Example 1,304,240 why I hate the shift

[Drebin]

I hope that doesn't end up hurting us.

 

[1msucub]

Yep. Just play baseball, man.

 

[PineGroveBully]

Couldn't agree more

 

[skydawg1]

Especially in a game like this. Jeez.

 

[Drebin]

Especially in a game like this. Jeez.

And against Duplantis of all people. It was really stupid. Luckily LSU said hold my beer on that steal attempt.

 

[patdog]

No kidding. May as well have just intentionally walked him. I can see it on a mediocre dead pull hitter. But never against a good hitter.

 

[M R DAWGS]

This new fangled shift idea will come back to bite us in the a** at a big moment this season. If putting all of your players on one side of the field was a good idea, teams would’ve been doing it for 40 years. Guess what, It’s not smart. Even the most pull heavy hitter will sometimes mis-time a ball and go the opposite way. With the shift arrangement, they’ll be able to run for days.

 

[coach66]

Agree, know your hitter.

Nm

 

[Drebin]

This new fangled shift idea will come back to bite us in the a** at a big moment this season. If putting all of your players on one side of the field was a good idea, teams would’ve been doing it for 40 years. Guess what, It’s not smart. Even the most pull heavy hitter will sometimes mis-time a ball and go the opposite way. With the shift arrangement, they’ll be able to run for days.

It's not a bad idea to do it at the major league level with dead pull hitters and volumes of advanced scouting data. The stats show that it works.

At the college level though, I don't see as much value in it. Against a hitter like Duplantis, it's downright stupid.

 

[coach66]

Agree.

nm

 

[$altyDawg]

Exactly right! Trust your pitching and your fielding.

 

[CochiseCowbell]

It's not that new of an idea. Teams famously employed it against Ted Williams. It is now being used more rampantly in the Show, however to the point that they are considering outlawing it.

 

[msstate7]

Maybe in college, but best use it in mlb or you'll be killed

 

[00Dawg]

If you read The Science of Hitting...

Williams tells you how he adjusted. In this day and age, anyone who can't (or won't) follow a similar approach should suffer the consequences.

 

[Drebin]

Maybe in college, but best use it in mlb or you'll be killed

It's effective in MLB against certain types of hitters, but like everything else, it's started getting used too much, and managers are starting to outsmart themselves with it.

 

[CochiseCowbell]

The way the game has been taken over by sabermetrics and analytics today managers, & GMs, don't want the players to adjust. They'd rather have a K with the possibility of a HR (for the data tells them the odds) than hit a single. I don't agree with this, but that's what the game is now. I'm not an old school stuck in the mud baseball guy, I just think sometimes the reliance on the data goes too far.

 

[msstate7]

It's effective in MLB against certain types of hitters, but like everything else, it's started getting used too much, and managers are starting to outsmart themselves with it.

Eh, I don't know. If say the Phillies shift against Freddie freeman tomorrow and he hits a groundball single to left field. Did you really hurt yourself? Freeman is capable of hitting a ball out every PA... who cares about a single

ETA... if it's losing effectiveness, why the talk of banning it? It's very effective

 

[8dog]

Against aub we had julian (i think) trying to lay down bunts. And he fouled the first two off putting him in a hole. I dont think its really hurt us but i do think we play halter a little too deep at times. There also seems to be no evidence yet that it actually works in mlb

 

[Drebin]

Eh, I don't know. If say the Phillies shift against Freddie freeman tomorrow and he hits a groundball single to left field. Did you really hurt yourself? Freeman is capable of hitting a ball out every PA... who cares about a single

ETA... if it's losing effectiveness, why the talk of banning it? It's very effective

If I'm the Phillies, I'd rather have the out and Acuna hitting with the bases empty. Freeman is capable of hitting a home run anytime, but over the course of a season, he has roughly a 5 to 6% chance of hitting a homer on any given at bat, roughly about the same as Acuna.

I didn't say it wasn't effective. In fact, I said it was for certain hitters. But it's being overused. And the talk of banning it is not serious.

The people who want it banned are the dead pull hitters who refuse to adjust their approach and are losing two to three base hits a week because of it.

 

[patdog]

I didn't say it wasn't effective. In fact, I said it was for certain hitters. But it's being overused. And the talk of banning it is not serious.

The people who want it banned are the dead pull hitters who refuse to adjust their approach and are losing two to three base hits a week because of it.

Exactly. It's effective in certain limited situations in MLB where you have hundreds of games of advanced stats to analyze for each hitter. It's being overused (definitely by us with maybe 30-40 relevant games of stats to analyze and not nearly the staff to do it), but any talk of banning it is ********.

 

[shotgunDawg]

I find this discussion to be heavily biased towards the negative because 1. We don’t give credit or realize when it works and 2. There is an echo chamber of frustration when the shift is obviously to blame.

Unless someone is going to chart when our guys are in the right position and the shifts work vs when they don’t, then I can only take this conversation as people venting frustration.

 

[Drebin]

I find this discussion to be heavily biased towards the negative because 1. We don’t give credit or realize when it works and 2. There is an echo chamber of frustration when the shift is obviously to blame.

Unless someone is going to chart when our guys are in the right position and the shifts work vs when they don’t, then I can only take this conversation as people venting frustration.

I would be saying it even if it had worked in that situation last night. Duplantis is one of the all time SEC leading hitters and can hit to all fields. So, in a one run game, we put a shift on and give him a free hit. It was retarded.

There are times that the shift is appropriate. That was not one of them.

What would you be thinking if someone shifted against Mangum? That's right....automatic hit.