Real small ball

[JohnU]

I had the chance on Saturday to go see my Gary SS-RailCats play against the dreaded and dastardly St. Paul Saints. I got there a half-inning late, no big deal ... Gary's leadoff guy, as usual, drew a walk (he had 3 on Sunday) and ... after an out, stole second. Came home on a single. The next guy stole second.

By the second inning, the St. Paul pitcher was beside himself. Gary -- twice -- executed a double steal and a sacrifice bunt, three line drives up the middle for singles.

By the fourth inning, the St. Paul pitcher was twisting and turning. Every time he looked up, somebody was either bluffing a bunt, taking an extra long lead ... finally it was clear, they were gonna steal a base, just not clear which pitch.

Once, the Gary guy was leading off third base far enough that he could have stolen home without a throw. No need. Wild pitch. He scored anyhow.

This is small-ball. Gary has, in 36 games, hit FOUR home runs, two of them by the same guy.


On Friday, they were down to their last out, nobody on base, trailing by 3 runs.
Scored all three without a hit -- a walk, two HBP and a fielding error by the pitcher.
Won it in the 10th.

 

[BigDDude]

I had the chance on Saturday to go see my Gary SS-RailCats play against the dreaded and dastardly St. Paul Saints. I got there a half-inning late, no big deal ... Gary's leadoff guy, as usual, drew a walk (he had 3 on Sunday) and ... after an out, stole second. Came home on a single. The next guy stole second.

By the second inning, the St. Paul pitcher was beside himself. Gary -- twice -- executed a double steal and a sacrifice bunt, three line drives up the middle for singles.

By the fourth inning, the St. Paul pitcher was twisting and turning. Every time he looked up, somebody was either bluffing a bunt, taking an extra long lead ... finally it was clear, they were gonna steal a base, just not clear which pitch.

Once, the Gary guy was leading off third base far enough that he could have stolen home without a throw. No need. Wild pitch. He scored anyhow.

This is small-ball. Gary has, in 36 games, hit FOUR home runs, two of them by the same guy.


On Friday, they were down to their last out, nobody on base, trailing by 3 runs.
Scored all three without a hit -- a walk, two HBP and a fielding error by the pitcher.
Won it in the 10th.

I will guess the manager of the Gary team to be an old, grizzled baseball vet, one who stresses fundamentals to the nth degree. NOT that is is bad, on the contrary. On a team with no real superstar players, if you can get the entire team to buy into the managers vision and concept, and if these same guys play a fundamentally sound game, then you can have a real winner on your hands. And, some of these less than stellar type can get noticed just the same, but for playing the game "the right way", and a few can make a good MLB career from this.

In my mind right now, I am thinking former Angel & Cardinal David Eckstein. He had a fine 10 year career with less than eye popping tools, but for playing the game the correct way each and every inning and game.

Sorry for the ramble.....

 

[JohnU]

You can't win in Gary with the long ball. The wind blows off Lake Michigan and most days, fly balls just die about 5 feet short of the track. There are home runs, naturally, but it's not a sluggers park in a league where pitching is suspect.

In 2007, Gary won the league title with a total of 32 home runs in the entire season. Most of them were hit on the road. I have NOT seen a home run by a Gary player in a regular season game in more than 2 years. One, last year, in a preseason game. That's it.


But when their pitching gets shaky, they are in trouble. In the indy leagues, you keep 10 pitchers and if one of them doesn't have it that night, you just endure, hope to play through it. The big inning can happen anytime, anyplace. Not much the managers can do with a 22-man roster. They don't have LOOGY of situation guys ... most of them do have closers, but closers often pitch 2 innings.

Teams with slow outfields or narrow range in Gary are destined to get beat.

The indy leagues are different from affiliated minor leagues in that the manager of an indy team builds his entire roster on his philosophy. In that respect, the affiliated leagues may have better players but they don't have better TEAMS.

The best indy league teams, for attendance, are in Winnipeg, St. Paul and Kansas City, KN. Winnipeg, of course, is a zillion years from any competition so they have a rapt following. St. Paul is owned by Mike Veeck, and that ought to tell you a little about them. They are finally getting a new ballpark in a couple of years.

 

[Redsfan1507]

Generally, the team that has its way more, wins. The team that spends more time doing things they either aren't good at, and/or don't prefer, usually loses. Small ball, on any good team I've ever been involved with, led to wins... and sided the long ball, which led to blowouts.

Dusty limits his team too much, to go long or go a long time between runs. It allows the opposition to concentrate on what they want up do,while Dusty's swingaholics commit suicide getting themselves out. It's why the Reds make soon to be released pitchers look like Cy Young candidates. It just eliminates most other offensive tools to the equivent of going every task in building a house with a sledgehammer. Not impossible, but it puts more pressure on the carpenter than is necessary.

It's not just the Reds... every team that Dusty has underperformed with starved without steals, hit and runs, productive outs, and fundamental situational defense... In other words, Dusty doesn't manage wins, he only watches them. The sad truth is the batboy could have won 95% of Dusty's 1600 wins. He isn't terrible, and only about a dozen losses a year are the result of Dusty's incompetence, most against equal talent where a gaffe a game just is too much charity to compensate for by his players. Dusty doesn't like small ball, because he's terrible at it, not because his players are.

 

[JohnU]

Went to see the RCs again today ... tied in the 9th at 3-3.
Leadoff guy in the bottom of the 9th lines a single to right-center and the CF, deciding to let the ball come to him at about the 380-foot mark, allows the hitter to stretch it to a double.
Sac bunt, man on 3rd, 1 out. Next guy fans.
Next guy, wild pitch, winning run scores.
That's 6 in a row.

 

[Redsfan1507]

I'll take runner at 3b one out every time, in the 1st inning or the 9th, and if you allow me to do that a couple of times, I'll beat you more than half the time. It's the same math casinos allow drunken ametuers gamblers to take another hit trying to draw to an inside straight... And the one guy that hits is just discount advertising to the next 100 chumps who bet on doing it too. It's Dusty's swing away sign after the leadoff double, that keeps the Reds going to the ATM for " another bat" every year.

A guy that stole 30 bases in a year in the minors, can't do it in MLB, but a .250 minor league hitter is supposed to hit .280 in MLB ? I don't follow this teams assumptions sometimes. The way Cozart is used mystifies me.

 

[HammerDown]

Sounds like the Boche when he managed the Padres.

 

[Redsfan1507]

Being good at small call doesn't mean you sacrifice homers. It just means you win more between them. Boche knows this. He was a catcher that understood his ability to make a living didn't depend on him hitting regular homers, too...a handicap that helped educate him. Dusty skipped all that.

 

[JohnU]

Gary has 1 home run in the 6 games -- and none in the last 5.
Today, another double steal and another that got the lead runner thrown out.
Damned safety squeeze play later on almost worked though. It went foul.

 

[HammerDown]

Being good at small call doesn't mean you sacrifice homers. It just means you win more between them. Boche knows this. He was a catcher that understood his ability to make a living didn't depend on him hitting regular homers, too...a handicap that helped educate him. Dusty skipped all that.

He understands it NOW. He went up there and started doing things we were begging him to do for years. My buddy can do an imitation of Boche defending his refusal to hit-n-run that will leave any Padres fan in tears.

 

[JohnU]

To hit and run, you have to first teach guys to hit and after that, assuming they get to first, then you have to teach them how to run. Kinda depends on your batting order a little. I will say this one more thing about the Gary team -- they do NOT hit and run. They just steal second. That's easier to do in the minors, of course. But it's not impossible at the top level.

Depends on whether you think the stolen base is good strategy. I'd say getting to 2nd base is good strategy if you can do it without wasting an out.

 

[HammerDown]

Some guy did a scientific study on a massive amount of data on stealing bases in all sorts of situations and what he wanted to do was process that data and make it user friendly; basically he wanted to be able to tell us if stealing bases historically changed the outcome of games. I was surprised at the answer. John, you wanna take a guess? And BTW, he had another study on whether a strategic lineup made any difference over a random lineup. Some of you might remember this. Do you know what the answer is to both questions, based on mountains of data?

 

[JohnU]

I don't know that the stolen base is a game-changer, any more than a leadoff double.
However, I think having three or four potential base stealers does matter -- assuming they all reach base with any degree of regularity.

I know that if you don't steal at least 76 percent, you cost your team runs.

 

[HammerDown]

The guy's study determined conclusively that whether you steal bases or not and lineups are virtually meaningless to a won-loss record at the end of the season. I was shocked.

 

[JohnU]

I don't always buy that about the lineups, unless it's the Reds who are lucky to get 3 hits in a row.
I do think Ruth and Gehrig enhanced each other's numbers and there are teams that benefit from certain guys hitting ahead or behind somebody else. But since nobody is ever going to try it, the data will always be the product of a theory.

 

[HammerDown]

I don't always buy that about the lineups, unless it's the Reds who are lucky to get 3 hits in a row.
I do think Ruth and Gehrig enhanced each other's numbers and there are teams that benefit from certain guys hitting ahead or behind somebody else. But since nobody is ever going to try it, the data will always be the product of a theory.

Yeah, try convincing Sparky to bat Pete in the nine-hole.

 

[JohnU]

Yeah, try convincing Sparky to bat Pete in the nine-hole.

After the first 8 guys batted, Pete would be leading off.

 

[Redsfan1507]

Depends...depends... Depends.

The aforementioned mountain of steals data complies all steals and all runs, in the hands of all managers, on all teams...IMO, useless drivel used to give the impression of insignificance. Value is in the details. The same paintbrush used by a house painter could produce a masterpiece by an artist, and such is Baseball 101. It isn't the brush, or the paint, it's the skill and the application of them that separates them into completely different categories.

Getting runners into scoring position, especially to 3b, with the minimum amount of outs, is critical to the odds of scoring runs. Because in almost ALL game scenarios, there are 24-27 outs...but only a fraction of the same amount of hits.

I dislike the way "RISP" is thrown around like ketchup-to use indescriminantly like it tastes the same bo matter what you eat it with. There is a substantial difference in odds of scoring with a RISP at 3b and 1 out, than say a RISP at 2b with 2 out.... and a steal of 2b, like bunting a runner to 2b, with 2 outs ...as example, is worth a lot less than a steal of 2b and a bunt to 3b for the 1st out is.

I will also argue ( assuming that the term "steals" means successful ones, as unsuccessful ones are often a detergent to scoring) that a steal often has residual benefits that don't always equate to scoring immediately, but enhance your chances of scoring later. The more pitchers fear a steal, the more throws over they make, increasing odds of an error, a balk, or simply throwing a fastball to the hitter instead of a breaking ball in the dirt. It also duplicates focus on more than just the hitter, and it's a fact human brains don't function as well ( or relay info to the body) as well when spread over multiple simultaneous activities.

The MLB success rate on steals is singificany better than catchers throw out percentage, but it doesn't mean a slow guy can ever be successful stealing. Managers that double steal say, with Scott Rolen and Jay Bruce as runners, with no outs and 2 strikes on the hitter Ryan Hanigan aren't playing odds that often result in their favor. Managers that hit and run with a pitcher at the plate and less than 2 outs aren't either. Steal attempts with 1 out and 2 strikes on the hitter, result in a LOT more inning ending DP's than with only 1 strike, for instance.

Many managers that don't have the inclination to try to manufacture runs, that don't have elite power and / or elite average lineups, try to hide their incompetence with fundamental execution behind a high strikeout rate or low speed rosters. There are some tell-tale signs it's BS...like not attempting sound situational play, then attempting low odds bad situational play... Timing ISNT everything, but it sure helps.

 

[JohnU]

The stolen base is simply a way to get to another base.

 

[Redsfan1507]

Correct. That doesn't require a hitter. Try advancing any other way without one, other than a balk. It's technically, at least one out better than a productive out even.