JoeC

Driving in 2 runs from a bases-loaded-nobody-out situation? I'll take it.

Hey - a sac fly!

Or when you get hit in the elbow to drive in a run.

Hoping that it was a matter of just getting his work in and working on locating pitches, etc., regardless of the outcome (or situation). That said, not really encouraging.

Gavin Lux... clearly a bright spot on that Dodger team </engineering dad joke>

I know ?

On a positive note, our hitters so far don't look completely lost. Actually liked Jose's and Pollock's AB's.

Is my way of thinking antiquated in that you want your strongest defenders up the middle? Until last season I had never heard of so many people suggesting to move questionable defenders from the corner infield spots to 2B. The only other time I have heard of a move to 2B for subpar defenders is if said "subpar" defense came at SS. ...am I missing something?

I wouldn't even say that we disagree on that, at least on an individual performance level. Players at this level SHOULD be accountable for their own performance. Where we disagree I think is that once you start to stack up all of these shortcomings, the aggregate blame falls on the coaching staff.

I am half beginning to wonder if playing Leury so frequently is a huge “F you” from TLR in response to his being on the roster.

So, basically we agree…? where we diverge is where our primary anger gets directed.

Please let me know where I say that Moncada's (and others') poor performances are excusable. They are professionals, as you point out. They should get their share of the blame. However, to dismiss coaches' impact on players' performance is just as ignorant a position as to 100% blame the coaches for their performance, and my whole point is that when an entire roster is underperforming, you might want to start to look a little more closely at common contributing factors.

I'd say it's offensive. But yes - another solid outing by Cueto, all things considered. If we can get 6 innings / 3ER out of him every 5 days, I'd be thrilled.

Controversial take: The Sale trade seems to be working out for both teams.

The half-cynical answer is "I don't know - that's why I'm not a baseball coach." As for the types of answers? I don't think there's anything that would be fixed INSTNATLY as soon as the manager stopped doing it, but if I had to give a generalized answer, it could be things like preaching a poor approach at the plate, confusing the shit out of players by clearly demonstrating that playing time is basically random, etc. Again, when over half the offense is failing (not just one player), it's the leadership's job to right the ship. In this case the leader is TLR.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/l/larocad01.shtml https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/e/encared01.shtml ...and to a lesser extent (one above-average OPS year hit above-average OPS-wise) https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/d/dunnad01.shtml

Not sure. That said, Moncada is FAR from the only one, which tells me that there's something systematic going on that may be beyond the scope of just something Moncada can control. The impact suggests the scope goes beyond individual players.

For once, thank goodness for this "decision" by La Russa.

I guess my fundamental disagreement is in the definition of "exploitive" practices. In the examples you give, the rules are in place to prevent "exploitive" practices (your word). My fundamental issue is that the league is, in essence, telling everyone "whelp - there's literally no better way to counteract this tactic that's existed since before Ted Williams. We'll just tell people they aren't allowed to do it." To go back to my response to your "look at other sports" point, I understand and acknowledge your point, and you're right. That said, in most other sports there is a clear trade-off in employing certain tactics for the benefit of a defensive strategy, and the sports in each instance at least made some semblance of an effort to adjust before saying "there's literally nothing we can do." Baseball is the only one of the sports you've mentioned where the prevailing strategic adjustment to "there's a wall there" has been "I'm going to keep beating my head into that wall."

I asked for defense for hockey, football, and soccer. Football has strict formation requirements. Once the ball is snapped, all bets are off.

So I must ask you - what is your purpose as a coach, if coaches (as you say) have no impact? Don't get me wrong - players need to be able to motivate and fix themselves, but the overall strategy and approach are defined by the coaching staff. The data that get fed (on the whole) to the players come through the coaching staff. Yes, it's up to the players to execute and develop the tactics, but if they're not living up to their talent, it's up to the coaching staff to figure out why and to give them the resources (information or otherwise) to succeed. If this failure is endemic to the team, then the coaching staff needs to change their approach.

Can you give me the examples for hockey, football, and soccer, specifically for defense? As long as play is active, defensive players can go wherever they damn well please. There are restrictions on what they can or cannot do during said play, but there's nothing in the NHL rule book that theoretically prevents five defensive players to lay on top of each other and form a wall behind their goaltender. Do I like the shift? No, but I think a movement to ban the shift (which goes back, albeit to a lesser degree, well beyond any of our lifetimes) seems like a shortsighted move without forcing teams / players to develop strategies and tactics to defeat them.

I guess what constitutes a “shift?” would it be illegal for a shortstop to start sprinting toward the 2B bag so that by the time the ball reached the hitter, he would be in a position to field the grounder to the right of the bag? if MLB goes through with a shift ban, expect them to miss some glaring loophole.

Would this also extend to moving an outfielder into the infield to get a 5-infielder configuration with a winning run on 3rd in a walk-off situation?

Hell - if they do, good for them (and him). Was doing us no good by being here. If he can turn it around somewhere else (especially in the NL), then great.