I’m really not a fan of the hit and run. Yesterday’s ninth inning was a good example of why. I’m less against it early in the game, so that, if it fails, there is time to, you know, make up for it. Hit and runs get talked about in the TV booth a lot but they don’t happen all that often
If it fails in the ninth inning, well, that’s it, that’s the game. You have to be really sure it will work in the ninth. So you have to be sure the pitcher is going to throw a strike. It isn’t a terrible bet that the first
pitch to a batter in the ninth inning will be a strike. But this one was nowhere near a strike. In fact, it was close to a pitchout. It was the first pitch thrown:
For a bit I thought that the Yankees’ must have thought that a hit and run was on….but if that was true, you’d want the pitch higher than that, to make it easier for the catcher to popup and make the throw to second.
Nathan Lukes isn’t one of the guys I’d like to have stealing. Lukes is 2-for-4 as a basestealer this year.
Earl Weaver used to hate the hit-and-run. He believed in the ‘run and hit’, saying the player at first base goes to steal, and the batter can swing or not. He thought that the runner on the hit and run didn’t try for their best possible jump. That they don’t run full out. I think it is silly to believe the runner doesn’t go hard because it is a hit-and-run. Basically, I think it is semantics.
The thing about a hit and run (or run and hit) is that the runner doesn’t have a choice. On a normal steal, if the jump isn’t good, if he slips a bit, or if he isn’t feeling it, he doesn’t have to run.
I also think there are only a few guys on any team that I would want to be the ‘hit’ part of the hit and run—someone who doesn’t swing and miss much. On the Jays, I’d perhaps hit and run with Alejandro Kirk. Straw? well maybe I guess, he doesn’t strike out much, his ‘whiff’ rate is low, but he’s likely not one I’d choose. That might be a personal thing. Maybe he is a good candidate for it.
John Schneider said the team wanted to test the arm of Yankees’ catcher Austin Wells , which, looking at Baseball Reference, seems like bad move. Wells has thrown out 26.7%. League average is 21.8. It appears that Wells is better than the average catcher (although Addison Barger stole successfully earlier). I don’t know if you hit and run to test the catcher. I think you hit and run hoping for contact at the plate.
Anyway….I think if you want to hit and run in the first inning, or early in the game. Ok, I get it, the manager wants to look like he’s doing something. When it works, it looks great. And, early in the game, when it doesn’t work (which it doesn’t a large percentage of the time),, it is early in the game and if you lose by that one run, no one will connect the dots.
When you do it in the ninth and it doesn’t work, the dots connect themselves.
I guess it is the life of a manager, if it had worked, we wouldn’t be saying what a dumb move it was. And if he hadn’t tried it, odds were low we have gotten the runner around the bases, anyway.
