Let Woe Befall the Bunt Dorks - (Series Preview: Chicago White Sox (72-53) vs. Toronto Blue Jays (64-58))
It is August 20, 2021. I have checked into my hotel room in Cochrane, Alberta, a town with an economy centred around cowboy paraphernalia, fringey far-right electoral candidates, and nightmarish traffic. I have settled down with comfort food from Boston Pizza to watch the Toronto Blue Jays play baseball. Because I am a fool who hates himself and hates being happy.
Fast-forward nine innings later. The bad news is that the Jays’ bats have gone silent, completely unable to score except for a Vladimir Guerrero Jr. home run off of Tyler Alexander in the fourth. The good news is that Robbie Ray turned in one of his best starts of the year: A dominant 12-strikeout eight-inning gem in which he dominated the Tigers, the only run coming in the eighth when Detroit shortstop and podcaster Zack Short scored from third off a wild pitch from Ray that got past Alejandro Kirk’s semi-kneeled catcher’s stance. This predictably prompted seething tirades about modern catching from Buck Martinez and Joe Siddall that were simultaneously grating and utterly hilarious.
Better news now. It’s the bottom of the ninth and the score is still tied at one. The Tigers have their best reliever in to try to send the game to extra innings, left-handed flamethrower Gregory Soto. And he is wild.
Teoscar Hernández and Lourdes Gurriel Jr. both work full-count walks. The next scheduled hitter is Kirk, and things are coming up Milhouse. Kirk is an excellent contact hitter with a good eye. Hern´andez at second is one of the team’s fastest runners. A walk to load the bases would be okay, I guess, but if Kirk can just poke a single past the infield, it’s an all but guaranteed win for the Blue Jays.
Yep, after a pretty bad road trip, it looks like things are finally going the Jays’ wa- WHAT THE FUCK
Kirk is out of the game. The light-hitting Breyvic Valera strolls to the plate instead. Tigers first baseman Jonathan Schoop comes halfway down the first base line. Breyvic Valera is going to bunt. God fucking damn it.
If like me, you make the mistake of having your interaction with baseball fans be almost entirely online, you will undoubtedly come across the subspecies of rube known as the “Bunt Dork”.
Bunt Dorks, like the rest of their genus, the “Small Ball Perverts”, bemoan the Three-True Outcomes style that has taken over modern baseball with the advent of sabermetrics, craving the more dynamic baseball of the 80s that was centred around making contact and stealing bases. And in general, I can certainly agree with this in broad strokes.
Sabermetrics are clearly strategically superior to whatever the fuck it is that Tony La Russa is doing, and I would fully expect any team I follow to use sabermetrics (as every team not named the Colorado Rockies does) to find any strategic advantage possible. And sometimes Small Ball Perverts can take it to silly extents. Hearing Buck Martinez and Pat Tabler drone passionately on about “good fundamental baseball”, or whatever the fuck “manufacturing runs” means, when the opposing team (and believe me, it’s always the opposing team) lofts a deep but non-threatening soft fly ball to mid-centre field to score a run, making it 8-2 for the bad guys gets pretty grating. But I totally agree that something aesthetically pleasing about baseball was lost in the transition to the modern game, even if I don’t think it’s ruined baseball or anything.
Taking it to another level, however, is the Bunt Dork. Against all the substantial evidence to the contrary, they insist that bunts are, in fact, an invaluable part of any offensive strategy that any player must brush up on, even when they are a generational talent who could just as easily flick a ball 600 feet the other way with the same amount of effort I use to scratch my nose. And conventional (read: Archaic) baseball knowledge says that with runners on first and second, with a weaker hitter, or in the National League, usually a pitcher, coming up, that a bunt should be attempted to move the runners deeper into scoring position, even at the cost of an out.
With only one run necessary to win, this would seem to support the Bunt Dork’s argument. However: In this situation, there are a few mitigating factors. First: The switch-hitting Valera would be batting right-handed against the left-handed Soto, so it’s already harder to lay a bunt down the third-base line. If anything, he would send it down the first base line, which isn’t quite as advantageous.Second: Soto throws 100 miles per hour. That is not easy to square up, and there aren’t exactly a lot of opportunities to practice that situation. If you don’t agree, I hope to see you try it soon.
Third: While Breyvic Valera is, indeed, a weaker hitter, Alejandro Kirk sure as fuck is not. Some would say he is, in fact, a good hitter. You should not be playing for the sacrifice there, especially with Randal Grichuk and Kevin Smith batting after him. You are playing to win a fucking baseball game. Not cater to old heads. Especially with two strikes.
Anyways, Charlie Montoyo, the same manager who had Santiago Espinal attempt a bunt with two strikes multiple times this season, had Breyvic Valera bunt with two strikes. And all the credit to Valera, who was just looking to put it on the ground in play, he laid a great bunt down the first base line… Jonathan Schoop, who was playing in, made a terrific play to get Teoscar at third base. And then Randal Grichuk grounded into a double play.
In a hotel room in Cochrane, Alberta, a twenty-something baseball nerd stuffed BBQ chicken pizza into his face to keep from getting a noise complaint.
Then the Jays lost the game. Also the series. They dropped two of three to the Detroit Tigers, utterly refusing to pack up terrific starting pitching with any significant degree of offensive production. One of the pitchers they refused to demolish was Drew Fucking Hutchison, the man who singlehandedly reduced the Pitcher Win stat to oblivion, where it belongs. And they were still one routine ground ball away from winning that game, if not for an awful throw from the usually-excellent Marcus Semien. I am so sad.
But hey, at least there wasn’t an embarrassing quote from the opposing manager twisting the knife vis á vis the Jays’ egregious lapse of any semblance of strategic thinking-
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Before we get into the upcoming four-game series against the Chicago White Sox assuming I don’t hurl myself off a cliff first, humour me as I plead for engagement. If you like what Jayslam is doing, please consider sharing this post with a pal who may be interested! Or an enemy! I’m happy with either.
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BEST BIRDS
Hitter: Lourdes Gurriel Jr. (2) 12 plate appearances, .400/.500/.400, 4 total bases, 2 Weighted Runs Created, 0.44 Win Probability Added,
Honourable Mentions: Marcus Semien, Santiago Espinal
Pitcher: Robbie Ray (11) 8 innings, 29 batters faced, 5 hits, 1 earned run, 11 strikeouts, 0 walks, 0.42 FIP, 0.35 Win Probability Added, 0.37 WPA/LI
All these pitchers deserved so much better.
Honourable Mentions: Hyun Jin Ryu, Steven Matz
BEST BIRD STANDINGS
Hitters:
Vladimir Guerrero Jr.- 11
George Springer- 7
Bo Bichette- 6
Marcus Semien- 5
Teoscar Hernández- 3
Lourdes Gurriel Jr.- 2
Joe Panik- 2 (now on the Miami Marlins)
Randal Grichuk- 2
Santiago Espinal- 1
Cavan Biggio- 1 (10-day IL)
Pitchers:
Robbie Ray- 11
Hyun Jin Ryu- 8
Alek Manoah- 6
Ross Stripling- 4 (10-day IL)
Steven Matz- 4
Julian Merryweather- 2 (60-day IL)
Trevor Richards- 1
Anthony Kay- 1 (Triple-A)
Anthony Castro- 1 (10-day IL)
Ryan Borucki- 1 (Triple-A)
SCHEDULE/PROBABLE PITCHERS
Monday, August 23 (7 p.m. EST/5 p.m. MST): Lance Lynn vs. Alek Manoah
Tuesday, August 24 (7 p.m. EST/5 p.m. MST): Dylan Cease vs. José Berríos
Wednesday, August 25 (7 p.m. EST/5 p.m. MST): Lucas Giolito vs. Robbie Ray
Thursday, August 26 (3 p.m. EST/1 p.m. MST): Carlos Rodón vs. Hyun Jin Ryu
THE OPPOSITION
Pythagorean Record: 75-50
Run differential: +127 (617 runs scored, 490 runs allowed)
Season Series vs. Blue Jays: 2-1
Record since the last series vs. Blue Jays: 34-29
Last 10 games: 5-5
Fun fact: Lucas Giolito’s uncle is Mark Frost, a screenwriter and novelist who co-created Twin Peaks with David Lynch. This makes sense because, after Friday and Sunday’s games, I felt the urge to watch something to pick up my mood a bit. Something light and fun. Like Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me.
Despite being a shoo-in for the playoffs, I look at the White Sox and I see a team that should, in all rights, have a better record. And I would know, I’ve had experience following a team that should be much better than their record. In unrelated news, I’m thinking of becoming the Joker full-time.
Part of that can be traced to Tony La Russa, I think. Despite my rule of thumb of “managers just don’t matter that much, quit being a boomer”, it’s hard to overlook one that just refuses to shift, by all accounts (keeping in mind that I’m hearing this all secondhand).
Tony “Hall of Famer Baseball Person” La Russa can only do so much to slow this train down though. While Yermín Mercedes has been sent down after turning into a pumpkin, now devoting his time to playing in Charlotte and being an Instagram weirdo, the return of Luis Robert and Eloy Jiménez from the IL to a lineup that includes Tim Anderson, José Abreu, Yoán Moncada, a now-good Andrew Vaughn, and sure, César Hernández too, what the fuck ever, is a scary thought. And that doesn’t include catcher and Three True Outcomes King Yasmani Grandal, who’s still working his way back from injury.
The White Sox went shopping for bullpen help (and sure, César Hernández too, what the fuck ever) at the deadline, sending Nick Madrigal and Codi Heuer to the Cubs in return for Craig Kimbrel and Ryan Tepera, who join the back-end with Liam Hendriks, Michael Kopech, and Garret Crochet. Kimbrel hasn’t quite lived up to expectations yet, but even if he doesn’t figure it out, that’s still a terrifying bullpen. They’ll be expected to finish off games started by Cy Young candidates Lance Lynn and Carlos Rodón, as well as Lucas Fucking Giolito and Dylan Cease.
I guess Dallas Keuchel has been pretty bad. Hard to be effective when you don’t strike anybody out and you get crushed by hard contact. So yeah, not great. He’s also the only starting pitcher that the Jays won’t be facing this series.
Hold me.
Best Players:
(Stats as of August 21, 2021)
Lance Lynn, Starting Pitcher 2.26 ERA/3.93 xFIP, 27.8 K%, 7.9 BB%
Carlos Rodón, Starting Pitcher 2.38 ERA/2.93 xFIP, 36.2 K%, 6.8 BB%
Tim Anderson, Shortstop .303/.330/.460, 117 wRC+
Yoán Moncada, Third Base .255/.370/.395, 118 wRC+
José Abreu, First Base .245/.335/.483, 124 wRC+
Under-Performers:
(Stats as of August 21, 2021)
César Hernández, Second Base .230/.309/.408, 94 wRC+
Dallas Keuchel, Starting Pitcher 4.71 ERA/4.53 xFIP, 14.1 K%, 7.9 BB%
Danny Mendick, Super Utility .207/.304/.279, 70 wRC+