Lilliquist ready to lead top-flight pitching staff to new heights

Fired by the Cardinals at the end of the regular season, Derek Lilliquist had to wonder if it would take a while to find another pitching coach job as good as the one he held the previous six seasons. That kind of job opening, for a perennial postseason contender, doesn't come around all that often.

And then one did.

When the Nationals came calling last month, needing a new pitching coach after Dusty Baker's departure led to Mike Maddux leaving (for St. Louis, of all places), Lilliquist suddenly found himself in arguably an even better situation than he was in before.

"As a pitching guy, this is probably the best spot to be, considering the starters we have and the bullpen we have in place already," he said. "It's a team built to win."

The Nationals wanted to retain Maddux, who in his two seasons on the staff had a profound impact on several pitchers, from Max Scherzer winning two Cy Young Awards to Stephen Strasburg becoming a finalist for the award for the first time to Gio Gonzalez's bounceback to the emergence of several young arms.

But until they had a manager of their own, the Nats couldn't prevent Maddux from signing elsewhere. So when he left for the Cardinals to replace Lilliquist, they needed to look in a new direction. That direction, as it turned out, was to hire the suddenly available guy with six years' experience that included a World Series title and a strong track record of pitching success.

"He comes with a good reputation, and he comes from obviously the Cardinals, who have been very good and had very good pitching staffs over the years there," Strasburg said. "So I'm excited to just work with him and pick his brain and try to improve myself."

Lilliquist boils down his philosophy on pitching to one simple thought: Try to get guys to hit the ball on the ground, not in the air.

"It's controlling the count, staying in positive pitching counts, trying to keep the ball on the ground as much as possible," he said. "As you know, home runs are way up, and there's no homers on the ground."

That's almost in direct contrast with the approach new hitting coach Kevin Long will be espousing to the Nationals' position players. Long is one of the leading proponents of the "launch angle" revolution, which he perfected during his time coaching the Mets, helping turn Daniel Murphy into one of the league's best sluggers.

As that approach begins to overtake the entire spots, Lilliquist believes pitchers have to rethink the way they go after hitters.

"I feel like the swing path right now is, like, mid-thigh," he said. "There's room from the bottom to under, down under 17 inches underneath the plate, or above the strike zone. Used to be guys were better hitters up in the strike zone, (so) we wanted to stay in the bottom of the zone. Now the trend is going more mid-thigh with the bat path, so we pitch to the top and underneath."

Lilliquist does believe in the importance of the high fastball. It's something catcher Matt Wieters brought over last season when he joined the Nationals, and pitchers almost universally applauded the approach. Even guys who aren't classic power pitchers, like Tanner Roark, found success going upstairs every once in a while.

"It takes practice," Lilliquist said. "Guys that have good four-seam fastballs, they can get the ball up in the strike zone, without maximum power. Not even a 98 (mph) guy. You can have a 92 (mph) guy that can pitch up in the strike zone."

Though there is plenty Lilliquist will attempt to instill in his new staff, he's also smart enough to recognize he's not being handed an inexperienced group of pitchers with no prior track record of success.

"Give them the ball and watch them pitch," he said of Scherzer, Strasburg and the like. "We have a good combination of veterans and young guys, and everybody learns from each other. I'm here to do whatever it takes to get the last out in the last game."