On this week's No Juice Podcast, Dan Anderson and Parker Hageman are joined by former Minnesota Twins pitcher Cole DeVries. They discuss clubhouse chemistry, pitching coaches, advanced stats and rookie hazing.

 

Click to listen below."The big thing that pitching coaches are told when you get to pro ball is not to hurt anyone," DeVries told the No Juice Podcast on his sentiments towards pitching coaches and their influence over the staff in light of the recent hiring of Neil Allen as the Twins pitching coach.

 

"If it was someone who I knew how to help correct the problem I had is that you use [the pitching coach] when you are in a slump. Because when you are going good, you don’t need anyone’s help. You know what you are doing, everything’s working for those two, three, four or five starts but when you go on the other half of that and you are just getting killed every time you are going out, that’s when I always tried to lean on that pitching coach.”

 

He also spoke about his interactions with Rick Anderson, providing insight into how some pitchers approach their game.

 

“I was never much of a big video guy because I would go more off feel," DeVries said. "If something felt off. Because I knew exactly how my body had to feel in order to execute a pitch in certain location. So where I started to have trouble was when I couldn’t feel what I was doing, if things kind of felt numb or my body was all over the place. And so that’s why I never really watched very much video: because there is no feel in video. That’s why I always had to iron my things out in bullpen.”

 

Devries, who retired after the 2013 season, talked about his injuries and decision to retire. Listen below, on iTunes or on Stitcher:

 

NO JUICE PODCAST, EPISODE #32: COLE DEVRIES

 

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"You know what you are doing, everything’s working for those two, three, four or five starts"

 

Does anyone remember which five consecutive starts DeVries might be talking about?

 

_{^{/ Channeling my inner Mike Berardino, by being a p-word.   Seriously, this was a very nice interview, with great questions, and Cole sounds like a super solid guy.  And without checking I'll bet Cole had some nice 5+ game streaks at AAA.}}

Prior to the interview I had to refresh myself on his career and went to check out his game logs at B-R.com. In terms of 2012, I was surprised how well he pitched. His overall numbers were not great because in two of his 17 outings he allowed 7 runs (one in which he only went 1.1 innings vs Tampa). In 8 of his outings he allowed 1 earned run or fewer. He had decent splits that year as well. 

 

If he never tweaked his forearm in spring training 2013, who knows where his career would have gone.

Great photo, BTW.  He offered a comparison to Britney, but I think he sells himself short.

 

_{^{/ not}}

He came up in 2012 and surprised a lot of people. He definitely deserved the opportunity and I think he made the most of it. He did have the two really poor games that Parker mentioned, but I was very surprised how well he threw. Had decent control and a pretty good, sharp 12-6 curveball. 

 

He's always been willing to speak his mind, which is cool.