It did.
The first out, you may recall, was recorded at third base. Juan Uribe was ordered to lay down a sacrifice bunt attempt and pushed the ball just a little too hard, enough to result in lead runner Michael Young getting gunned down by the Diamondbacks’ infield while a frustrated Uribe touched first base safely.
Dodgers manager Don “Mattingly … voluntarily hobbled the Dodgers by ordering hot hand Juan Uribe to sacrifice with runners on first and second and nobody out,” wrote Jay Jaffe at SI.com.
“Makes perfect sense if you’re into age-old rationales, and even if you’re not, it just might have worked if Uribe WOULD HAVE ACTUALLY GOTTEN THE JOB DONE,” wrote Tony Jackson (among his many less-than-flattering odes to the sacrifice bunt).
But if you read anything this morning about the bunt and its history, and why there’s such a loud furor over Mattingly’s decision, head over to BuzzFeed (and just try to resist the allure of “18 Animals Who Got the Last Laugh”). The age-old anti-bunting argument, presented by author Erik Malinowski, can be summed up in two points:
1, Baseball history — we’re talking a huge sample size here — shows that trading an out for 90 feet decreases a team’s odds of scoring a run.
2, Executing the bunt strategy usually requires a fast runner, a skilled bunter and another hit after the bunt (a sacrifice fly or an opponent’s error would have worked in this particular case, too). The Dodgers had none of these in the ninth inning Monday.
The argument is about as old as me — born in the early 1980s — so to convince bunting advocates against their position in 2013 reeks of dragging tobacco executives before the House of Representatives in 1994. I don’t have the power to levy a bunting tax, though I do have the power to point out its illogic. That doesn’t seem to be enough.
So what would convince Mattingly and the Dodgers to stop bunting at this point?
Malinowski hints — and recent history suggests — that it might simply require some more progressive thinking in the Dodgers’ front office, and some people who can present the data in a convincing manner. A little desperation would help, too.
Take the 2012 Pittsburgh Pirates, for example. They had an old-school manager (Clint Hurdle) and a fairly desperate circumstance. Their payroll was maxed out. They were competing in a tough division. And they were giving away outs — not by bunting, but in the way they played defense. So with the help of a few progressive front-office officials, the Pirates turned a little conventional baseball wisdom on its head and changed the way they played defense. It’s been an important factor in their success this season.
If the Pirates can do it, maybe the Dodgers can turn some (quasi-conventional) baseball wisdom on its head and change the way they advance runners. It will take desperation and progressive thinking.
Some bullet points for a Roberto Clemente Day:
• Did Matt Kemp adjust his batting stance while he was on the disabled list?
• The Dodgers’ charitable arm, the Los Angeles Dodgers Foundation (formerly the Dodgers Dream Foundation) has a new executive director.
• Scott Elbert was back in the Dodgers’ clubhouse.
• Minor-league signing to report: 19-year-old pitcher Takumi Numata. The right-hander graduated from Ohgaki Nihon University High School in 2012 and played for the Edion AIT OB Blits of the Japanese Industrial League from April-September 2013. The 6-foot-1, 188-pounder from Nagoya, Aichi, Japan was signed by Dodger scouts Isao O’Jimi and Pat Kelly. He is expected to report to Camelback Ranch – Glendale, where he will work out with the Dodgers’ Instructional League team.
• ESPN.com’s Keith Law admitted that he guessed wrong on Yaisel Puig.
• Edwin Jackson yelled at his manager.
• Pitching velocity is a risk factor for injury, writes the New York Times. (Anyone who’s watched Matt Harvey and Stephen Strasburg tear their UCLs, and seen Jamie Moyer pitch at age 49, probably could have figured this out on their own.)
• Maybe Paco Rodriguez, at this stage of the season and his career, is nothing more than a situational left-hander after all.
• ESPN.com got scouts talking about Cuban first baseman Jose Abreu, who’s recently been watched by the San Francisco Giants, among other teams.
• Forgot to point out yesterday that it was Orel Hershiser‘s birthday. Number 55 turned 55. Happy belated birthday, Bulldog.
• This solo track from Daniel Rossen of Grizzly Bear, released late last year, invokes everything I love about Grizzly Bear: