International Tie-breaker; how do you coach it?

[Quasimodo]

International Tie-breaker - Defensive Strategies

I held a discussion among American coaches in summer of 2017 on the International Tie Breaker and how to coach it, hoping that it may help some younger coaches learn through the discussion process. I am not going to just give opinion or dogma here, but let you see some more important points made in the discussion. So here is the posted question on the internet Fast-Pitch site.

At the World Cup in Oklahoma City this past summer, the Aussie coach made what I considered a fatal error in coaching against Team Canada during their international tie-breaker. At the European Championships in Ronchi de Legionari, Italy, the Russian coach made almost the exact same error coaching against the eventual winners, The Netherlands, in a 1-1 game. Until that moment in the game, I felt the Cuban guy coaching the Russia team actually out-coached the perennial “top dogs”, The Netherlands.

I have a few questions for your consideration, but only considering the DEFENSE and potential strategies at this time:

1) How do you coach this situation as the VISITING and HOME team coaches?
2) What are your strategies and why? Help newer coaches understand with your detailed explanation.

3) One team has a distinct disadvantage! Which is it, and WHY?
4) Can you guess the mistake the coaches made, mentioned above? Think of the worst case scenario as a coaching mistake. Their mistake was not a total mistake of strategy, they had already committed to a strategy, but it got lost in the heat of battle in the 8th and 9th innings.

Remember, this is about only the Defensive perspective.

 

[quincy]

Might want to define international tie rule.

MLB played it this year with interesting results.

 

[Schmick's Gloves]

Strike all their hitters out

 

[marriard]

I have a few questions for your consideration, but only considering the DEFENSE and potential strategies at this time:

1) How do you coach this situation as the VISITING and HOME team coaches?
2) What are your strategies and why? Help newer coaches understand with your detailed explanation.

Offense:
Vistors: Get your run in by sac bunting them across to third + one of squeeze, GB to right side/sac fly/hit, try to manufacture a second run once you get your run in.

Defense ONLY:
As HOME team, get the first batter out; you HAVE to get the out. Defending runner on 3rd with 1 out can be workable. You CANNOT give up more than the one run. If you try to get the lead runner you better get them; it is a highly risky move since they are not forced.

As VISITORS; it depends whether I got 1 run across or more than 1. If I got 1, then it is the same. Get the first runner out, try to defend 1 out, runner on third. If I got two, I can play it more straight because they runner on 2 isn't the winning run.

If the winning run gets to third or even second, then establish forces at the next base by intentionally walking batters UNLESS you have an easy out coming up or it turns the order over to their best batters. I am not loading the bases for the player who is already 4-4.

If we messed up and got zero runs, then I am walking the first batter top establish the force at third, moving infields in and doing everything I can to get the lead runner at third.

3) One team has a distinct disadvantage! Which is it, and WHY?

HOME has a distinct disadvantage because the VISITORS should be in front when you come to bat. And if they found a way to get more than 1 run across you are screwed big time because you can't easily manufacture bringing in the runner from 2nd.

4) Can you guess the mistake the coaches made, mentioned above? Think of the worst-case scenario as a coaching mistake. Their mistake was not a total mistake of strategy, they had already committed to a strategy, but it got lost in the heat of battle in the 8th and 9th innings.

99.9% of the time it is not getting the first batter out. 1st and 3rd with no outs is a bad time. As HOME team you have to be OK with the run scoring because you will have the same opportunity at your at bat to execurte and manufacture the run.

 

[Nimrod]

Offense:
Vistors: Get your run in by sac bunting them across to third + one of squeeze, GB to right side/sac fly/hit, try to manufacture a second run once you get your run in.

I like your assessment. For what I quoted you on, would you play the top half of the inning the same if the score was 1-1 vs. 9-9?

 

[CoachJD]

Luckily, we have data! For baseball. Which may be different in this case, but I've yet to see any good run expectancy matrices for softball so it's the best we have.

Here's a good article from over the summer when MLB implemented the rule. The minors have been using it for a while, so that's where the data is from.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2020/07/23/heres-how-mlb-teams-should-handle-runner-second-base-extra-innings/

The tl;dr version is that the data (again, for baseball) says teams should do almost exactly the opposite of what marriard recommends.

Another caveat to the data: Data for professionals, even minor leaguers, might be comparable to the NPF or college softball, but it's likely not as comparable to the youth game.

 

[marriard]

Luckily, we have data! For baseball. Which may be different in this case, but I've yet to see any good run expectancy matrices for softball so it's the best we have.

Here's a good article from over the summer when MLB implemented the rule. The minors have been using it for a while, so that's where the data is from.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2020/07/23/heres-how-mlb-teams-should-handle-runner-second-base-extra-innings/

The tl;dr version is that the data (again, for baseball) says teams should do almost exactly the opposite of what marriard recommends.

Another caveat to the data: Data for professionals, even minor leaguers, might be comparable to the NPF or college softball, but it's likely not as comparable to the youth game.

The logic in baseball seems to be to find a way to justify not bunting...

I have seen:
-they never bunt, so they are not good at bunting
- bases are 90' so harder to sac when everyone is ready
- it goes against their normal batting, so execution is harder
- a sac fly is as good as a bunt and I might get a hit so lets do that
- 'it isn't real baseball so I am going to be all grumpy about that'

But in the end, it is 'it isn't macho to bunt'

 

[Quasimodo]

Might want to define international tie rule.

MLB played it this year with interesting results.

I didn't get to see a single MLB game being in the Philippines. But my inkling would be that MLB coaches played less small ball.

 

[marriard]

I like your assessment. For what I quoted you on, would you play the top half of the inning the same if the score was 1-1 vs. 9-9?

Most likely, yes. A lead is a lead. The pressure to execute when behind is substantial. May depend on who is coming up; but not having a lead going into the bottom half of the inning is a recipe for losing a vast majority of the time.

 

[marriard]

Went and looked at DD's team data from GC for the past 5 seasons:

10 games ITB as vistor. Scored 1 run or more in every extra inning of 9 games. Won 9 games. Only lost on a failed Sac Bunt where they did get the runner at 3rd.

12 games ITB as home. Won 9 games. 7 of those games we won when the visting team failed to score in the top half of an inning and we sac'd a girl to third and forced loaded bases (3 coaches didn't load the bases when we got the girl to 3B and they all lost)

As vistors, we won in the first extra inning 6 times. 2 games went 2 extras. 1 went 4.

As home we won only 2 times in the first extra inning. We mostly won in the second inning. Once we won in the the 4th extra.