- Feb 12, 2014
- 648
- 43
In Saturday's Alabama vs. Florida game, Coach Murphy had his clean up batter sacrifice bunt a runner from first to second base with no outs. That runner was eventually stranded as Alabama struggled offensively. It really got me thinking about the role of the sacrifice bunt in softball.
It's now generally accepted among those who like analytics that sacrifice bunts are a terrible strategy in baseball. For instance, sacrificing often lowers the chances of a runner scoring rather than enhances the chance. Giving away outs is more and more seen as a bad move in baseball.
Is this true in softball? Bunting, especially slap bunts and bunting for base hits, is a much larger part of the game of softball than in baseball. Does this make any difference in terms of sacrifice bunting? I'd love to hear the thoughts of others on the topic. Is the sacrifice over-used? Does it potentially do more harm than good as in baseball? Is there anything remotely similar to SABR for the game of softball that goes back and looks at mathematical trends in the game?
It's now generally accepted among those who like analytics that sacrifice bunts are a terrible strategy in baseball. For instance, sacrificing often lowers the chances of a runner scoring rather than enhances the chance. Giving away outs is more and more seen as a bad move in baseball.
Is this true in softball? Bunting, especially slap bunts and bunting for base hits, is a much larger part of the game of softball than in baseball. Does this make any difference in terms of sacrifice bunting? I'd love to hear the thoughts of others on the topic. Is the sacrifice over-used? Does it potentially do more harm than good as in baseball? Is there anything remotely similar to SABR for the game of softball that goes back and looks at mathematical trends in the game?