one of the top prospecs. Not many fans know who Howard Spence is.

 

I htink Nick hit it on the head.....our young guys have had some difficulty adjusting. Fact is, there's nothing Hickey is going to tell Clemens or Pettitte that they dont already know....and Roy O is arguable the best pitcher in the majors with or without him. I dont think that Lidge's inability to turn around has anything to do with Hickey..i think it has more to do with Lidge himself....nothing Hickey could have done different would have made a difference.

Interesting though indeed that Garner gets no blame at all for the season...and in fact gets praise by being extended.

 

The crux of our effective pitching staff were the sure things down the stretch: Oswalt, Clemens, Pettitte. I would expect those three to more or less operate outside the realm of the pitching coach. (I'm not saying Hickey doesn't observe and see things to help them out, just that they operate on a different level.)

Trever Miller is also a veteran with a track record, and Wheeler has been really good before. All of our other guys with potential really faltered coming into the league - Hirsch, Buchholz, Albers, Astacio, Wandy, etc. The only guy who came up and met (and imo, exceeded) expectations out of the shoot was Sampson. Nieve straightened himself out once he got in the pen, which is probably the biggest positive out of our pitching coach. I would also give him some credit for helping straighten out Qualls to some extent, but Qualls is also a proven performer.

I'm not saying the rookies are supposed to come out and perform like they did in the minors, and maybe guys like Astacio and Wandy don't really have the MLB makeup, Albers was called up too early, and that's not Hickey's fault. But I would put the MLB progress of guys like Hirsch and Buchholz on Hickey, and I don't think anyone knows what to expect from them because there was no discernable growth pattern.

Hitting may be a different story because we flat out don't have many guys expected to get better there; the Luke Scott explosion and the progress shown by Wily T may have even bought Sean Berry additional time.

EDIT: Nick was apparently on the same wavelength.

 

I think Hickey has a good future in the broadcasting business.

But I'm not sure why he gets so much love on this board. Over the last two years, Hirsh, Astacio, Buchholz, Nieve are all talented young pitchers who haven't come close to some of the expectations fans had for them. I'm not blaming Hickey for this - perhaps they all coincidentally were either overrated or need more time - but there's no doubt this organization's young pitching has underachieved relative to expectations and it's possible this could be a reason.

 

That sucks. I'm a fan of Hickey. I think he's a very handsome man, and I was impressed by his commuincation ability on camera. He's very well spoken, unlike Garner.

Oh well.

We need a new manager, I hate Garner.

 

Many managers will get extended prior to their last season (or gotten rid of). You don't want a manager having a lame-duck season where they are distracted by contract issues. When they do face that situation, generally bad things happen to the team.

 

Those bashing Garner and calling for him to be fired are idiots, pure and simple.

 

The rest of the staff will return.

 

This is slightly off topic, but I would love for someone with actual knowledge on the subject to write an article on why Brad Ausmus is such a joy to work with for both young pitchers and veterans alike. This is something that has always fascinated me about Brad and the so-called 'intangibles' he brings to the game. Anyone care to drop some knowledge on this topic? Thanks.

 

i can't tell if this is a joke.

i think the lack of any real progress with the youngsters is right on. even backe has been wildly inconsistent.

hickey came with garner, right? mid-2004? from RR? i can't think of one pitcher beyond clemens/pettitte/oswalt that's been consistently decent in that time that wasn't already established. maybe wheeler?

 

Just like many here are blaming Pupurra for riding Hunsicker's coat-tails... in many respects, Hickey/Garner are simply riding the foundation that was instilled by Hooten/Jimy Williams.

Say what you want about Jimy's in-game strategy... but the guy was a phenominal instructor/teacher, and played a big role in the development of Everett, Ensberg, Lidge, and Qualls... and he got the most out of guys like Wade Miller, Tim Redding, Ron Villone, Ricky Stone.

 

Of all the criticisms you could make about a manager/coach/instructor, this is the absolute dumbest.

 

you can add in marginal young pitchers as well.

hirsh was the only guy that was a big prospect and he did not look comfortable at all. a coach can only do so much. hirsh needs more time at the major league level, but he does look like he thinks too much on the mound.

i think moving nieve to the pen was great because he looks like he has the potential to be another lights out middle relief (hopefully closer) guy.

wandy is like trying to turn chicken sh.t into chicken salad. wandy is a marginal major league pitcher.

albers threw a grand total of 15 innings and he did not look like a big time pitcher either.

and tay-tay hasn't exactly been tearing it up in the minors either. from a few weeks ago... "I thought I'd figured some of this stuff out down in Triple-A and I just went back to doing the same old thing I was doing in the past," Buchholz said.
(Updated 09/12/2006).

so we have nieve (solid middle relief), hirsh (potential 2/3 guy), and sampson(4/5/spot starter/long relief) out of that group. i would consider that a pretty high success rate, if hirsh makes it, with how badly pitchers flame out. further with sampson let's take a quick look at his minor league numbers and ONE thing jumps out very quickly. CONTROL! he has like 59 walks in the past 425+ IP in the minors.


i dunno...this firing seems pretty nonsensical (that is a word, right?) to me.

 

Garner is on 610 right now. When asked point blank, he said there is no real reason, it was just a gut feeling they went with.

Brilliant!!!!

 

If there were a substantial issue, would you expect Garner to run him down in public?

And "new approach, fresh ideas" kinds of personnel change happen all the time, in baseball and in just about every other walk of life.

 

Sounds to me like the decision was about something other than baseball. Let the theories fly! (Either that, or there is a pitching coach that they always wanted who just showed up and asked for a job.)

 

it could have been to appease roger and andy; they may have had a problem with him and told management, step one to greasing their probability of returning: get their guy in there. wouldn't shock me if his replacement has clemens/pettitte ties.