Pirates Minor League Hitting Coach Jon Nunnally Talks Coaching Philosophy (+)
ALTOONA- Over the course of my trip to see the Altoona Curve play their home opener April 6-7, I was biding my time to get the opportunity to talk with Altoona’s hitting coach, Jon Nunnally.
Throughout my time talking with Pittsburgh Pirates‘ prospects, the one name that kept coming up was Nunnally’s. The players seem to have taken a liking to him and love the amount of detail he provides in his teachings.
Nunnally was brought into the Pirates’ organization in 2019 when he was brought on as Altoona’s hitting coach. Previously he served in similar roles in the Los Angeles Angles’ system, as well as the Boston Red Sox.
What initially sparked my interest in talking with Nunnally was my observation during a round of batting practice when I noticed Pirates prospect, Mason Martin, and Nunnally having an in-depth conversation about first movement when the pitch is thrown.
For several minutes, Nunnally was animated, engaged, and encouraging Martin throughout the teaching moment, and sure enough, Martin put forth an excellent batting session thanks to the first movement lesson Nunnally presented to him.
About an hour later, I was able to pull Nunnally aside and discuss the conversation he had with Martin.
“We we’re talking about preparation and the preparation you need to have during batting practice, and don’t overthink about situations and stuff like that. When you do that, you start to tax your brain and tax your body, and you got teammates that have to go up and hit too. You can’t take five minutes of batting practice when you have an allotted 15 minutes or something like that.”
Nunnally definitely cares about the physical part of the game and how you perform in that manner, but he seems to really take special care and attention to the mental side of the game and make sure his players aren’t overthinking the situations and trust in their abilities to get them where they want to go.
When the minor league rosters dropped for the Pirates, and we all took a look at the names, it seemed like Altoona had a few repeat guys on the roster.
Now there can be times as a player when you face those frustrations. How does a coach like Nunnally handle those situations and get the players to trust the process?
“Those things end up taking care of themselves over time,” said Nunnally. “When those things happen to them, some guys just fall in line. They might be upset for a day, two days, maybe even a week? Probably so, but once things get going, they are ready to go, and they lock in.
“Sometimes you just got to give them their space and let them feel it out, and then go from there. You need to give them that time to do what they need to do and get their mind right. Once they get their mind right, we can have that conversation and get things going.”
One of the final topics we discussed was the former first overall pick, Henry Davis, and what Nunnally has seen from him in the off-season leading up to the 2023 season.
“It’s been amazing. Everything he hit, he hit hard, laying off of pitches and taking his walks. This guy works so hard, and he challenges himself every single day. Taking those challenges to his everyday work, makes things look a lot easier on the field. It’s great to see, and I love having him and a bunch of guys like that. It’s nice having to pull guys back instead of having to push them. Henry is one guy that you never have to push.”
Nunnally seems to have the pulse of the situation at hand, and he seems to know how to reach these guys on a personal level to get them going.
When I return to Altoona in late May, I will be looking forward to seeing the fruits of his labor and getting to catch up again.