Posted by: Pinetar (james.pohl@kiski.org) on Wed Mar 23 16:25:16 2005

> Hi Tony:
>
> I must concur with you that certain athletes are blessed with more naturally ability than others. Following this logic, some individuals tend to explain all high caliber players by their genetic predisposition. Yet, this categorical structure fails to account for the Bretts, Yastremskis or Otts in the baseball world. Let's analyze each one to get a holistic picture.
>
> In "Born to Hit"--a biography of George Brett--it is brought to the reader's attention that scouts rated Brett negatively in many categories, including hitting. After gaining only eight hits in his first 40 at-bats 1973--a .125 average, he struggled in his second season to maintain a .206 average, until Charley Lau, the Royal's batting instructor at the time, taught him how to evaluate his swing.
> Consequently, Brett finished that season with a .282 season, and hit .300 consistently, peaking at a .390 average in 1980. When his career ended, Brett's .300+ lifetime average allowed him to attain immortality.
>
> Another exception to genetics rule is Carl Yaztremski, who according to "The Short Season," put forth every effort possible to learn and understand the fundamentals of a solid swing. The book notes that he spent countless hours practicing "one-handed flip drills" with Lau advocate Walt Hriniak. I believe that even Durwood Merill, a former American League umpire, commends Yaztremski for working tirelessly to counteract his lack of natural talent. His work also allowed him to be immortalized.
>
> Lastly, Mel Ott used a style allowing him to amass 511 home runs lifetime, despite his small stature. More precisely, Ott used Power Field Orientation (see BHL's Mar. 2004 "Power Field Orientation" posts for a precise definition on this philosophy) to take advantage of the short right field fence in the Polo Grounds. Ott's reason for doing so, in my opinion, was to hit to the shortest part of the field where the ball can be hit with the most authority, and have the best chance of carrying over the fence, even if the ball is struck improperly. In other words, Ott used tactics to overcome his size deficit, and become a Hall of Famer.
>
> Seen in this light, one is not necessarily "doomed" just because one does not possess genetic advantages. For sure, Brett, Yaztremski, and Ott had very few. On the other hand, instead of complaining about what they "lacked," this respective trio used perseverence, hard work, and strategy to stealth their way into the Hall of Fame. The way I see it, if these individuals can accomplish what they did, the is certainly hope for other players lacking genetic traits to rise to greatness.
>
> Just My Sentiments,
> BHL

BHL,
If your point was that hard work and a desire to improve will go a long way toward compensating for a young players lack of talent, I would agree with you whole-heartedly. Over the years, I have seen many young ballplayers out-perform their more talented teammates and advance to higher levels of success solely because they were determined to do so.
That said, however, I think that you could probably have found better examples of those that overcame their lack of a “genetic predisposition” for success in baseball than the three you chose for your “holistic” analysis; i.e. George Brett, Carl Yastrezmski, and Mel Ott. On the contrary, I believe them to be extremely gifted athletes.
Although you state that “scouts rated Brett negatively in many categories, including hitting”, these same scouts must have found enough positives to enable him to be drafted in the second round as an 18-year old.
And the perceived negatives of his game did not keep him from being selected to all-star teams in each of his first three years in organized baseball, nor did they keep him from being called up to the major-league club as a 20-year old. The fact that he failed to impress as a hitter at first is not at all unusual. A pretty fair athlete by the name of Mays went hitless in his 25 times at bat in the majors and was hitting only .235 or so in his second year before being drafted into the army.
As for Carl Yastrezmski, there is no doubt that he, like Brett, worked extremely hard to improve his game. However, to say that he achieved his success despite a “lack of natural talent” does not seem to reflect the reality of his situation. In deed, he seemed to have been gifted enough as a youngster to have been a 3-sport star in high school, setting an individual conference scoring record in basketball, and compiling a career batting average of over .500 in baseball. His “lack of natural talent” did not keep him from getting a baseball/basketball scholarship to Notre Dame where, after a year, according to one biography “his seemingly limitless potential” led him to sign a major-league contract with the Red Sox. He led the league in hitting with a .377 average his first year in organized baseball and barely missed winning the batting title at the Triple-A level during his second year. Hardly the feats of someone suffering from genetic deficiencies. As for Walt Hriniak’s contributions to his success, Hriniak didn’t become the Red Sox hitting coach until 1977, some 16 years after Yastrezmski became a major leaguer and after he had won a triple crown and three batting titles and after having led the league in slugging percentage three times and on-base percentage five times.
As far as Mel Ott is concerned, undoubtedly his ability to take advantage of the short right-field fence in Yankee Stadium had a lot to do with his 511 home runs; however, I doubt that it had much to do with the .304 batting average he was able to compile over the course of his 21-year major league career. And I wonder how many players “lacking in natural talent” have earned the appellation “Boy Wonder” and were called up to the major leagues and achieved success at the age of seventeen.