Menhart planning to stick around
Pitching coach earned stripes at lower levels
WASHINGTON – Paul Menhart was sick of having blood on his hands.
He was delivering glass all over Georgia, and sometimes that glass broke, and so he’d get home in the evenings, spent, and look at the cuts covering his fingers. It was December 2005. He hadn’t played baseball for four years, since throwing his last pitch for the Solano Steelheads, and wasn’t sure what to do next. But Menhart didn’t want to lift another window pane. He didn’t want to climb into that big truck, snap in the lock bars, rumble down some highway while collecting an hourly wage.
He didn’t like life after baseball, not even a little bit, and there was only one fix. He had to get back in. Then one day the phone rang. And then it rang again.
Menhart has trouble remembering every detail of how he went from lost to pitching coach for the Washington Nationals. The last step was public. He replaced Derek Lilliquist in May, after Lilliquist was fired, and took over an experienced rotation and spiraling bullpen. The expectations were high then. They’ve only heightened with the Nationals in the thick of a pennant race.
But the promotion is only a tiny part of what got him here. Sit with the 50-yearold long enough, let his memory jog, and it all rushes back — the partying that shortened his playing days, the summer spent landscaping, the glass, the cramped classrooms, the two job offers in one day, the 13 years spent in the Nationals’ minor league system, climbing to the moment that everything changed.
He was walking his dog Gracie, an Australian Shepherd-Husky mix, when he received a phone call from Doug Harris this spring. The Nationals’ assistant general manager told Menhart he was getting moved up to the big leagues. He’d spent parts of years there as a player, achieving that dream in the mid-‘90s, but never stuck. That crossed his mind right away, the unfulfillment, and it still does all the time.
“I want to be here much longer than I was as a player,” Menhart said, shades pushed onto his forehead, leaning back in the dugout before another summer game. “I want this to be my last job.”
Built for job
The Nationals built Menhart up for his current job, testing him at every level, taking more than a decade to see what he can handle. That meant three years as a low-Class A pitching coach, three years in advanced-Class A, two years in Class AA and, finally, a year with the Class AAA Syracuse Chiefs in 2014. Then came four full seasons as the minor-league pitching coordinator, bouncing to all Washington’s affiliates, arriving wherever a young player needed advice.
And when it came time to replace Lilliquist in May, with the rotation underachieving and the bullpen on life support, Harris came up with simple logic. Harris oversees the Nationals’ system and has grown close with Menhart through their constant work together. He told general manager Mike Rizzo that while Menhart was a great coordinator, and valuable in the role, he makes an even better pitching coach.
Harris pointed to Menhart’s season with the Harrisburg Senators in 2013. Their .242 team average was the worst in the Eastern League, but their 3.43 ERA was the best by a good margin. They fed the Nationals with pitchers all season. And they still made it all the way to the finals.
“We’ve had so many young pitchers influenced by Paul over the years,” Harris said. “He’s at his best when working one-on-one and looking for the small ways to improve.”
In the last few months, in what’s been a challenge and a chance, Menhart has searched for those edges with Washington’s staff. He helped Erick Fedde find the right arm slot for his curveball. He noticed higher spin rates for Sean Doolittle’s slider, a secondary pitch the closer rarely uses, and suggested specific situations to throw it in.
Pitchers mention Menhart often when discussing work between outings. What he gets out of the Nationals’ three new relievers — Daniel Hudson, Hunter Strickland and Roenis Elías — will show how quickly he can spot minor adjustments for veterans. What he gets out of the young depth starters — Ross, Fedde and Austin Voth — will be critical to Washington’s playoff hopes. And his rotation, down ace Max Scherzer for at least another start, has a tall task against the surging New York Mets this weekend. Menhart has Stephen Strasburg, Patrick Corbin and Aníbal Sánchez lined up. That’s as far as he can see right now.