What’s it like being the new Cubs pitching coach as staff struggles?

4:03 am | April 10, 2019 | Go to Source | Author:

7:00 AM ET

CHICAGO — He got his dream job at 37 years old: Chicago Cubs pitching coach. Then the season started, and Tommy Hottovy (Hot-ah-vee) must have thought he was part of a recurring nightmare. The Cubs bullpen blew three leads in the team’s first five games, and the staff ERA was closer to 10.00 than 3.00.

Last year, Hottovy was a little known “run-prevention coordinator” for the Cubs, hunched over a computer most of his day. Now he’s squarely in the spotlight, leading a veteran group with playoff aspirations — and trying to recover from a rough start and build off the momentum of a shutout in the home opener.

Have you had some sleepless nights?

Hottovy: “I didn’t sleep a lot in the old job anyway. We want to be better. We all hold ourselves accountable, so yeah, it’s sleepless nights. It’s rethinking how we’ve pitched guys. It’s rethinking mechanics and digging into guys. We know if we keep doing things the way we should be doing them, we’ll be OK.”

Over the weekend, Theo Epstein said, “Don’t blame the pitching coach.” Did you appreciate your boss saying that so early in the season?

Hottovy: “We all feel accountable. We all want to shoulder some of the blame. No one is solely responsible when things are bad. And it’s not one person when things are good. It’s a group effort. We’re going to keep grinding. But sure, it was nice.”

They say things are contagious in baseball. Why would a whole staff come out of spring training walking guys as much as the Cubs have?

Hottovy: “I think we put pressure on ourselves to come out and have a good start. It’s human nature for guys to want to do more than they need to. We’ve had multiple guys act like they have to be the guy, the stopper, the guy to turn things around. But if that’s your thought process, instead of executing pitches and getting into the flow of the game and trusting the catcher and getting into attack mode, then that’s not good. We’re trying to get guys refocused on things we can control. Getting back to that attack mode.”

You were up 14-5 the other day, and the cameras caught Joe Maddon upset when reliever Randy Rosario walked the first two batters of the inning. Is that a different category because there is no hero to be in a blowout like that?

Hottovy: “That was just a focus issue with him. He had been so good coming into the game in a big spot, then he comes in where it was just ‘get an inning,’ and sometimes you lose that focus. No matter the score, you have to come in and attack. It’s a learning experience for a 24-year-old kid.”

At the beginning of spring training, reliever Carl Edwards Jr. was mimicking Dodgers closer Kenley Jansen’s delivery, with a pause before throwing the ball. By the time the season started, the hesitation move was deemed illegal by umpires. Edwards had an awful start to the year, getting sent down before the Cubs played a home game. Confusion ensued as to why he had attempted an illegal delivery.

What was the deal with Edwards? The move didn’t look illegal at the beginning of the spring, then all of a sudden it was.

Hottovy: “Here is the evolution of that. Back in spring training, that move was built in as a drill, something for him to use to stay over the rubber and drive toward the plate. As he was doing it, it was just a ‘tap and go,’ and as he took it into games, we asked multiple people, multiple umpires about it, and it was fine. What he was doing at the time was fine. As spring training went, we heard nothing. We asked, we checked on the rules — nothing.

“But that first hitter in Texas, the first leg lift, and he held it, and they deemed that illegal. He changed the move. It was a lot for him to think about. So we’ve tried to simplify things for him.”

Joe Maddon said umpire Bill Miller did come to you guys at the end of spring.

Hottovy: “It was the last game in spring, and he had thrown the whole time without being illegal. Then the first game, it was really dramatic.”

I have to ask if you think that was a wasted six weeks for Edwards?

Hottovy: “No, not at all, because the point of that drill was to get him to a position to be quicker with runners on base. To be a 1.1 to the plate with runners on. That’s a huge part of his development.”

Back to you. Have you heard from people in the early going here wondering what’s going on?

Hottovy: “Look, this job, this role should have criticism, should have people looking at what you are doing. But the only people’s opinion I can listen to are the players, the coaches, the manager and the front office. We know what we have to do to be successful. Everything else is noise.”