Hanrahan still part of the game
The playing career of this former Pirates closer ended with two Tommy John surgeries, but he has found success as a minor league pitching coach
ALTOONA, Pa. — Joel Hanrahan has every right to be bitter.
Just 10 months after taking the mound at his second consecutive MLB All- Star Game, he pitched his last professional inning. That was six years ago, before three years in baseball wilderness, trying to reclaim the electricity that fleetingly made him one of the game’s most feared closers before it was sapped by back- to- back Tommy John surgeries.
But as he sits on the back of a bench in the Altoona Curve dugout, staring into the light rain falling over Blair County Ballpark, none of that seems to be on Hanrahan’s mind. Now the pitching coach for Altoona, the Pirates Class AA affiliate, his thoughts instead drift forward to whether that day’s game will be played and how the Eastern League’s new split- season schedule might affect the Curve’s playoff chances. His playing days only come up when pressed.
“I’m not sitting here watching the games and doubting, saying, ‘ I could get this guy out,’” Hanrahan said. “... I know that I can’t.”
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Hanrahan is on his third stop in as many years — from rookie- ball Bristol to Class A West Virginia Power and now to Altoona, all in the organization where he pitched to a 2.59 ERA with 82 saves from 2009- 12.
Those years in Pittsburgh made the Pirates the easy call when he decided to get into coaching late in 2016, more than three years removed from his last competitive pitch. After a pair of contracts with Detroit came and went without ever regaining full health, Hanrahan’s final decision came when his second Tommy John surgery brought the same results as the first — months of hard work with no payoff.
That realization might never have come without an ordinary session of catch with Jordan Walden in the fall of 2016. Walden, like Hanrahan, would never pitch in the majors again, but at the time, he was in the Cardinals organization, rehabilitating a slew of shoulder injuries. And when Walden — who Hanrahan says was well ahead of him at the time — graded his own rehab as “terrible,” Hanrahan knew that was it.
“I knew that if I kept pushing my rehab, it didn’t feel good enough that I could keep pushing it to get back,” Hanrahan said. “I felt like if I kept pushing it, I was going to hurt myself further, so therefore it was time to stop the rehab process.”
That afternoon, as he drove home from therapy, Hanrahan called Pirates general manager Neal Huntington and asked about job opportunities. Within weeks, he was the organization’s newest pitching coach.
Before then, he had to prove he was ready to move on from his playing days.
“The worst thing you can do is hire somebody that’s not done playing,” said Larry Broadway, the Pirates director of minor league operations. “They’re always comparing themselves to guys who are playing, and it’s just not a great fit.”
Knowing Hanrahan’s competitiveness and baseball mind, the Pirates set up a series of interviews at their instructional league facility in Florida. Once his desire to coach became clear, the only question was whether there was an open spot in the organization. At first, that was going to be as the assistant pitching coach at the Class A West Virginia Black Bears before a late reshuffling sent him to Bristol.
Two and a half years in, many in the organization will say the hire paid off. But early in that first year, Hanrahan was driven to the brink of quitting by a 17- 49 season — “I was really contemplating if I wanted to do this,” he says now.
After an 0- 2 start in Class A the next year, he warned manager Wyatt Toregas that losing was to be expected with him in tow. By that point, though, it was said jokingly, with the ability to compartmentalize game results from player development.
“Working with the guys when the season wasn’t well and then working with them the next year,” Hanrahan said, “and seeing the adjustments that they were able to make and the information that you gave them the year before — you see that playing out the next year, it really keeps you wanting to come back and see the development of the guys.”
Even before the wins started to roll in — West Virginia finished 71- 62 — Toregas was blown away. He’s careful not to dismiss any of the other pitching coaches he has worked with, but it’s clear Hanrahan stands alone.
“He made my job as a manager so easy,” Toregas said. “I didn’t have to worry about anything with the pitching last year. I didn’t have to worry about anything. I just asked him, ‘ Hey, who’s hot today?’ That’s pretty much all I ever asked him.”
Many of the pitchers Hanrahan coached in 2017 followed him to Class A and, knowing their struggles, he warned Toregas of the issues they had been working through. But as they reported to West Virginia, the struggles that plagued them the previous year were gone, the result of directed offseasons that focused on the issues Hanrahan pinpointed. Toregas knew he had something special.
Their developmental plan: Break the season into monthly blocks, giving each pitcher one thing to work on each month. By the end of the year, that meant each pitcher had fixed five issues, something Toregas credited with much of the staff’s success.
For Beau Sulser — one of many early success stories — the first focus was restoring his confidence after posting a 5.31 ERA in his first season of pro ball at low Class A. Hanrahan’s unique combination of commanding respect — his 6- foot- 4 frame and seven years of MLB experience do that for him — and carrying a relatable disposition helped Sulser shed the frustrations that had marred the previous year.
Now with Altoona, in his second season with Hanrahan, Sulser’s tweaks have adjusted accordingly. Last month, he was leaving the ball up and Hanrahan noticed he was sinking down on his back leg. The two watched video together to help Sulser get back on top of the ball and regain his command. Since then, he has pitched to a 1.23 ERA in 22 innings and was named to the Eastern League All- Star team.
“I’m very lucky I got the chance to work with him for two years because he’s seen me that much longer,” Sulser said. “It’s easier for him to pick stuff up if I’m doing well or doing something I shouldn’t be doing.”
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Even in a life devoted to baseball, Hanrahan emphasizes a work/ life balance. With his playing days over, he’s a family man at his core. His first child, Ryan, was born in his final big- league spring training, with the Red Sox in 2013. Three years later, just months before his retirement, his daughter, Cora, joined the family.
It’s a life filled with family responsibilities, seemingly at odds with a job that requires him to be on the road in small cities throughout the northeast for eight months at a time, thousands of miles from his Texas home.
But as Hanrahan has found, the two are more compatible than meets the eye. He’s in his 19th year of finding a new place to live each season, constant traveling and late nights at the ballpark. It’s all his relationship with his wife, Kim, has ever known — the two met in Washington, D. C. during Hanrahan’s stint with the Nationals.
“She married me knowing that I was a baseball player and baseball was a big part of my life,” Hanrahan said. “And she accepted that from the get- go. So she’s ready for it, she loves the traveling and the different experiences. She’s gotten to see a lot of the country; her family’s not too far from here. So she’s enjoying it.”
That relationship is part of what helped push him into coaching in the first place. As he and Kim weighed his options after retirement, she told him he would be miserable if he went to work. Three years on, that conversation has paid off for the whole family.
Ryan is a constant presence in the Curve’s clubhouse now that school’s out. Cora, now 3, demands to stop every time they drive by the ballpark, eager to see where her dad works. And while the months between spring training and school letting out are tough, the four- month offseason gives Hanrahan the chance to be a regular dad, with carpool lines and family time filling the winter.
As for baseball, that part is no different than it’s ever been. When asked whether his perspective of the game has changed since becoming a coach, his answer is as simple as it is predictable.
“No, it’s still a really hard game.”
With that, he gets up, stops to chat with a few staffers and disappears into the clubhouse, where he’ll try to make it a little easier for the next generation of Pirates.