ANAHEIM — When the Angels fired pitching coach Mike Maddux and his staff on Tuesday, interim general manager John Mozeliak said they weren’t using all the technology at their disposal.
So the first question for interim pitching coach Tim Leveque on Wednesday was obviously about his ideas when it comes to using tech.
“My philosophy’s been to just try to use as much information as I can, because ultimately at the end of the day, it’s about making the right decision, right?” Leveque said. “What my instinct tells me, what information the organization has, how I know the guys, and just trying to use everything that we have to try make the best decisions possible.”
One of the issues was that the Angels weren’t always using the Trackman system during regular-season bullpen sessions, so that’s likely to change under the new regime.
Leveque was a natural choice because he had worked under Mozeliak for 20 years with the St. Louis Cardinals. He had been a minor league pitching coach, a senior minor league pitching coordinator and a pitching analyst.
The Angels hired Leveque as their Double-A pitching coach in December.
This year at Rocket City he worked with current Angels pitchers Luke Murphy, Ryan Johnson and Blake Weiman.
There are plenty of areas the Angels need to improve over the rest of the season. Notably, they have issued the most walks in the majors.
“I think with walks and throwing strikes, it’s just a general philosophy to control the count as much as possible, be aggressive in the zone,” Leveque said. “It doesn’t happen overnight. There’s a lot of reasons why walk rates can be what they are. But it’s my job to try unlock whatever I can with individual guys to try get them, to attack the zone a little bit more.”
PLAN FOR KIKUCHI
Left-hander Yusei Kikuchi will make a fourth minor league start, on Saturday at Class-A Rancho Cucamonga, as he works his way back from shoulder inflammation that has taken him out of the rotation since late April.
Kikuchi said his goals are to get into the fifth inning and get his velocity up to 97 mph. He’d also like to get some better results.
Kikuchi has a 15.75 ERA in three minor league games. When he pitched last month at Rancho Cucamonga, he couldn’t use a PitchCom, because it’s not allowed at that level. Instead, he came up with some simple signs to let the catcher know what was coming, and the hitters figured it out.
He said he asked about using PitchCom this time and was told it’s not allowed. So he’s going to try to come up with better signs this time.
NOTES
Shortstop Zach Neto got his first career start at DH on Wednesday. “With Neto playing pretty much every inning of every game, it’s nice to give him a day just to take a mental break, from the field, but still have his bat in the lineup,” Manager Kurt Suzuki said. …
Catcher Sebastian Rivero, who was returned from his rehab assignment because of continued discomfort in his left hand, said it hurts when he’s hitting if he misses the barrel. He said catching was no problem, not even when catching 100 mph pitches from Trey Gregory-Alford. Rivero said he’s planning to try to swing again this weekend. …
Suzuki confirmed that the Angels’ plan is to have Neto hit leadoff against left-handed pitchers and Wade Meckler hit leadoff against righties. He mentioned Nolan Schanuel when asked who else could lead off against righties.
UP NEXT
Rangers (RHP Jacob deGrom, 8-7, 3.87 ERA) at Angels (RHP Walbert Ureña, 7-8, 2.83 ERA), Thursday, 7:07 p.m., ABTV, 830 AM