Is bunting considered "old softball"

[Bonesaw]

I remember Bama beating Florida because Barnhill couldn't field a bunt. I was there.

And at what level of play was the math calculated from?

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I would bet all the calculations and stats are from baseball.

 

[ANNASDAD]

When you and your team think you’re all that and at the worst possible time you run up against a team full of lightening bolts who will bunt at anytime and in any count. You quickly find yourself 7 runs down and wondered what happened?

You then realize how relevant bunting is!

Over the past several years I’ve actually screamed at the TV more than once watching MLB, especially postseason when a bunt was 120% the right call at a particular time or situation. But no........infield pop up, wasted out, baserunner stayed put!

 

[krazykat]

Any thoughts on the coaches who let their player swing at strike 1 and then attempt to sacrifice with one strike. I've never understood that strategy; however, I am not an analytics guy.

 

[Bullseye]

Any thoughts on the coaches who let their player swing at strike 1 and then attempt to sacrifice with one strike. I've never understood that strategy; however, I am not an analytics guy.

Deception or after the swing and miss says better off trying to bunt.

A batter bunting with a runner roaring in from third must be a damn fast executed play to get the out at home. Tag play at that.

 

[_MIA_]

I haven’t looked at the analytics but for HL players I would guess that it would tell you it only makes sense to bunt with zero outs and when you only need to score a single run, e.g bottom of the last inning scored tied.

Of course in any statistical analysis which uses a subset of the population (in this case probably professional baseball) to accumulate the data there may be situations where the particular game situation would actually have a different distribution e.g the defense for whatever reason doesn’t do a good job of securing outs against bunts. This would be the case a lot of the times at the younger ages but in that case do you really want your developing hitters bunting all the time?

 

[Bullseye]

I wish Dusty Baker knew about this old school thing called bunting! Now that the MLB instituted ITB in extra innings where a runner starts on 2nd with 0 outs. Bunt your runner over and have 2 outs to get him to cross the plate. The small ball game put pressure on a defense and can reveal weaknesses and tendencies in coverages.

When I see a team start bunting a lot and our team cannot defend it, I call it "Death by Small Ball." You know what bothers more than anything? When a kid can't lay down a sac bunt. They try to get fancy and do a sneaky bunt which results in a pop up or 2 foul balls which ends up in K.

MLB will bring in sprinters and teach them to bunt.

 

[_MIA_]

MLB will bring in sprinters

They have tried doing that in football... it typically doesn’t work out too well.

 

[625ender]

When you and your team think you’re all that and at the worst possible time you run up against a team full of lightening bolts who will bunt at anytime and in any count. You quickly find yourself 7 runs down and wondered what happened?

You then realize how relevant bunting is!

Over the past several years I’ve actually screamed at the TV more than once watching MLB, especially postseason when a bunt was 120% the right call at a particular time or situation. But no........infield pop up, wasted out, baserunner stayed put!

It's an out in MLB.

Professional hitters are good. Rolling the dice on them making contact or laying down a bunt is easy. If the batter hit a ball to right and drove in a run would you feel differently? A deep sac fly?

If small ball worked they would do it. I assure you of that

 

[ANNASDAD]

If the batter hit a ball to right and drove in a run would you feel differently?

Well absolutely! But the scenarios I’m referring to that wasn’t the case, I’d rather waste an out advancing a runner than wasting one and not moving the runner.........wouldn’t you?

And these professional hitters you speak of were the ones I was screaming at, well them and their managers!

Pretty sure it was Joe Maddon in the 2017 NLCS I’m talking about, if I remember correctly. He had several situations were he should have sacrificed bunted and didn’t.....and blew it! And the Dodgers sent them home!

 

[625ender]

Well absolutely! But the scenarios I’m referring to that wasn’t the case, I’d rather waste an out advancing a runner than wasting one and not moving the runner.........wouldn’t you?

And these professional hitters you speak of were the ones I was screaming at, well them and their managers!

Pretty sure it was Joe Maddon in the 2017 NLCS I’m talking about, if I remember correctly. He had several situations were he should have sacrificed bunted and didn’t.....and blew it! And the Dodgers sent them home!

Thats a big difference between well coached defenses and poorly coached defenses. A properly coached pitcher will not let you bunt in a bunting situation. Also a properly coached defense will kill that lead runner no question.

You see it all the time in fastpitch. Everybody in the park knows what a slapper or bunter is about to do, but poorly coached teams let it happen.