Phil Wood's Take on the Stolen Base Controversy
by zib23 on Sep 2, 2010 3:52 PM EDT
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PrintThe man makes a strong point.
It's amazing that so many fans seem to think that stealing bases when you're down by double digit runs is somehow breaking one of the game's unwritten rules. When you're up by a bunch you don't steal; when you're trying to come back - with 5 innings left to play - it's a calculated risk and nothing more.
The whole thing's worth a read. He disapproves of a lot of what Nyjer did, but not the stolen bases.
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There's room for disagreement here
but I think Ray Knight said it best yesterday. Everyone watching the game knew exactly what was going on. Those stolen bases had absolutely nothing with trying to win the game for the Nats. It was solely about giving the Marlins the finger for the beanball. Knight described it as “showing up” the Marlins.
What I really don’t like about it, is that it puts our guys at risk. Being stand-up guys, the other Nats went out there in support of Morgan, even though I suspect many of them probably don’t agree with what Morgan has been doing for the past two or three weeks (throwing the ball at the fan in Philadelphia, decking two catchers when he would have had a better chance to score by sliding, stealing the bases to flip off the Marlins). So if the other Nats don’t go out there, they will appear cowardly and disloyal. But if they do go out there, they risk getting a serious injury because of a series of dumb actions on Morgan’s part. It’s a no-win situation for them. It’s unfair for Morgan to put his teammates in that position.
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"Save it. I'm goin' for a smoothie."
The Washington Nationals, the team of the 2010s!
I don't care why he stole the bases
It’s irrelevant. Stealing bases is a baseball move. Plunking a guy is a revenge/douche/punk move. If you want to get revenge for a guy stealing bases, you do it with a baseball move.
"Don't mind WM...he's an all-around jerk."
One of those might have been aggressively holding him on second base and slapping some nasty tags on him.
On a desperate search for Sunshine at Nats Park. In Rizzo and Ramos we trust.
Hypothetical:
What little game Nyjer has left is his speed. Those stolen bases actually created a run. He may have been extra-motivated because they plunked him, but he was still playing his game. So here is an hypothetical: Adam Dunn’s game is power. If he hit a solo shot the next time up, down 11 runs, would that be “showing up” the Marlins?
No, of course not.
I know it’s strange, but stealing bases, swinging on 3-0 counts and pick-off plays are treated as no-nos in lopsided games. Getting hits or striking hitters out are not. That’s just the way the game has evolved. All the players know it, or they should know it. The fact that Nyjer managed to score a run on a cheap SF because of the steals is not really relevant.
Baseball is a pretty nuanced sport. There are a lot of traditions that don’t translate at all to other sports. This all comes about because there’s a lot of thinking time in baseball, and every little thing players do is captured, observed, and noted for future reference. As time has passed these unwritten rules have come about and they are respected, even if they often seem to not make much sense.
By the way, back to your question, if Adam Dunn hits the home run it’s perfectly OK. If he stands at home plate for two seconds and admires his home run it’s a “plunkable infraction”. Very subtle difference, I know.
Rob
"Ninety feet between home plate and first base may be the closest man has ever come to perfection." -- Red Smith
I always thought that the "unwritten rules" only applied to the winning team.
It’s just dumb to try to handicap the losing team. If we’re going to do that, we should just institute an unwritten mercy rule. If you’re losing by 10 runs, the game is over. We wouldn’t want anyone to get offended.
Some of those 'rules' work both ways
Typically, teams don’t hold the runners, which gives them a better lead, but they are also expected not to try to take advantage of the situation and steal the base. I think in general this allows the game to progress quickly. Both teams usually want to move it along, not worry about the single-run, small-ball style of ball that drags the game down without much chance at all of affecting the outcome. If the losing team crawls its way back into the game, its going to do so by stringing together a bunch of hits, not by stealing bases, sacrificing, etc.
Rob
"Ninety feet between home plate and first base may be the closest man has ever come to perfection." -- Red Smith
Not Sure
If the defense is not holding the runner on, then that is a huge advantage to the defense in preventing hits that could lead to a comeback. Anyway Ben Goessling reported that, “(A few scouts) didn’t have a problem with him stealing two bases in the fourth inning – and as one person pointed out, the Marlins were holding Morgan on the bag when he stole them. If they’re doing that, it’s clear they expect him to run.”
If “not running when you are down big” is an unwritten rule, I think it is the least known— that is why there is so much dispute. But I am not even sure that people just aren’t confusing this situation with “don;t steal when you are up big”, conflating it because of how big a mess Nyjer has been of late.
Even Gaby Sanchez seemed confused. When former MLB pitcher and XM Radio host Jeff Nelson defended the right of the losing teams to employ the stolen base in a comeback, Sanchez responded, “Yeah, I definitely understand both ways of it, it was just I definitely know he was stealing because he got hit. It wasn’t, ‘Oh, we’re down by 10 or 11, I’m going to steal those to get to third, it was, ‘You guys hit me on purpose so now I’m going to steal second, I’m going to steal third,’ and I know that was his mindset…”
It wasn’t an unwritten rule that got Nyjer plunked; it was that the Marlins were still mad at him and think he’s a punk. I won;t argue that judgement one way or the other, but it wasn’t an unwritten rule. If it was, it shouldn’t be.
Fair enough.
I think Volstad and Sanchez are punks too.
"Inconceivable!"
"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."
-The Princess Bride
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