Sacrifice Bunts and Math

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radness

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Dec 13, 2019
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...read it to be in agreement with a good reason to try to get runners on base.#5 hitter on fire.

Think the sacrifice word is not the objective here.
 
Jun 8, 2016
16,118
113
...read it to be in agreement with a good reason to try to get runners on base.#5 hitter on fire.

Think the sacrifice word is not the objective here.
Sure..but the thread is about sacrifice bunts...We've had this "discussion" before. Nobody is saying bunting with the intent of getting on base is a bad thing in certain circumstances just like in a few (not many) cases it makes statistical sense to sacrifice bunt.
 
Jun 8, 2016
16,118
113
Understand that leadoff single sacrificed to 2B and scoring chances go down, but a little surprised that leadoff double sacrificed to 3B and scoring chances go up. You hear a lot of "already in scoring position", "score from 2nd on a single". Sac fly/wild pitch must outweigh that.
The probability of scoring is still pretty high so they are in "scoring position"..just not as good a "scoring position" ;)
 
Oct 26, 2019
1,375
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Here is a good example of bunting in a bad spot last weekend. 10U semifinal game we are winning 7-6 in the top of the 5th (time expired and last inning). Opposing team is hitting in the top with a runner on 3rd and no outs. I called time to conference with the defense to make sure they knew if the other team bunted we wanted to take the out at first. The game would be tied and we would score in the bottom of the inning just like we had scored in every previous inning of the game.

sure enough - they bunted her home, she scored, and we took the out at first. We got out of that inning with no more runs allowed because the sac bunt killed their rally. We scored in the bottom to win. If I’m the visiting team in that situation I’m trying to score more than 1 run in that inning and swinging away.
 
Jun 8, 2016
16,118
113
Here is a good example of bunting in a bad spot last weekend. 10U semifinal game we are winning 7-6 in the top of the 5th (time expired and last inning). Opposing team is hitting in the top with a runner on 3rd and no outs. I called time to conference with the defense to make sure they knew if the other team bunted we wanted to take the out at first. The game would be tied and we would score in the bottom of the inning just like we had scored in every previous inning of the game.

sure enough - they bunted her home, she scored, and we took the out at first. We got out of that inning with no more runs allowed because the sac bunt killed their rally. We scored in the bottom to win. If I’m the visiting team in that situation I’m trying to score more than 1 run in that inning and swinging away.
Sac bunting really only makes sense statistically if you know for sure 1 run is going to win you the game...e.g. home team, last inning, tie game. Of course this is based upon an "average" hitter so if you have a kid who has struck out 158 times in a row (e.g. most National League pitchers)....well.
 
May 17, 2012
2,804
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Plus NCAA softball stats and probabilities don't really map so cleanly to MLB stats. Aside from the obvious detail that baseball and softball are different games, MLB players and umpires tend to make fewer mistakes than even the best college players.

If I had a dollar every time someone posted this.....there are websites and research papers that are dedicated to fastpitch analytics based on fastpitch stats. Guess what, they hold up very similar to MLB analytics. Specifically runs expectancy analytics.

Hell use your own stats and plug a season worth of stats into the formulas.

I know I did.
 
May 17, 2012
2,804
113

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