“This is exactly what’s wrong with baseball.” As news of Sig Mejdal’s last two seasons in the Houston Astros organization makes headlines, his work may have only engendered fans from within, while nurturing enemies in the front offices of some other teams.

Mejdal himself, suspecting resentment from opponents, has stated that “We get strange looks. I’ve noticed that. I bet we’re the most disliked organization, if you were to survey experienced baseball people. I think we have the Yankees beat — by a healthy margin, maybe.”

What is it that brings the Astros anywhere close to eclipsing the expansive hatred by others usually enjoyed and even welcomed by the Bronx Bombers… especially when his job title is something as benign as minor league coach?

From NASA to Minute Maid

A former NASA researcher, the 52-year-old Mejdal (pronounced MY-dell) began his relationship with Astros GM Jeff Luhnow in 2005 when the latter was in the St. Louis Cardinals’ employ. He followed the data-driven Luhnow to Houston in early 2012, where he helped build the eventual 2017 World Series winner from a perennial loser. Now he’s on the front lines of baseball’s statistical revolution.

As an aside, it was Mejdal’s compromised e-mail server that was at the center of the Cardinals-Astros hacking scandal of 2014.

Mejdal’s first title with Houston wasn’t exactly “off the rack,” and admittedly caused many execs to cast a glance askance in Houston’s direction. Mejdal was named the Astros’ Director of Decision Sciences, possibly causing HR departments throughout MLB to raise eyebrows and stroke chins in disbelief.

He was promoted to his current title (special assistant to the GM, but essentially a roving front office liaison) ahead of the 2016 season. “To a certain extent, he’s sort of our futurist,” Luhnow said of Mejdal to The Athletic, March 23. “He’s always thinking about where the industry’s going, what’s next and how we can prepare before the other 29 teams do.”

Doff the Tie, Don the Cleats

The Astros put their lead analyst Mejdal in uniform for three months, last year, as a “development coach” for their short-season Class A affiliate (his first time in uniform, he says, since his last year of Little League). While simultaneously fulfilling his special assistant to the GM duties, Mejdal was embedded with the upstate New York-Penn League Tri-City ValleyCats (based in Troy, NY), riding the buses, eating clubhouse meals, and even hitting pregame fielding practice fungoes.

His task? To help the Tri-City coaches and players understand and utilize the vast technologies available in today’s game, according to a March 13, 2017, Houston Chronicle article. “I wanted someone from the front office who understood all the stuff that we’re doing,” Luhnow said of Mejdal’s appointment, “but also had context from where we’ve come and where we’re going.”

Mejdal was with the team for its entire 75-game schedule, which ran from mid-June, ending in early September. The Cats ended their season in third place (out of four teams) in the NY-Penn League Stedler division, seven games back at 34-39 (.466 winning percentage).

But, Tri-City’s record was irrelevant to Luhnow’s goals. By learning from Mejdal’s experience with Tri-City, he hopes to give the Astros a better chance to turn their concepts into reality.

Front offices throughout baseball are now crowded with well-educated executives who have backgrounds outside baseball. Luhnow, born in Mexico City and touting an MBA from the Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern, wondered how the Astros could get more from theirs.

Through it all, Mejdal’s unorthodox appointment might have rankled some around the industry, particularly coaches who may have put in the grunt work for years hoping for an opportunity on a professional staff. The Astros’ development coach position, though, a hybrid between field staff and analytical work, is one the Houston organization created in 2015, although the two who occupied the role that season had backgrounds as instructors and players.

Application, or Greasing the Tunnel Between Exec Suite and Dugout

Erik Lief, of the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH), put the merging of front office analytics with on-field application into perspective, in his April 13, 2018 report:

“But now, 15 years after Michael Lewis’ influential work (“Moneyball”) upended Major League Baseball’s old-school protocols, we’re on the verge of having that once-reviled stat geek … in the dugout, in person – in uniform – dispensing advice directly to the manager during the game.

“That scenario hasn’t happened yet in the big leagues. But with this hallowed threshold having been crossed in lower-tier venues – last month (March, 2018) during spring training by the Philadelphia Phillies and the Tampa Bay Rays, and last season by by a minor-league affiliate of the Houston Astros, the defending World Series champions – MLB’s day is clearly right around the corner.”

Eyeing the Future

“The reality is this is going to be the norm in baseball… We see what the future is going to be,” said Morgan Ensberg, the manager of the Tri-City ValleyCats (and former Astro, 2000-2007). “We got to experience what a major league bench is going to be like in a few years. There’s a bunch of information that I couldn’t possibly know.”

“Other teams may see that as something that’s silly,” added the former major-league veteran, speaking to the Wall Street Journal. “But if other teams really look at what the future’s going to look like, it’s going to be having an analyst on the bench.”

To take advantage of all this new available information, Ensberg would consult Mejdal at least five times a game, asking what the numbers suggested in a given situation. He would also ask his hitting and pitching coaches for their input, before weighing his options and making a decision.

Players, likewise, sought out Mejdal to dig deeper on their performance.

“They ate this stuff up,” Mejdal said. “There was no surprise or skepticism. It was like: ‘Wow, really? You guys can measure that? I didn’t know that.'”

Plus, the on-field experience sharpened Mejdal’s baseball acumen, highlighting nuances of the game he had never noticed before: The footwork of catchers, the acceleration technique of base runners, and the drop steps of the outfielders, among others.

Related: Morgan Ensberg, Chris Holt Lead Former Astros Into 2018 Minor League Coaching Jobs

Meeting of the Minds

The question might naturally arise: Why does someone like Mejdal have to be in the dugout? Can’t his information just be sent to the manager in real-time during the game? Currently, in MLB, that answer is “no,” as there is a specific rule preventing the use of electronic enabling in the dugout:

“No club shall use electronic equipment, including walkie-talkies and cellular telephones, to communicate to or with any on-field personnel, including those in the dugout, bullpen, field, and – during the game – the clubhouse,” reads a memo issued to all teams. “Such equipment may not be used for the purpose of stealing signs or conveying information designed to give a club an advantage.”

One example of analytics-driven managing is the practice of defensive shifting, which nearly every MLB team now employs to some degree or other, and the Astros employ extensively, as reported here. “Defensive shifting calls for the moving of players from their long-held, traditional positions to spots on the field where, statistical analysis of opposing players shows based on past performance, they are more prone to hit the ball,” Lief explains. “Once considered blasphemous, defensive shifting is now commonplace. Data on specific pitcher-batter matchups are also frequently used by managers to determine overall strategy, as well as what to do specifically in pivotal situations.”

This is what makes the “marriage” of Luhnow, Mejdal and Astros manager AJ Hinch so ingenious. Hinch manages from a strategic position, utilizing advanced metric data to maneuver particular pitchers to face certain hitters, pinch-hit against pitchers, and position his fielders to give his team an advantage based on hitters’ past performances.

Works Just Fine

“They’re our species, they’re not aliens for which we need some expert to translate and communicate,” said Mejdal, re-capping his Tri-City tenure, and ballplayers, in general. “I don’t buy into the idea that a socially mature, sensitive analyst cannot speak to a baseball player, and my experience is that it works just fine.”

“A lot of clubs have really good ideas,” Luhnow told the New York Times in late April. “I think what will separate some from others is the ability to react and utilize, implement and sort of institutionalize programs out in the field.”

“In doing so,” the Times asserts, “The Astros have found that entry-level players now yearn for the kind of information that tech-savvy teams can provide. Most of these players were born in the mid- to late 1990s, which means that, by their formative amateur years, modern metrics had been normalized. This is not their fathers’ game anymore.”

Related: Astros Uncovered: System-Wide Power Focus Enforced With All Hitters

A Player’s Take