Balls Put in Play by the RS Last Night

[spiritof66]

In last night's game thread, I commented that if Bundy's game plan was to have the RS hit the ball as hard as they wanted so long as they were hitting it in the general direction of Manny and Adam, it was working pretty well. After the game, it occurred to me that I could think of only one ball that the RS put in play to the right side.

I just checked, and the RS hit only two fair balls to the right side (Benintendi's ground ball to Davis in the third, and Moreland's DP grounder to Schoop in the fourth. I did this quickly and may be slightly off, but by my count the RS hit 26 fair balls (by inning 2, 2, 3, 2, 4, 3, 1, 6, 3). Two outs were made on foul popups to 1B and the C. 

All six of the RS hits went to the left side or to CF (2 to LF, 2 to CF, one to 3B, and 1 to SS/LF), Of the remaining 20 fair balls, all of which resulted in POs, 2 were mentioned above, 9 balls were hit to 3B (many of which could have ended up in LF but didn't), 2 to SS, 3 to LF, and 4 to CF (not necessarily to CF, but close enough to CF that Adam could run them down). No fair balls were hit to RF.

I don't know what to make of this distribution, or even know how unusual it is. It does confirm what I saw last night: that the RS were pulling Bundy very consistently. (The two balls hit to the right side were hit by LHers.) My impression last night was that they were pulling his fastball as well as off-speed pitches, which I would take as a bad sign; maybe I'll check later. I'm also wondering whether the RS hitters are trying too hard to go LF and use the Wall, and if so whether that has something to do with their disappointing offensive output so far (13th in he AL in runs scored and last in HRs).

[Emory Eagle]

I don't think Bundy or really any pitcher has very much control where the ball is put in play against him.  Are there stats that measure a pitcher's ability to do this?

I did think he looked a lot sharper last night than in his previous start, which is a very good sign.  And he had decent velocity.

Would like to see less walks and more Ks of course.   

[spiritof66]

23 minutes ago, Emory Eagle said:

I don't think Bundy or really any pitcher has very much control where the ball is put in play against him.  Are there stats that measure a pitcher's ability to do this?

I did think he looked a lot sharper last night than in his previous start, which is a very good sign.  And he had decent velocity.

Would like to see less walks and more Ks of course.   

I agree with that, and the remarks about Bundy's game plan were made in jest. I would make this exception, though, and maybe we just disagree about this. You would expect that at least some hitters would swing late on a fastball and hit them the other way, either because they just don't catch up with it or feel the need to cut down on their swings with two strikes. The extent to which that didn't happen last night was unusual. That, with the absence of Ks plus the number of hard-hit balls, makes me a little less bullish on Bundy's performance, even though to me he looked very good and efficient, despite getting squeezed a few times by the umpire. But I don't want to overstate the point about balls being hit to the left side, just wanted to throw it out there. 

I do think it's probably no accident that the RS righthanded hitters, many of whom can hit to all fields, were pulling the ball all night, though I'm not sure what to make of it.

[Emory Eagle]

5 minutes ago, spiritof66 said:

I agree with that, and the remarks about Bundy's game plan were made in jest. I would make this exception, though, and maybe we just disagree about this. You would expect that at least some hitters would swing late on a fastball and hit them the other way, either because they just don't catch up with it or feel the need to cut down on their swings with two strikes. The extent to which that didn't happen last night was unusual. That, with the absence of Ks plus the number of hard-hit balls, makes me a little less bullish on Bundy's performance, even though to me he looked very good and efficient, despite getting squeezed a few times by the umpire. But I don't want to overstate the point about balls being hit to the left side, just wanted to throw it out there. 

I do think it's probably no accident that the RS righthanded hitters, many of whom can hit to all fields, were pulling the ball all night, though I'm not sure what to make of it.

I would bet it's a combination of (i) a conscious focus by RS right-handed hitters to try to take advantage of the Green Monster and pull the ball and (ii) Bundy's relatively middling velocity on the FB and his frequent use of off-speed pitches (haven't looked at a break down of last night, but he does seem to throw off-speed stuff for strikes in any count and, just anecdotally, for a relatively high % of his overall pitches).