@MarkKnudson41
Back in the day, the Kansas City Royals used to be synonymous with the term “small ball.” Playing their home games in spacious Kaufman Stadium, the old Royals used their speed and bat control – not so much home runs – to score runs and win a lot of baseball games, including a pair of American League pennants and a World Series title in 1985.
Colorado Rockies manager Bud Black was on those Royals teams. So Bud knows “small ball.”
The current Royals, who recently left Coors Field with a series win over the Rockies, are just like everyone else – including Black’s current team – in their offensive approach. Swing for the fence, regardless of the situation, regardless of the pitcher or the count. Offensive baseball today is about trying to hit home runs and living with strikeouts.
But why? Because analytics say so.
Rockies third base coach Stu Cole played during that era where striking out was a bad thing. Putting the ball in play, forcing the defense to make plays, creating situations where a simple ground ball could produce a badly needed run was the right way to play the game. In today’s game…not so much. Now coaches like Cole have to be emersed in what the advanced data – analytics – tell them they should do.
Example: On their most recent road trip, the Rockies trailed the Arizona Diamondbacks 1-0 entering the ninth inning of the second game. DBacks closer Mark Melancon was on the mound trying to close out the win against his hometown team. But the first two Rockies, C.J. Cron and Ryan McMahon, reached base, so with no outs catcher Elias Diaz came to the plate.
It was a classic “put down a sacrifice bunt” situation.
Standing in the third base coaches box, Cole knew what he wasn’t going to see. He wasn’t going to see Diaz bunt, partly because the analytics say that the odds of Diaz getting a hit (he’s currently hitting .213) were better than the odds of the Rockies bringing the tying and potentially winning runs home after giving up an out via the sacrifice. And partly – maybe mostly – because Diaz is not a skilled bunter.
“Because he’s a guy who never bunts,” Cole noted in explaining the decision. “These days, you might has well have a guy who never bunts swing the bat and hopefully he can get into one and give you three runs across the board more so than just one.”
Diaz is a big leaguer and has been playing baseball for a couple of decades now. But he hasn’t mastered the basic skill of bunting, apparently?
In Cole’s day, having Diaz bunt both runners into scoring position would have been an automatic. Sacrifice one out to get both runners into position to score with one hit, which would have meant taking the lead and potentially stealing the win.
Diaz did not get a bunt sign. The catcher swung away…and struck out.
As fate would have it, Yonathan Daza and Jose Iglesias came up with clutch ninth inning singles after Diaz had punched out and the Rockies pulled out the come from behind win, so in reality, neither scenario played out during that particular at-bat. But in numerous similar situations throughout baseball now, batters who haven’t mastered the skill of bunting a baseball are striking out or otherwise failing to move runners up and thereby making meaningless outs that fail to benefit their team in any way.
That’s better baseball?
The way the Rockies have produced offense on the road the past few seasons screams for a new approach. Cole says that Rockies coaches are pushing the idea of “using the big part of the ballpark” in most situations, home and road, rather than advocating for a different approach away from Coors Field. But you have to wonder if a little more bunting, a few more stolen base attempts and good ole ‘hit and run’ play now and again might be useful in jump starting an offense that’s handicapped by the dreaded “Coors Field Hangover.”
Doesn’t that just make sense?
The road win in Arizona proved to be as rare as a bunt these days. It’s fair to wonder which we’ll see more often the rest of the season.
Be sure to catch Mark Knudson and Manny Randhawa on the Park Adjusted Rockies Podcast each week, available on all major Podcast platforms.