Scott Harris continues to add sharp minds to the Tigers organization. His latest hire, reported over the weekend though yet to be confirmed by the club, is a former professor who just so happens to be a pitching coach: University of Iowa's Robin Lund.
Lund, 50, is joining A.J. Hinch's staff as the Tigers assistant pitching coach under Chris Fetter, according to D1 Baseball.
Lund spent four seasons as Iowa's pitching coach, sending seven pitchers to MLB organizations over the past two years. Just last season, he helped transform South Dakota State transfer Adam Mazur into the Big Ten Pitcher of the Year -- the second straight Hawkeye to earn the honor -- and a third-round draft pick of the Padres. 2021 Big Ten Pitcher of the Year Trenton Wallace was an 11th-round pick of the Blue Jays.
Lund's pitching staff was one of the best in the country last season. Iowa ranked second nationally in hits allowed per nine, third in strikeouts per nine and fourth in ERA (3.72). It also shattered the program's single-season record for strikeouts.
Prior to joining the Hawkeyes, Lund spent 17 years as an associate professor in the Department of Kinesiology at Northern Iowa. He taught students in the areas of biomechanics, anatomy and statistics, and his research was focused on improving athletic performance. He applied it well at Iowa.
Now he'll try to apply it in Detroit. The Tigers could use it. Their young rotation was ravaged by injuries last season, when Tarik Skubal was their only pitcher to make at least 20 starts. And Skubal was sidelined by the end of the season himself with an injury that required elbow surgery.
Harris, the Tigers new president of baseball operations, has already parted ways with the club's longtime director of medical services Kevin Rand and re-assigned head athletic trainer Doug Teter to the minors.
Asked last month about his vision for a new strength and conditioning staff, Harris said, "We need to understand how our players are moving and how we can align those movement patterns with our hitting and pitching coaches."
Hence the hire of Lund, who has his Ph.D. in exercise science.
"If we have a medical and strength and conditioning department that has strong relationships with our pitching and hitting departments, then we can work on movement patters that allow our players to get a little more power out of their deliveries or make a little bit more contact or reshape their bat paths to allow them to perform a little bit better," said Harris. "That alignment can get more performance out of our players."
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