Last night’s Mets/Phillies game lasted 10 innings (Phillies won 6-3).
10 innings = 30 outs on offense for each team. The game can’t end before you run out of these outs…these outs are valuable baseball commodities.
So can someone please explain why Jerry Manuel called for three (3!) sacrifice bunts? None of these occurred in the 8th/9th innings. Two of these occurred after lead-off doubles, so the runner was already in scoring position with no outs. The other occurred with a man on 1st and one out. All occurred with the struggling, soft-throwing Jamie Moyer on the mound (current ERA 6.11, current WHIP 1.49).
Had all three of these bunts worked as planned, the Mets would have conceded a full inning’s worth of outs. While playing against the team that has scored more runs than any other in the major leagues this season. And having Tim Redding as their starting pitcher (he actually threw a good game last night).
Someone please explain. PLEASE. I must be missing something.
Tags: jamie moyer, jerry manuel, Mets, phillies, sacrifice bunts, tim redding
(4.89 out of 5)
I agree – bad calls by Manuel. What a chowderhead. I only understand calling for a sacrifice with a runner on second and no outs in very close games in the late innings or when embroiled in a major pitcher’s duel. The last time Jamie Moyer was part of a duel, it involved musket balls, not baseballs.
It beats losing by dropping a pop-up to second.
Speaking of that disastrous dropped pop-up by Castillo, while it’s obvious that the Mets don’t lose that game if Castillo catches it, it’s also true that the Mets don’t lose that game if K-rod doesn’t give up a hit to Jeter and a walk to Texeira. Everyone was saying that Castillo blew the save and not K-rod but they’re forgetting that K-rod put two guys on in the inning, which is always asking for trouble.
To me, it’s not so much about who gets credit for the blown save. I’m don’t even like the distinction between earned and unearned runs– those base runners are on K-Rod. But the away team had a lead with two outs in the bottom of the ninth. There was an infield pop-up, which if caught, wins the game. How often does that ball get caught? 99 out of 100 times? Probably even more often. That is the odds of the Mets winning the game. When Castillo drops that ball, the odds of winning goes to 0%. Essentially certain win to completely certain loss.
There was a funny moment in the YES Network post-game interview with A-Rod. The YES reporter started her question by saying, “Francisco Rodriguez hadn’t blow a save all year…” At that point, A-Rod interrupted her and said, “He still hasn’t.”