Games » Milwaukee Brewers
Jun13The secret to exciting baseball
Lee Judge
The Kansas City Star
Here’s what the last two games have taught me: if you pitch well, play good defense and don’t score a lot of runs, you’ll have some exciting baseball games.
First inning: Brewers right fielder Norichika Aoki leads off the game. The Royals appear to defend him the same way they defend Derek Jeter, but in reverse (Jeter’s a righty, Aoki hits from the left side). Alex Gordon and Jarrod Dyson are playing Aoki to hit the fastball the other way (they’ve moved closer to the left field line) and Jeff Francoeur stays put in case Jonathan Sanchez makes a mistake with an off-speed pitch—that’s the pitch Aoki can pull.
There’s one critical difference from the way the Royals play Jeter; they’re playing shallow…and that will come up later in the game.
Gordon leads off the Royals’ half of the inning with a double and Yuniesky Betancourt does his job: he hits the ball to the right side and Gordon moves to third. Billy Butler grounds out to short and Gordon scores.
Third inning: The Brewers strike back with an infield single, a bunt single, a bunt single and an infield single to Alcides Escobar. The game is tied 1-1 and the ball hasn’t left the infield.
Fourth inning: Sanchez has been pitching extremely well, one hard-hit ball so far, but then runs into trouble when he walks Cody Ransom and George Kottaras. Edwin Maysonet then hits the ball to hell-and-gone, but Jarrod Dyson runs it down in deep center. Jarrod has just saved at least one run, maybe two.
Fifth inning: Dyson tries a bunt of his own, but Milwaukee pitcher Randy Wolf finishes in good fielding position and is able to make a play. Jonathan Sanchez falls off to the third-base side which makes him more vulnerable to bunts.
Sixth inning: Two outs, score tied, Billy Butler on first and Jeff Francoeur hits the ball down into the left field corner. Billy chugs into third and Eddie Rodriguez sends him home. Frankly, I would have been surprised if Eddie had done anything else. If Eddie stops Billy, he’s counting on Mike Moustakas getting a hit off the left-handed Wolf. The Milwaukee starter had already handled Moose twice and hitting with runners in scoring position has not been going well lately.
I’ve known a few people who have made a living standing in the third-base coaches box. They’ll tell you there are times you send a runner knowing he’ll get thrown out if the other team handles the ball perfectly. But in some cases, hoping for an off-line throw still presents a better chance than the alternative. The Brewers handled the ball well, Billy was out easily, but sending him still seemed like the right call.
Seventh inning: Score 2-1, Moustakas leads off the inning with a walk. Ned Yost lets Alcides Escobar hit away. Esky hits into a double play and a promising start goes to waste. After the game, a fan calls in to a radio show to complain about Yost not bunting in this situation. (Clearly, Ned is going to get criticized no matter what he does, so he might as well do what he thinks is right.)
If Ned had used Esky (hitting .288 at the start of the game) to bunt, Jarrod Dyson would have faced a left-handed pitcher and if that didn’t work out, Humberto Quintero would have to drive the run in with two outs.
Eighth inning: Quintero leads off with a single and, once again, Ned chooses not to bunt. Understandable, since he’d be using Alex Gordon to sacrifice. Yost sends Chris Getz out to pinch run, but Francisco Rodriguez has shortened up his motion and is getting the ball to home plate too quickly for Getz to steal. Gordon flies out and Yuni hits into another double play to end the inning.
Bunt or hit away: both have risks.
Ninth inning: Playing Aoki shallow hurts the Royals when he splits the left-center gap for a double. The Brewers bunt him over and he scores the third Milwaukee run. Aoki scores when Brayan Pena picks up the bunt, feels he has no time to set his feet and makes a wide throw to first base. This is one of the reasons teams lay down bunts: if you constantly hit away, people play where they want and make plays that are familiar and comfortable. Bunting can force people into attempting throws they normally don’t make. That’s what happens to Pena.
In the bottom of the inning, pitcher John Axford sets up the Royals by walking Hosmer and Moustakas, then gives up a triple to Escobar. Game tied. We go to extra innings. Deadlines are missed.
Eleventh inning: Butler singles, Hosmer walks and Francoeur hits a shot into left field. This time Eddie Rodriguez stops Billy at third. I can’t tell if the crowd is booing Eddie or saying “Moooose”, but I suspect it’s a combination of both. The fans who were so sure Eddie shouldn’t have sent Billy in the sixth are now sure Eddie should have sent Billy in the 11th.
Once again, it appears Eddie has made the right call: nobody is out and the Royals have three shots at scoring Butler. It only takes one, Moose walks and there’s your ballgame.
One on one
Once again, I got some time with Yost, and here’s what I learned:
We’ll see him play for one run more often when the team isn’t hitting. He doesn’t see the point in playing for the big inning when the big inning doesn’t seem likely. As long as the one run matters, he’s likely to go for it.
Ned brought in Jonathan Broxton to close the game Tuesday night, even though the hitter leading off the inning, Aramis Ramirez, has good numbers against the Kansas City closer. Ned believes the closer is the closer and if you start messing around with those roles, you’re going to pay for that down the road. If the closer makes a mess (Broxton did) let him get out of his own mess (Broxton did), not a mess created by somebody else. Give them a clean inning to work with.
Ned wasn’t going to get a reliever up while Luis Mendoza had a no-hitter going. He didn’t want Luis to look down in the pen and see someone warming up, but Ned made sure the pen knew that if Mendoza gave up a hit, he wanted Aaron Crow up fast.
Ned said he doesn’t believe in managing strictly by the book. Every situation is unique and he may make a decision that doesn’t follow accepted “by the book” managing. He played for a tie on the road in Pittsburgh because he felt his bullpen was in better shape than the Pirates’ and big innings have been hard to come by. He figured, get it tied, then worry about the win.
Mr. Robinson’s new neighborhood
I ask Clint Robinson the difference between Triple-A and the big leagues, and he tells me about his first major league at-bat. He was facing the Pittsburgh Pirates’ closer, Joel Hanrahan. Hanrahan had the whole deal, closer music, weird facial hair and great stuff.
The first pitch was 96 MPH on the black away. In Omaha, Clint would not want to swing at that pitch. A pitch like that would be the best the pitcher could do and Clint could count on something a little more hittable on the next delivery.
In the big leagues, Clint thought that might be the best pitch he was going to get and maybe he should’ve swung. Sure enough, two back-foot sliders later, Clint was headed back to the dugout, carrying his bat. Clint tells me he’s not overwhelmed and he knows he can make the adjustment. He’s just got to jump on that first hittable fastball he sees — up here, he may not get two.
Escobar
Moustakas
Butler
Blair Bieser
11 months, 2 weeks agoIn the bottom of the 8th, with the Royals down a run, Quintero singled, and Getz pinch-ran for him. Gordon then flied out, and Betancourt grounded into a double play. I was surprised Yost didn’t leave Getz in to play second in the top of the 9th and substitute Pena for Betancourt. It seemed to me Yost would have wanted to put his best defense out there to try to keep the deficit at just one run for the bottom of the 9th. Plus, if the game went into extra innings, there’d more likely be a need for “small ball”, and it seemed to me Yost would have wanted Getz in the line-up for his ability to steal a base or bunt. And Getz would have been the 7th man due up instead of Pena.
John Wilson
11 months, 2 weeks agoI too was surprised Getz didn’t stay in the lineup. I was also surprised they sent Billy home to try and score. It was all good in the end tho.
Blair Bieser
11 months, 2 weeks agoIt’s funny, but I was thinking afterwards that a possibly good reason not to send Butler might be to make Wolf face Moustakas and hopefully run up his pitch count so the Royals could get into the Brewers bullpen sooner.
Don Aubry
11 months, 2 weeks agoI understand the reasoning behind sending Billy. The Brewers had to make two well-executed throws ans a well-executed tag. What I don’t understand is why Billy didn’t slide. The catcher didn’t have to execute. That was about as awkward an entry to home as I have seen.
Fred Bracken
11 months, 2 weeks agoDoes anyone else wonder why Ned left Billy in the game in the 11th rather than pinch-run for him when he was at second base? It worked out OK, but it might not have.
John Wilson
11 months, 2 weeks agoFred - according to the announcers, there was nobody left on the bench to pinch-run since Getz had already gone in to run earlier.
Bryan Knight
11 months, 2 weeks agoYup…Getz ran for Quintero, Pena replaced him. Robinson batted for Dyson, and Maier replaced him, so that was the whole bench…The only possiblity was maybe a starting pitcher on his day off, but that’s very risky.
Larry Tindle
11 months, 2 weeks agoFred, he had already used his bench. He would have had to run a pitcher.
Don, it is the responsiblity of the on deck hitter to tell the runner what to do. Can’t find a camera angle that shows what was happening.
Our announcers didn’t explain the balk in the 4th but the Brewers announcers did. Sanchez did nothing wrong. Hos was moving away from the base when the throw came. The first baseman has to be stationary or moving towards the bag on a pick off.
Lee, according to Rule 8.02 (e) Moose is not allowed to use the rosin bag on his glove. I know we have talked about his use of rosin on past posts.
Spent the 9th inning standing next to a Brewers fan. He was describing Axford to me and I thought he was talking about Broxton. Always a heart atack but seems to get the job done most times. Thankfully not last night.
Fred Bracken
11 months, 2 weeks agoGood reason. I wasn’t keeping track.
Joe Reubens
11 months, 2 weeks agoYeah - the bench was empty, unless we wanted to send out Chen to pinch run for Billy. Getz pinch ran, Pena replaced him for D, Robinson pinch hit for Dyson and Mitch replaced him in CF. The bench is not very versatile right now but I’m not sure what could fix that. I like Robinson and would love it if he could succeed but his only experience will most likely be PHing - doesn’t make sense to bench Hos or Billy to get him more PAs.
After Esky’s triple I thought that Ned might have known what he was doing last year. This was the type of situation many were grumbling about not PHing for him last year (I’ll admit I did my share). Esky came through in the clutch.
Does anybody have any insight on when Cain or Perez will be up? I’m curious to see what happens with Q and Pena. I would rather stick with Pena but I will not be surprised if they go with Q - not that the trade can look much worse, but trading two prospects for 40 games from Q and much much less from Bourgeios doesn’t seem likely. Q has done well - but it seems like we payed too steep a price to get him when he wasn’t going to start in Houston anyway.
Brendan Woodbury
11 months, 2 weeks agoLee -
It’s fun to watch the Royals win a few, especially over the Brewers with Tuesday’s win coming against Greinke and with Escobar playing a huge role in last night’s win.
I know that there’s been a lot of debate in the comments recently about what the comments should be, and today’s notes help clarify my thinking.
I think today’s notes do a great job of putting the debate on here into relief. Sabermetrics is overwhelmingly about knowing and playing the odds. Yost’s managing style is about knowing (at least some of) the odds but also playing hunches.
I don’t at all rule out the possibility that a manager can beat the odds — either through having info the stats don’t capture, or by perceiving something subconciously, or just through dumb luck (although luck ought to bounce around month to month and year to year).
So Yost and his coaches should feel free to play hunches — to send a runner from third who looks easily out, to sac bunt in the fourth inning, to start Yuni at second. It’s nice to have some insight into how he makes these decisions, and this blog does a great job providing that insight.
It’s also important for saber guys to acknowledge that deviating from the seemingly optimal play can be successful. In poker, lots of people know the odds and choose to defy the odds and play a hunch instead. Some go bankrupt; some of them make millions.
However, I think it makes sense to count the chips in front of Yost and see how his hunches are working out.
At some regular intervals, I think the Royals results should be measured against run expectancy and league averages. I understand if you want to limit debate the rest of the time, but I think there’s real value in checking to see whether the strategy is working.
Matt Davis
11 months, 2 weeks agoI was at the game and started thinking that we hadn’t seen Tim Collins in awhile. Then he comes into the game in the 11th and ended up with the win. That’s great, but I still came home and checked Baseball Reference for his latest appearances. After pitching in a slew of games in May, his June appearances were June 2, June 4, June 8, June 13. I realize there were a couple off days in there, but between June 4 and 8 there were 2 games, and since the 8th he had sat 3 games and Yost was apparently willing to let him sit a 4th straight game until he was running out of pitchers in the 11th. Anything going on? “Minor” injury? Or just circumstances?
John Wilson
11 months, 2 weeks agoJoe - Ned Yost had said in an interview in the last week (I don’t remember if it was in the Star or on TV) that he didn’t feel that he would have to send a catcher down immediately once Perez came back. Beyond that, Pena appears at least to me to be the most likely to go if any catcher does. That probably means Clint Robinson goes back down since he is up for interleague play anyway.
Jay Hall
11 months, 2 weeks agoFirst off, I agreed with letting Escobar swing the bat in the 7th inning. Too many people base their criticisms off the results rather than the strategy. The strategy didn’t work out, but down one run it doesn’t make sense to take the bat out of the hands of the best batter due up that inning.
I was glad to see the Royals work walks to key the win last night. Too often, the Royals are chasing pitches early in the count, leaving them in bad counts or hitting pitcher’s pitches for weak outs. Working walks is a way to spark the offense when guys aren’t slugging all over the park.
Butler should have slid on the play at the plate, I think. He was indecisive and that usually leads to bad play or injuries. It is possible that he didn’t get any direction from the on deck circle, but with the catcher set up outside the baseline, Billy at least has to aim for the inner third of the plate. Still, Billy did his job (hit) and did it well.
Jared Dull
11 months, 2 weeks agoJoe, Cain should start minor league rehab any day now and we may see Perez before the end of the next road trip.
As far as Q or Pena, I would have to give the slight edge to Q. Their OPS is almost identical but Q has significantly more RBIs (18 to 11) and Q seems to be a little more reliable as a catcher which I’m sure is due to his experience. Still a tough call though because Pena is younger and has more upside.
It was disappointing, as well as surprising, to see Hoz not run out that sharp hit to short. Corey Hart bobbled it and if Hoz had hustled he may have been safe at first. They would have had runners on the corners with two out in a close game with Frenchy coming up against a lefty. Instead it was inning over.
Jeff Frost
11 months, 2 weeks agoThe Royals train is coming! We are due for a stretch of success! Starting pitching is coming around. Relief has been amazing. Defense has had it’s ups and downs, but is turning a corner, and truly should be very good when you think about it- Moose, much improved, Getz, very good, Dyson can run anything down, and Escobar, Hosmer, Perez, Gordon, and Frenchy all GG winners or caliber. With that said, we have good hitters who have not been in sync yet. As soon as we get everyone hitting and doing it when RISP is there, this team could be scary.
Remember- on July 20, 1984 the Royals were 42-52 and 10 behind in a weak division. We win the pennant and it becomes the impetus to us winning it all in 1985!! BELIEVE!!! (No- I didn’t drink the kool-aid, just feel VERY good about this team yet!)
Go Royals and thanks Lee for always amazing insight!
Tom Roesler
11 months, 2 weeks agoI didn’t get to see the first six innings of the game last night and was bummed because I really wanted to see how Sanchez approached the game. I’ve felt all season that he was trying to be “too fine” in trying to paint the corners (basically, not throwing strikes).
How did he do last night? What was is strikes to balls ratio? How many pitches did he throw?
I can’t help but think if he just pounds the zone, he can be a really effective pitcher, so I’m hoping that’s what he started doing last night. Any help?
Tom Roesler
11 months, 2 weeks agoAlso, meant to give Lee props for the catching video. That’s the reason why you get respect and one of the reasons I think you’re the best at what you do. Keeping it real. Keeping it fun. Keeping it baseball. Thanks Lee!
Jared Dull
11 months, 2 weeks agoTom, Sanchez looked pretty good. He was a little wild at times, but that’s to be expected with him. His stuff was dominant until about the 80 pitch mark. He lost a lot of velocity. Hopefully thats due to not pitching much over the last couple months and not some lingering problem from the injury. He says he’s 100%, but pitchers aren’t always honest about their health, i.e. Danny Duffy.
And I sure hope Sanchez is better in the locker room than he is with the media. The guy comes across as a jerk, quite frankly. I mean you don’t have to be Bruce Chen, but at least act like you appreciate being here.
Jim Fetterolf
11 months, 2 weeks ago“Sabermetrics is overwhelmingly about knowing and playing the odds.”
The odds of a very large and average sample size.
“Yost’s managing style is about knowing (at least some of) the odds but also playing hunches.”
What you see as hunches are equivalent to a card-counter playing black jack. He is playing much more specific odds than just “stay on 14”. Gets back to weighting from historical averages to at-the-moment specifics.
Luke Healy
11 months, 2 weeks agoI didn’t mind billy being sent home on the two-out double. It took a perfect relay and the lefty-lefty matchup was next. I wonder what the percentages are though for a relay throw to the plate for most teams, or if the third base coach is aware of that going into the game. Sure you sometimes see that relay throw bouncing away—but professionals seem like they are able to hit the cutoff man and make the throw home the majority of the time if they have the time to make two throws. Am I wrong? I still agree with the decision, just wondering.
Charles Purvis
11 months, 2 weeks agoIt didn’t take two perfect throws to get Butler in the 6th—it wasn’t even remotely close at the plate.
I didn’t know that a first baseman can cause a balk. Learned something new.
Curtis Ruder
11 months, 2 weeks agoSure, Yost is going to be criticized no matter what. But the key is discerning which criticism is good (mine) versus which is garbage (most everyone else’s).
OK, I’m joking in the parentheses. But this does illustrate why I participate in the debate here but not on talk radio. The ratio of idiots is much lower, even when I disagree.
I also didn’t see Moustakas helping Billy when he was thrown out. I don’t think it would have mattered, other than Billy might have looked more confident. But he still would have been out.
I understand Ned’s thinking about big innings; I really do. But I also think that his thinking is part of the problem. Yes, the offense is struggling to put a big inning together. But it doesn’t help that whenever we get a couple of runners on, we then give away an out to get in the way of a big inning. At the same time, when a guy is pressing, giving him a simpler way to contribute can get him out of his head a little bit, the way a cold shooter in basketball might get fouled, make a couple of freebies, and reestablish his rhythm. So there are pros and cons. But dang if it doesn’t seem like we cooperate with the defense in preventing the big inning.