Catching Up With Coach Schlossnagle
9/6/2011 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
Sept. 6, 2011
FORT WORTH, TEXAS - Gofrogs.com recently caught up with TCU baseball head coach Jim Schlossnagle to get his thoughts on the past summer and the upcoming fall semester.
Q: This past summer saw a lot of players have solid seasons for their summer league teams. How do summer leagues help the players with their development?
JS: Summer baseball is vital to the development of your program, especially for position players and for any player that didn't get significant playing time during the college season. It really helps a player's confidence if he goes off in a quality summer league and has success.
For example, Josh Elander was the starting catcher for the USA National Team, was one of their leading hitters and was lauded by the coaching staff for his leadership skills. For Josh, that is huge, as we need him to be that kind of player and leader for us and for him to do that on an international stage against the best the world has to offer really raises his confidence level. The same goes for Andrew Mitchell with Team USA and for guys like Brett Johnson (NECBL) and Stefan Crichton (Alaska).
In addition, for a pitcher like Trey Teakell, who we believe has the chance to be a very good college pitcher, to be win the best pitcher award of his summer league and get a lot of quality innings is only going to make him better for TCU this year.
Q: There are some vacant spots on the field with the departure of players in the draft and graduation. How do you and your staff go about filling those holes?
JS: First, you get out and hustle on the recruiting circuit, sign good players and find a way to hold them in the draft. Much easier said than done. There are certainly players within the program as well that will be presented with opportunities to compete for starting spots as well.
The focus of our fall is going to be on the fact that we want every player to compete in every possible phase of the program... academically, socially, strength and conditioning and on the baseball field. Our saying is, "Everything Counts," so every player will be evaluated every day on how they take care of their business. By the end of the fall, we will have a good idea of who the good players are, who the good people are and who we can count on. Anyone that doesn't fall into all three of those three categories won't be around here in the spring.
Speaking of the draft, Baseball America deemed the Horned Frogs as "winners". Talk about the highs and lows of signing day and the boost you got with the return of Jason Coats and Kaleb Merck as well as the five newcomers that were drafted and decided to come to school.
JS: That's nice of Baseball America to write that, but that can only be evaluated over time. If the guys we held in the draft turn into good players in our program and they help us get back to Omaha and win, then we were winners. If they don't, then it's just words on a piece of paper.
I am excited about the guys who decided to return, especially Jason Coats and Kaleb Merck, two guys that could have begun their pro career. In addition, the fact that Kevin Cron, Jerrick Suiter, Derek Odell, Kevin Cornelius and Brandon Finnegan are at TCU now is a great testament to our program and our university.
The draft is so hard to predict these days and it's only going to get worse in my opinion. MLB teams clearly see the value in investing in the draft and that cost is relative to the huge cost of signing free agents at the major league level. Therefore, it's hard for a college program to compete when the MLB has all of the money and none of the rules. College baseball has all of the rules and none of the money. That's a hard game to win.
I was very disappointed that we didn't keep Tyler Collins and Cody Anderson. Those are two junior college players who would have been big contributors here and, in my opinion, they signed for significantly less than their current value and much, much less than what their value would have been had they put up good numbers for TCU this year. For example, in just nine months, Andrew Cashner was able to sign for over five times as much as he was offered prior to coming to TCU, after having a great season for us in 2008.
Q: This fall will bring a new experience to the team when you take a trip to the Dominican Republic. Tell us how this opportunity came up and how that experience will help the team in the spring.
JS: I have always wanted to take a team on a trip internationally. With this particular team, since we have so many new players, I thought it was a good time for us to go down to the Dominican and spend some quality time together.
The baseball portion of the trip will be a lot of fun but it certainly is not the reason we are going. We are looking forward to the time together as a team and some great community service work with an organization we dearly love, Esperanza.
We are hoping that the trip brings us closer together as a team and, from a baseball standpoint, prepares, especially our young players, for the season. Anytime you can play against someone other than yourself, you certainly learn more about your team.
Q: With full team practices not starting until October, what kinds of things do you do in the fall to keep the athletes sharp and in shape?
JS: Because of our trip to the Dominican Republic, we are starting fall practice later than ever on October 11. Between now and then, we will really spend a lot of time in the weight room getting faster and stronger.
On the field, we will take advantage of the NCAA rules that allow us small group and individual time with the players. We'll spend a lot of time on the fundamentals of each position as well as their hitting to get them ready for fall practice. There is no doubt that this fall will be key to our success. We have 17 or 18 new players and return only five pitchers that have pitched in a Division I game so there is much work to be done. It's a very different situation than the last three or four years, when we've always had a veteran team. This is the largest amount of new players we have ever had and that is very exciting for our staff to get to work with.
