Yankees @ Red Sox- Opening Series

I just don't understand this at all. Gardner is already a perfectly capable bunter, but if he bunts, nine times out of ten it should be because he's capable of bunting for a hit, not because he's giving up an out to move a slow guy into scoring position for the leadoff hitter.

The goal of baseball (on offense) is to score as many runs as you can. Seems obvious, but it's worth pointing out because your suggestions would almost undoubtedly lower the number of runs they would score.

 

It was a sarcastic post, but is precisely what I mean. He should be drag bunting and poke hitting for base hits because his regular swing and weak subsequent contact substantially lowers his chances to get on base.

 

I doubt that's true.

Gardner's BABIP in the majors is .307... so when he makes contact, he gets on a base at a fair clip. A .300 BABIP is pretty damn good.

So he would need to succeed at least 30% of the time with his bunts in order for them to be worthwhile. That's tough to do, even for the best bunters.

Now, I see the value in the occasional bunt to keep fielders guessing. If they have to play in to guard against the bunt, it's that much more likely that he'll get grounders past them. And, really, that's all Gardner needs to do. If he hits the ball on the ground more often than in the air, he'll beat out his fair share of infield hits, in addition to the clean singles/doubles down the line, etc.

And guess what? He's doing exactly that. Like I said before, I think your beef is just with how it looks, and not how it works. And that's a shame, because it prevents you from seeing that what he does now works. He has a good eye, is ridiculously fast, has a very good contact % when he swings, and is getting better at keeping the ball on the ground. These are good things. And you want him bunting all the time? Please no.

 

Batting Average with Ball in Play?

I'm sure if I looked I would find higher BABIP in worse or on par players to Gardner.

This stat is not that much different than batting average the way I see it and his BA is a lot lower.

 

Also, you are kidding yourself if you believe Gardner is effective.

There will be a time, probably several, when Gardner will be called upon when the team needs him most, and he will fail.

Set aside the stats, if you look, apparently like I've been doing, one can clearly see his skill set is sub par.


Plus, no STAT is going to convince me otherwise, I've never liked Gardner since he came up, I'd much rather have someone else.

 

Then you don't understand what that stat means, nor do you understand how I used in that comparison.

To your other point, every single player in the entire fucking game of baseball comes up when his team needs him most and fails dozens of times every season! Are you kidding me?

Seems like all you're doing is setting up a scenario so you can hate him for whatever reason.

When I say he'll be effective, I mean he'll be a decent player. League average. He'll contribute to wins (he'll have a positive WAR).

Well, this sentence makes things a lot clearer.

Nothing like having a discussion with someone who's going to ignore facts to continue to believe what they want to believe.


By the way, I love when guys say that they're "Moneyball" guys (which is a misleading and often misapplied label), and then go on to show that they most definitely are NOT behind the concepts that were only rather superficially alluded to in the book. No, it's not ONLY the stats that are useful. But they can tell you when you're eyes are deceiving you. They aren't complete. But they're not separate from the game. They represent the game. They are representations that allow you to think critically and rationally about a situation. If you care about that sort of thing, of course. You've made it clear that you don't.

If you were interested in discussing the benefits of bunting and when it'd be a beneficial situation, I think that'd be interesting. But your recent posts seem to indicate that you're really just looking to hate on Gardner. Your posts aren't attempts at a thoughtful analysis for why X is better than Y. You take your initial feeling, and apply reasons that you hope work after the fact.

 

Seriously, fuck Joe West. Who the fuck does he think he is? Everyone knows Yankees/Red Sox games are 4 hour epics. That's how it is, and it's usually not due to guys taking their time. It's usually due to 2 things:

1) The fact that most games have 10+ combined runs scored
2) The managers micromanage their pitching all game

The first thing is due to it being two of the best lineups in baseball who see the same pitchers multiple times per year. The second is due to the fact that EIGHTEEN MOTHERFUCKING times per year MLB puts these teams head-to-head. The two teams that are fighting to see who gets to win the division or take the wildcard. What do you expect? I'd micromanage too!
-------------

As for the game, I love taking down Papelbon. The only problem with it is that it's one more nail in the coffin that leads to Bard getting the closer job in Boston.

I haven't said it today, so fuck Nick Johnson and his walks. He mixes in a nice strike out there and he actually looked like he wanted to contest a called strike that was nothing less than a great pitch. Yeah, great eye my ass.

As for Gardner, again, he's my prefered left fielder, but only because the shit piles behind him aren't any better. Santa, please bring me a Crawford for Christmas.

Chan Ho Park. Holy shit. It only gives me more heart burn when they show his face as he watches fly balls he gives up. Every time someone makes contact he looks like he needs to change his diapers. Can't really complain about the result, but where the hell was Aceves? He hasn't seen any action yet has he?

Interestingly enough, this was one of the few times I really felt like the Sox were getting completely screwed by balls/strikes calls. I'm not complaining, but I haven't felt like that in a very long time.

 

Aceves pitched Tuesday, and well...

 

...for two innings.

 

Where the hell was I? Holy shit. hmy:

 

Self-medicating maybe???

 

In all seriousness, I had been drinking a bit in the afternoon, but I'm certain I was sober during the game. And I was watching. How the hell did I miss two innings? Damn.

 

Alio, why is it so bad that Nick Johnson walks? I'm still waiting on either you, GQ, or Dwalsh to give me an answer on this.

 

I never said above. I question why he is hitting in the #2 hole, he should be leading off if he is going to walk a lot.

I'm not upset over his walks because we all knew before the season started he was going to walk a lot.

Again, like I said before, I like a guy who takes a lot of pitches, because it wears the pitcher down and the guy batting behind sees more of what the pitcher has to offer...

 

#91 baby.

He and Chan Ho were effective.

 

Cap, I suppose, I really can't gripe about Gardner until he hurts the Yanks on a routine basis.


They won their first series...I'm glad.

I understand your points, I really do, but I dislike him, although, seeing Wynn and Thames now, I agree w/ Alio there isn't a viable option on the bench.

Couple more shit shows by Thames and Gardner is batting v. LHP

 

i never said it was a bad thing that he walks. I'm a big Nick Johnson fan. Love his OBP and his eye at the plate.

I'll take a walk any day of the week, especially with Teixeira and Rodriguez behind him

 

That's fine. I don't care if some players are disliked. I just find it irritating when people then try to apply incorrect information to explain why they dislike someone. If someone wanted to say, "I dislike Nick Johnson because he has a stupid face," I got no beef with that. If someone said, "I dislike Nick Johnson because he's always hurt," that's cool, too. It's a true statement, and a reasonable concern. If, though, someone says, "I dislike Nick Johnson because he hurts the team with all of that walking and he can't hit," well, that's just flat out not true.

The same applies to your idea of why Johnson should not hit second. It's fine if you think he shouldn't... I'm sure there are plenty of arguably valid reasons someone could use to support the case that he doesn't belong there. (Perhaps you think that Johnson offers better protection for A-Rod, for example.) But saying that he's too slow and walks too much and that Gardner could bunt him over is just not a sound argument, and ignores the value Johnson provides. (i.e. He's on base all the time, presenting the people behind him with RBI opportunities.)

And one more time for the idea that Gardner sucks or should be bunting all the time. If you don't like Gardner, fine. If you think the Yanks should have signed Matt Holliday because he's better than Gardner, that's fine, too. But don't say he should be bunting all the time because his swing is ugly. That's just flat out not an effective strategy or one based on the realities of the game. Garnder has shown the ability to get on base at a decent clip at every level. It doesn't matter if it's pretty. It works... works remarkably well for a #9 hitter, especially. And it works better than the production that was offered by Melky, the guy he replaced. Bunting works well for a guy like him as a surprise and a chance to create a more favorable infield setup in the rest of his ABs. It also occasionally works if the Yanks want to move a guy over for the top of the order. But it needs to be a proper situation for that to be the right move. (I'm not a fan of how much Girardi loves the bunt.) If he's doing it for hits, though, it's an unassailable fact that he needs to have a very high success rate in order for that to be a more successful strategy than letting him swing away, regardless of how ugly you think his swing is.

He might as well right now. Gardner's not the one who has shitty L/R splits. That'd be Granderson. Or, perhaps more accurately, that would have been Granderson last year. I'm hopeful he's turned a bit of a corner and won't be god awful against lefties.

 

Cap, you misunderstood what I said.

Yes I said his swing is ugly. But also, when he makes contact with the ball, because of his poor swing, the resulting ball in play will cost him.

I looked up BABIP and it's what I thought it was with the exception that it is commonly viewed as a "luck" stat. So if he's at 308 and that's high for him, his numbers will even out.

So basically you are defending your point about Gardner with how lucky he is right now? We all know luck comes and goes.