Hahn embraces Oakland mindset
Pitcher grewup a fan of underdog Pirates
New A’s pitcher Jesse Hahn grew up in Groton, Connecticut, where the hearts of baseball fans are tugged by the Boston Red Sox to the north and by the New York Yankees to the south.
On which side of the dividing line did Hahn stand?
“I think I was probably the only Pittsburgh Pirates fan in the whole state,” he said with a laugh. “I used to get a lot of crap for it. It was good to be a San Diego Padres.
The A’s hope that Hahn, 25, can continue the upward trajectory of a year ago. The right-hander opened last season in Double-A, jumped from there to the majors on June 3 and still had time to go 7-4
with a 3.07 ERA for San Diego. Over 14 games in the majors, including a dozen starts, Hahn struck out 8.6 batters per nine innings, capping his full return to form after Tommy John surgery in 2010.
In a game against the Cincinnati Reds, the 6-foot5, 190-pounder registered seven consecutive outs via strikeout, becoming the first Padre to do so since data started being tracked in 1974. Six of those strikeouts came on his hallmark pitch, a 12-to-6 breaking ball.
“His curveball is electric,” A’s pitching coach Curt Young said.
Hahn, who is off to a slow start this spring (0-2, 6.14 ERA over three games) will pitch again Saturday against the Reds.
He remains strongly in the mix for the back end of the A’s rotation and has made a better impression than the stats indicate. “There’s no question how highly we value Jesse,” manager Bob Melvin said early this spring.
Hahn no longer roots for his blue-collar Pirates, but the theme of his youth remains the same.
“I hear that slogan ‘Green Collar Baseball’ all the time now,” he said, referring to an A’s marketing campaign. “I think this team is only an underdog because we rebuild so much every year. But every year, the A’s seem to go out there and prove their point. We’re always the underdog, and I don’t think we should be.”
Hahn said his favorite Pirates players growing up were the early 1990s duo of Bobby Bonilla and Barry Bonds. His favorite player of all-time, though, is Roberto Clemente.
If that sounds retro, consider that his father’s favorite player is Ty Cobb. Fred Hahn, who still lives in
“I think this team is only an underdog because we rebuild so much every year. But every year, the A’s seem to go out there and prove their point.”
— A’s pitcher Jesse Hahn
Groton, is a baseball junkie who estimates that he has watched the Ken Burns documentary series 100 times.
Fred Hahn grew up in Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania — also the home of Joe Namath. The Hahns’ love of bygone eras helps explain the most important part of Jesse’s game: that curveball. The slow, loopy breaking ball is invariably described the same way. “It’s old-school,” Fred Hahn said.
Major leaguers hit only .230 with a .297 on-base percentage against Hahn’s curveball last season, according to FanGraphs. Hahn throws it at 74.2 mph, a whopping contrast from his 91.1 mph fastball.
The curve was born during long afternoons in Washington Park in Groton, a father playing catch with his son. Fred Hahn recognized early that his boy had a strong arm.
“Jesse’s been throwing since was 4 years old,” he said. “If you bought him a truck or a car, he threw it.”
So when the kid was old enough, Fred would take him to the park near their home. Dad would sit on a bucket while Jesse threw pitch after pitch.
“Me and Jesse learned that curveball together,” said Fred, a former carpenter for the Electric Boat Corporation, a major submarine manufacturer for the U.S. Navy. “I would just sit on a bucket and Jesse’d pitch and I’d catch.
“And we just messed around with different grips. And when something was really good, I’d just say, ‘Yeah, stick with that, Jess. Stick with that.’ ”
In his terrific rookie season last year, Hahn gave up only four home runs in 73 1 ⁄ 3 innings pitched. He benefited from spacious Petco Park but expects now to enjoy his new home just as much.
“I think any pitcher would love to pitch here,” he said during an interview at the Coliseum. “It’s very similar to Petco. Big park. A lot of foul ground. I’m hoping to get a lot of outs in foul territory this year and maybe lower the pitch count a little bit.”
Hahn still needs to iron out some control problems. Paul Swydan, in an analysis for FanGraphs, noted that even amid his strong rookie year, Hahn had a below average swing rate and zone rate. That means if Hahn can’t get the ball over the plate, batters eventually will stop swinging.
Hahn, meanwhile, is ready to take the next step in his growth.
“I just want to take what I learned last year and build on that from experience,” he said. “I got to see how things are done at the major league level, and this year I get to work on it. Last year was so surreal. This year I can kind of work on pitching and adjusting to the game.”