Drawing Walks - The ‘Money’ Way to Do It
So I’m hooked. Moneyball. What a book. I mean, it just makes sense. To most focused baseball fans anyways. It’s a totally different way to think about baseball by the numbers. To try and sum up the entire book in one sentence: Do your best not to make an out. In the long run, regardless of how a batter gets on base, as long as he doesn’t make an out, he’s helping his team produce runs. Last night, in the bottom of the third, was a great example of how this is supposed to work.
With nobody on and two outs, Pedroia draws a walk on six pitches. Lugo up next, same result, a walk on six pitches. Two on, two outs. Youkilis next, and on four straight pitches, he walks. So now we have the bases loaded, still with two outs, and the Red Sox’s most clutch hitter coming to the plate, David Ortiz. It’s interesting to note that for those three batters, and the 16 pitches thrown to them, they only swung their bats once. A foul ball by Lugo.
My point here is that the inning was nothing extraordinary…some might even say boring. But for me watching, and anyone else who’s read Moneyball, it was textbook. The Sox were able to load the bases for their best hitter, doing so with patience, not base hits. Granted, Ortiz grounded out to end the inning, but more times than not we all know Ortiz comes through in that situation. If that half-inning was repeatable nine times, the Sox win 162 games.
But luckily for us, we have Willy Mo Pena on our team to hit game winning grand slam home runs. Did I really just say ‘luckily’, ‘Willy Mo Pena’, and ‘game-winning-grand-slam’ in the same sentence…? I think a small part of hell just froze over.
Stumble it!