Look at Ray Ray Run

I don't want to call out any posters specifically, but I am so tired of reading that Leury Garcia is a "good" utility player. He's not. He's one of the worst players in MLB (this year he has been the 2nd worst player in baseball). Leury Garcia has never been good. He's never been a player you have to lock up - he's always been replaceable (look at how Mendick is playing in limited time this year). The White Sox currently have two players in the minor leagues that would absolutely outproduced Leury Garcia for a minimum wage (Lenyn Sosa and Yolbert). After last night, Leury Garcia now has a 24 wRC+. The worst in baseball for anyone with over 100 PA's. Since Leury Garcia entered the league, of players with at least 2000 PA's in that span, Leury Garcia has been the 17th worst player in MLB via fWAR. By that same demographic, he's been the 9th worst hitter with a 76 wRC+. By every measure, Leury Garcia is one of the worst players who has been given any sort of consistent playing time in the past decade. While Leury Garcia leading off is inexplicable - Leury Garcia had the lowest wRC+ for a leadoff hitter this late in a season (with greater than 100 AB's) in at least the past 50 years - the onus can't lie solely on the shoulders of Tony La Russa. That said, the decisions of La Russa have just been inexplicable. La Russa's decision making has gotten so bad that other teams announcers are calling them out publicly: Rick Hahn was supposedly serious about winning, but he gave one of the worst players in baseball a three year contract which limited funds to allocate (apparently). Not only did he give him a three year contract, but he was one of the Sox first moves. Rick Hahn viewed Leury Garcia as a must lock up. Beyond that, this has happened multiple off-seasons now; Rick Hahn feels the need to "beat the market" for players who would likely have no market. No one in baseball was going to give Leury Garcia three years at 16+ million dollars, because as I laid out above, Leury Garcia is awful at baseball. This team made fans sit through a rebuild for years under the guise of spending and supporting the group once they came into their contention window. I guess Rick Hahn meant supporting them with dollars spent on replaceable utility players who are on the wrong side of 30. Eduardo Escobar, who cost the same yearly as Josh Harrison/Leury Garcia has been worth 1.1 fWAR. That's 2.2 more fWAR than Garcia/Harrison combined despite having similar total PA's. If Rick Hahn was serious about winning, he would release Leury Garcia and Josh Harrison today. He would call up Yolbert and Sosa. There was no excuse for Hahn to spend 10+ million dollars on two players who were easily two of the worst players in MLB. I'm tired of watching Leury Garcia and Josh Harrison. How Rick Hahn executed this off-season is baffling. And LEURY GARCIA IS NOT A GOOD UTILITY PLAYER. Please stop saying that.

Sheets running into robert. Jfc. Why does sheets keep starting in rf

Hes been the worst hitter in baseball. He's not a good anything

Nice. Biggest at bat of the game and the leadoff guy is up. That's gotta be a good thing, right??

Sox have two guys in the minors that would absolutely be better than Harrison a and leury (hard not to be) but rick hann isn't actually serious about winning,

I explain pretty thoroughly that I stated in my first post that they enforce offensive/defensive positions limits (not just defense), and also explained that I found it pretty arbitrary whether it's on offense or defense - the purpose is the same. Also that I found it odd that you are willing to accept it on offense in some sports, and offense and defense in basketball, but defense in baseball is for some reason off limits. Also, lineman are restricted once a ball is snapped as well.

Hockey you can't even enter a zone of the ice without the puck being there first. Soccer you can never be in front of the last line of defense as an offensive player and receive the ball. Basketball you cannot stand in the lane without an offensive player around you for longer than 3 seconds. In football, you cannot line up more than a certain amount of players on the line of scrimmage and only a certain kind of player is allowed to run past the line of scrimmage on pass plays. As I noted in my post, other leagues enforce defensive/offensive positioning to limit exploitative practices. I don't really think there's much difference between doing it on offense or defense. You're just choosing to accept those sports restrictions on player locations or movements, while being critical of MLB's proposal and pretending they're not at all similar. I'd argue they're all predicated around the same thing.

Leury Garcia has a 464 OPS and the WORST wRC+ in baseball (29!!!) of anyone with over 130 PA's. Yet here he is, leading off for the White Sox.

Why is Tony La Russa the way he is?

kind of like painting blue lines under ice, white lines on grass, and white lines on wood

I'm not too worried about infielders sprinting to another side of the base during the pitch (pretty sure that would be squashed, for one, and I greatly doubt the effectiveness of that strategy). Defense is reactionary, if you're moving before the ball is hit, you're never going to be in a very good defensive or reactionary position.

"• A ban on infield shifts. Beginning in 2023, teams no longer will be allowed to have more than two infielders on one side of second base. Opening the field puts a premium on athleticism and incentivizes hitters to put the ball in play." baseball is even discussing an outfield line to prevent OF'ers from playing super deep to cut off doubles and triples: • A maximum depth for outfielders. Still in the planning stage, it may be tried in extended spring games this year, perhaps defined by a green arc painted in the grass. Initial research by MLB shows that for every 10 feet outfielders play shallower, the rate of doubles and triples increases by 2%. With analytics pushing outfielders deeper, the rate of doubles and triples has fallen 12% in 20 years. https://www.si.com/mlb/2022/04/12/baseball-radical-changes-coming#:~:text=A ban on infield shifts,put the ball in play.&text=A maximum depth for outfielders.

How is it unfair to point to one area that has affected the overall degradation of offense that was laid out in my post? At no point did I imply that it was only because of shifts that those numbers have regressed. There are obviously other areas that have led to it; probably with a much larger impact. Just like the elongation of games has been driven by multiple components - max effort, pitching changes, slow pitch pace, and beyond, but the pitch clock has had a positive affect in the minor leagues. Should we not implement a pitch clock because we didn't resolve the other issues? Of course not.

I get your points, but at the same time I think where the batters box is and the hand one throws with is unrelated to strategic implementation of other teams. Defense is a control that can be dictated. The batters box isn't.

The rule has been pretty well laid out. You can only have two guys on one side of the second base bag. That doesn't mean you can't suddenly play up the middle. It prevents 2B from lining up 30 feet into the outfield and snagging missiles to throw the runner out at 2B.

You can't make people throw softer, or fewer off-speed pitches. I mentioned strikeout rates already. You can change the way defense has been exploited. No one said it was just shifts; shifts are just one area that the rules of the game can actually adjust to.

I said it earlier so don't wanna keep repeating, but playing the 2B in the OF and cutting off hits for lefties is unfair. Righties who pull the ball are not punished in a similar manner because you can't play in the outfield in left and make the throw to get the runner. I think it's fine that there's a left and right side of the infield with a set amount of players.

In 2000, the average MLB batting average was 276. In 2022, the average MLB batting average is 237. In 2000, MLB teams averaged 5.14 runs per game. In 2022, it's 4.3. 2000 AVG OPS: 782 2022 avg OPS: 699 They're having a hard time finding "someone who can" and it's hurting the game. That's the problem, and positioning plays into it; obviously strike outs are up as well which doesn't help.

But in hockey, you can't position your players wherever you want. In football, you can't position your players wherever you want In basketball, you can't position your players wherever you want. In soccer, you can't position your players wherever you want. I Don't get why people think baseball should be different. There are rules in all other sports preventing some form of exploitative defensive/offensive practices related to positioning. I don't see why baseball should be any different.

This is about defense though, not offense. I think the illegal defense comp in the NBA is much better than post up jumpers.

Yup. Not a lot of tim Andersons. I think the best example is illegal defense in the NBA. Sagging and remaining stationary in the paint was unfair to bigs and penetrating guards. No one said why don't they just learn to shoot from outside the paint. They knew it hurt the product. There's no reason a particular skill set should be punished over another. Lefties are at a distinct disadvantage because their pull side Is the short side so you can play in your outfield and still get em out.

I see this a lot, and I've gotta say.. hitting a baseball is really hard. Asking why you don't just hit it somewhere else is odd to say the least. As an analytical guy, I'm actually a fan of eliminating the three guys to a side shift.

Reece McGuire DH'ing and Leury leading off is pretty hilarious. SOmeone will have to tell me why it's not Luis 1, Vaughn 2...

The entire game we've never seen the ball in the field. They've been late in shifting to the camera and showing the right fielder all game.

Really the only way Mendick should feel safe to tag there is if he knows he can beat the throw to the bag. Meaning he has to be at the base before the throw gets there. If a good throw by the outfielder can get to the base before Mendick, then he should never be going because McGuire is slower than him so he wouldn't get to the base before Mendick gets to the base.