NLC transition to speed ?

[Redsfan1507]

Of course, Billy Hamilton is going to be important to the Reds Plan A...Cardinals lose Beltran and Freese, added Bourjos, making room for possible move of Carpenter to 3b, Wong to 2b. Sounds like more SB might be in their plans...although if Craig moves to OF, and Grizzly Adams gets more PT at 1b, they might not lose many HR either. Adams is a beast. Lefty hitting beast, BTW. IMO, if PED's are truly on the decline, we may see trends back toward speed and less dependant on HR again. It would be nice if BH could get the Reds ahead of that curve.

 

[JohnU]

I think a lot of front offices now are being blinded by sabrmetrics, which is fine for evaluating trends.

But when one metric is up, another is probably affected by that and some of these guys will end up doing what they always did -- use the eyeball test because, frankly, they don't have time to absorb all the data. It's a "huh, so what do we do next?" dilemma.

The SB has always been useful and most managers got away from it when the "data" showed that players were being thrown out. The problem was, these managers were expecting people to steal just because they could get a good jump. I don't care how good you are, if you are Brandon Phillips, you are not going to steal 80 percent of the bases.

After the managers all figured out that runners ain't that smart and catchers really ARE, they quit stealing.

The stolen base turns a single into a scoring chance but it's not as easy as a double.

Doubles are also hard.

This documentary established, the smarter stolen base strategy is in place. LaRussa told them to go when the ball was in the dirt. They still do that. I don't know why everyone doesn't. But you have to have something of an awareness at first base, unlike the Baker strategy of wait until the ball is hit, then try to reach 3rd base.

St. Lousy will be a real tough team again because they worked on fundamentals of hitting. Their baserunning was suspect and it's better now.

 

[Redsfan1507]

I prefer a single and a steal stranded at 2b, to a single and a strikeout and a DP pulling for a 2 run homer.

When about 65% of base stealers are successful, and homers only happen 5% of at bats, I'd try to figure out a way to advance more on steals and just consider homers occasional good fortune. Still gotta put the ball in play, it just doesn't have to be 400 feet.