Mariners director of player development Andy McKay talks to reporters during the team’s annual press briefing on Jan. 28 at Safeco Field.

Mariners director of player development Andy McKay talks to reporters during the team’s annual press briefing on Jan. 28 at Safeco Field.

Patterson: M’s new farm director bringing revolutionary approach

As I was sitting in the main interview room at Safeco Field waiting for the Seattle Mariners’ pre-spring training media luncheon to begin, who should walk by but Everett AquaSox general manager Danny Tetzlaff.

After exchanging brief pleasantries Tetzlaff departed, and as he was walking away he said in his southern drawl, “There’s a lot of changes comin’.”

Tetzlaff should know. He’ll be smack in the middle of the most radical of those changes.

For all the offseason turnover in the Mariners’ organization, from the hiring of Jerry Dipoto as general manager to the installation of Scott Servais as manager, perhaps the newcomer who warrants the biggest eyebrow raise is farm director Andy McKay.

McKay is not your traditional farm director. Though McKay has background as a coach, his previous position was as the Colorado Rockies’ peak performance coordinator, or what has since been described as the team’s mental skills coach.

Mental skills coach? Huh?

Get ready, Mariner prospects. You’re about to become the foot soldiers for a player-development revolution.

Dipoto has said repeatedly since being hired by the Mariners he believes unlocking the mind is the next great frontier in baseball. So if Dipoto is Thomas Jefferson, then McKay is his Lewis and Clark, charged with blazing a trail through the minor-league wilderness to the Pacific Ocean of player-development success.

There’s been much curiosity about McKay since the Mariners hired him in October. The pre-spring training media luncheon was the first opportunity for most of the local press to see McKay’s face, hear him speak, and find out first-hand just how radically he intends on changing the way Seattle does things in the minors.

McKay began by mapping out his four cornerstones of player development: character, fundamentals, competitiveness, team concept. Nothing particularly revolutionary there, those are characteristics I suspect every major-league team tries to instill in its minor leaguers.

Where McKay differs in in how he plans on instilling those values.

“We’re trying to take mental skills and not make it a side session, where we go into the classroom and do mental skills,” McKay explained. “There’s time for mental skills in a classroom, but it becomes embedded into everything that you do. You can whittle mental skills down to the basic concept of paying attention, so that when I’m doing a drill my mind is completely consumed with that drill and the rest of the world is gone. You teach it through textbooks, you teach it through classroom settings, but most importantly you teach it by your coaches bringing it to life in everything you do, by constantly reminding those players and bringing their focus to the present moment and what’s happening to them right here and right now. If you can train that way, it should translate into performance.”

McKay went on to detail how his program will be implemented. Every player in Seattle’s minor-league system will have a plan created during spring training containing measurable goals. Each minor-league staff will sit down with one player each day during the season to monitor that player’s progress within his plan. The end goal is to have a system that better helps players reach the majors — and be better ready to make an immediate impact on the field — and that once players reach the majors there’s years worth of mental data that can be used by the major-league staff.

Call it revolutionary. Call it intriguing. Call it crazy. But whatever it is, it’s certainly different.

None will have a better view of the differences in how Seattle’s minor-league system operates this season than those of us in Everett. The AquaSox, Seattle’s affiliate in the short-season Single-A Northwest League, will be on the front line of this revolution.

The Sox will be doing it with a manager, Rob Mummau, who’s spent six years managing in the Mariners’ system, including three in Everett. If there’s anyone who will have perspective on how radical McKay’s methods are — and whether those methods yield results — it’s Mummau. Mummau isn’t the type likely to divulge trade secrets, but oh how much I’d like to pick his brain in September as the season is winding to a close.

Mummau doesn’t arrive in Everett until June. Tetzlaff is here now, and although he hasn’t been made privy to all the changes in store this season, he has had the opportunity to chat with McKay and take a measure of the man.

“When I first met him I thought, ‘This guy is a little quieter, more subdued,’” Tetzlaff said. “But he’s got some good ideas and he’s got a plan. He’s not going to do the old-school baseball development like a lot of people have done. I’ve worked in a lot of different places and they’re definitely thinking outside of the box.

“It’s a little different from what I’ve heard before.”

It’s different from what any of us have heard before.

So the Mariners have decided that unlocking their prospects’ minds is the key to unlocking the doors that have been sealed shut in their minor-league system, preventing any quality players from escaping into the big leagues. Why not? It’s not like anything else the Mariners have tried in recent years has worked.

Visionary or crackpot? I have no idea. But I’m excited we’ll have a front-row seat to find out.

Check out Nick Patterson’s Seattle Sidelines blog at http://www.heraldnet.com/seattlesidelines, and follow him on Twitter at @NickHPatterson.

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