The defense thread, 2018

[Legend_Of_Joey]

15 minutes ago, Frobby said:

April 14, Game 15

I couldn’t bear to watch the entire game, so I’ll just report what I know about.   

- In the first inning, Manny made a relay throw home that was wide to the 3B side and hit the runner in the back.   The ball bounced away a bit, allowing the hitter to advance to 3B.   Error charged to Manny.

- In the fourth inning, Benintendi hit a single to RF with runners on 2nd and 3rd.    Santander overthrew the cutoff man and well wide of home.   Benintendi headed for 2B and Sisco tried to catch the throw, but dropped it.    Poor decision by Santander to throw through, poor throw, and poor failure to catch it by Sisco.   I think he took his eye off the ball while anticipating a throw to 2B.

- Two batters later, JD Martinez hit a routine grounder to Manny, who bounced his throw and it got past Davis.    Error on Manny, his second of the day.    I turned my TV off in disgust before they showed a replay, but my impression on the live play was that the bounced throw was playable by Davis and I was surprised he didn’t snag it.

- Mancini made a nice sliding catch and another catch on a ball that caught a gust of wind at the last second where he had to make a nice adjustment to make the catch.  

- Valencia made an error later that I didn’t see.

For the Manny throw to Davis, that is a play Davis *usually* makes. But the throw wasn't good. Davis had to stretch his arm, backhand it, AND stretch while on the bag. The ball just bounced a little high and Davis was a little slow, but got a piece of it with his glove.

Valencia just booted the ball. Never controlled it.

Santander might be trying to do too much in the field with his throws. That's the 2nd or 3rd play this week where he overthrew the cutoff man on a bad throw.

Sisco looked like he was paying attention to the runner going to second and took his eye off the ball on that one. On the Machado relay, he was lucky. His leg whipped around badly. If the ground was a bit more firm, I think his cleat would of stuck and he would of really hurt himself.

[Can_of_corn]

1 minute ago, Legend_Of_Joey said:

For the Manny throw to Davis, that is a play Davis *usually* makes. But the throw wasn't good. Davis had to stretch his arm, backhand it, AND stretch while on the bag. The ball just bounced a little high and Davis was a little slow, but got a piece of it with his glove.

Valencia just booted the ball. Never controlled it.

Santander might be trying to do too much in the field with his throws. That's the 2nd or 3rd play this week where he overthrew the cutoff man on a bad throw.

Sisco looked like he was paying attention to the runner going to second and took his eye off the ball on that one. On the Machado relay, he was lucky. His leg whipped around badly. If the ground was a bit more firm, I think his cleat would of stuck and he would of really hurt himself.

You have just described his season so far in five words.

[Going Underground]

27 minutes ago, Frobby said:

April 14, Game 15

I couldn’t bear to watch the entire game, so I’ll just report what I know about.   

- In the first inning, Manny made a relay throw home that was wide to the 3B side and hit the runner in the back.   The ball bounced away a bit, allowing the hitter to advance to 3B.   Error charged to Manny.

- In the fourth inning, Benintendi hit a single to RF with runners on 2nd and 3rd.    Santander overthrew the cutoff man and well wide of home.   Benintendi headed for 2B and Sisco tried to catch the throw, but dropped it.    Poor decision by Santander to throw through, poor throw, and poor failure to catch it by Sisco.   I think he took his eye off the ball while anticipating a throw to 2B.

- Two batters later, JD Martinez hit a routine grounder to Manny, who bounced his throw and it got past Davis.    Error on Manny, his second of the day.    I turned my TV off in disgust before they showed a replay, but my impression on the live play was that the bounced throw was playable by Davis and I was surprised he didn’t snag it.

- Mancini made a nice sliding catch and another catch on a ball that caught a gust of wind at the last second where he had to make a nice adjustment to make the catch.  

- Valencia made an error later that I didn’t see.

Not sure but Beckham fielded a grounder and wanted to flip it to someone but did not see anyone in the picture.Not sure how far Manny was over from the second base bag.Also time and again the Oriole outfielders miss the cut off man.Buck being a stickler for defense , this is unacceptable. Mancini after trying to catch the ball off the Green monster threw to no one at third.Also have seen no one going out to get the cut off throw.

[Can_of_corn]

6 minutes ago, Going Underground said:

Not sure but Beckham fielded a grounder and wanted to flip it to someone but did not see anyone in the picture.Not sure how far Manny was over from the second base bag.Also time and again the Oriole outfielders miss the cut off man.Buck being a stickler for defense , this is unacceptable. Mancini after trying to catch the ball off the Green monster threw to no one at third.Also have seen no one going out to get the cut off throw.

[Legend_Of_Joey]

35 minutes ago, Going Underground said:

Not sure but Beckham fielded a grounder and wanted to flip it to someone but did not see anyone in the picture.Not sure how far Manny was over from the second base bag.Also time and again the Oriole outfielders miss the cut off man.Buck being a stickler for defense , this is unacceptable. Mancini after trying to catch the ball off the Green monster threw to no one at third.Also have seen no one going out to get the cut off throw.

They were in a shift on the Beckham play, so no one was there to cover. 

[mdbdotcom]

Davis should have come off the bag to catch Manny's throw. There was no way that he was going to stretch out and backhand the ball on a bounce.

[Legend_Of_Joey]

36 minutes ago, mdbdotcom said:

Davis should have come off the bag to catch Manny's throw. There was no way that he was going to stretch out and backhand the ball on a bounce.

If he caught it, it might have been an out. It's a play he, and most first baseman, make 95% of the time.

[Frobby]

April 15, Game 16

Just a travesty of a defensive game, with all three Boston runs coming as a result of bad defense:

- With 1 out in the 5th, Lin hits a hard one-hopper a couple steps to Beckham’s right that Beckham could have gotten in front of, but he tries to backhand and it skips off his glove.    Hit hard enough to be scored a single, but Schoop makes this play 9 times out of 10.

- Next play is a sharp grounder that Davis fields on one short hop and he attempts to start a 3-6-1 DP, but his throw is wide and Manny does a good job keeping his toe on the bag while stretching to the 3B side, but his return throw is a half-step late because of Davis’ poor throw.   By the way, great job by Bundy of covering 1B, but for naught.   

- Bradley Jr. then steals 2B as Caleb spikes the throw and it hits the pitcher’s mound.    He scores the tying run on Benintendi’s triple.

- The sixth inning begins with Valencia booting a routine grounder.

-  Moreland lofts a double that bounces a foot or two short of the Green Monster in mid-LF.    I have no idea where Mancini was on this play because he got a late jump and gave up on catching it before reaching the wall.    I’d like to see his route, but I was surprised he wasn’t in position to at least attempt a catch.   

- With runners on 2nd and 3rd, Bundy throws a wild pitch that in my opinion Joseph absolutely should have blocked.    Runner scores.

- With two out, Valencia charges a slow chopper and bounces his throw, which Davis gloves but can’t handle, extending the inning.   Next hitter doubles and a runner scores from 3rd.   Bad play by both Valencia and Davis IMO.

- The final out of the inning is recorded on a routine grounder to Valencia where he bounces the throw again but Davis handles it this time.    What an ugly inning.

Those were the consequential plays.    Here’s a few other notables:

- There was a deep fly into Fenway’s Bermuda Triangle where Santander and Gentry both went after it and Santander made the catch with Gentry backing off at the very end of the play.    Nice communication by the two of them on that one.   

- Mancini threw a runner out at the plate on a very close play, on an excellent throw and excellent tag by Caleb.    

- Manny made a nice play grabbing a grounder in the hole and firing to 2B for the force play.    

- Bleier allowed a stolen base on which the runner took off before he’d even gone into his motion.   It was similar to the play where O’Day stopped, turned around threw the runner out at second, except that Bleier never saw the runner and pitched.    

[bobmc]

Not that bad some say!

Smith, Kim and Hardy are all gone. Trumbo is yet to play due to injury but should spend a lot of his time at DH. Mancini looks more comfortable in the outfield. And Adam Jones seems to have regained a sharpness in center.

Early on, the team’s fielding stats have seen improvement. They sit in 16th overall with 0.4 DEF, and they are all the way up in 10th with a 1.4 UZR. These O’s aren’t matching the previous heights that the franchise saw from 2012-14, but it is certainly a boost over last year’s disaster.

 

 

[bobmc]

From the same article above:

Machado has not been nearly as impressive at shortstop. FanGraphs has him with an atrocious -1.8 UZR through 146 innings, which would project out to a -13.8 UZR/150. That currently ranks him as the fifth-worst fielding shortstop in MLB.

Why has this happened to Machado? It’s pretty simple. Range, while important at every position, is more crucial at shortstop than it is at third base. Machado has the worst range of any shortstop in the league (-2.6 RngR). It’s a skill of his that had been deteriorating for a couple of years, but was easier to hide at his old position. At shortstop, the lack of range is quite evident.

[Frobby]

April 20, Game 20

I didn’t see much of this game, so some of this is second hand.

- Sisco misplayed two pop-ups in the first two innings.   The first fell in the infield for a “single” as Sisco never touched it, and led to an extended 26-pitch inning for Bundy.     The second landed in fair territory about 15 feet up the 3B line, but fortunately spun foul.    However, the batter got on base later in the at bat.    I didn’t see either play, just heard Joe Angel describe the second one on the radio and refer back to the first one.    So, anyone who saw these plays feel free to elaborate on what happened.

- On the positive side, the runner tried to steal later in the inning and Sisco gunned him down with a perfect throw.   (On this play, Jim Hunter complimented Manny’s tag and called him “one of the best taggers in baseball.”   I found that funny considering Manny mishandled 3-4 tags in the first week of the season.)

- Manny made a great diving play up the middle, then while still on his belly, flipped the ball backhand on a bounce to 2B to get an inning-ending force out.

[amdcpus]

1 minute ago, Frobby said:

April 20, Game 20

I didn’t see much of this game, so some of this is second hand.

- Sisco misplayed two pop-ups in the first two innings.   The first fell in the infield for a “single” as Sisco never touched it, and led to an extended 26-pitch inning for Bundy.     The second landed in fair territory about 15 feet up the 3B line, but fortunately spun foul.    However, the batter got on base later in the at bat.    I didn’t see either play, just heard Joe Angel describe the second one on the radio and refer back to the first one.    So, anyone who saw these plays feel free to elaborate on what happened.

- On the positive side, the runner tried to steal later in the inning and Sisco gunned him down with a perfect throw.   (On this play, Jim Hunter complimented Manny’s tag and called him “one of the best taggers in baseball.”   I found that funny considering Manny mishandled 3-4 tags in the first week of the season.)

- Manny made a great diving play up the middle, then while still on his belly, flipped the ball backhand on a bounce to 2B to get an inning-ending force out.

2nd one was Beckham's fault, not Sisco's. Beckham incorrectly called him off and didn't come close to catching it.

[tntoriole]

Trey with an outstanding catch in the first inning against Rays of a foul down the line, leaning way over the fence into the stands even while banging his knee again. 

[Frobby]

May 2, Game 30

In the 4th inning, Chris Davis had an Ohtani grounder in the hole bounce off his glove for an error.    His inability to cleanly glove grounders or throws in the dirt has been a real issue this year.     

Next, Simmons hit a ball down the line and Mancini made an ill-advised dive that was a half-foot short of the ball, which got past him and rolled to the wall.    Mancini recovered pretty quickly and retrieved it, throwing to Manny in short LF.   Manny made a relay throw home that short-hopped Caleb and popped over his shoulder behind home plate.   The play was backed up well but Simmons was able to advance to 3B on the play.    An error was charged to Manny, but in my opinion the throw was pretty good and Caleb should have caught it or at least stopped it.   One could question if Manny should have made the throw, which was a split-second late even if Joseph had caught it cleanly.   

The infield moved in for the next hitter, who slapped a sharp grounder over the 1B bag Davis made a tremdendous diving stab, then dove head first and tagged the bag with his bare hand a millisecond before the runner’s foot hit the bag.    The play was about as close as a play can possibly be, and withstood a replay challenge.    Tremendous play by Davis, partly atoning for his error earlier in the inning, but of course the runner scored from 3rd on the play.    

[Going Underground]

43 minutes ago, Frobby said:

May 2, Game 30

In the 4th inning, Chris Davis had an Ohtani grounder in the hole bounce off his glove for an error.    His inability to cleanly glove grounders or throws in the dirt has been a real issue this year.     

Next, Simmons hit a ball down the line and Mancini made an ill-advised dive that was a half-foot short of the ball, which got past him and rolled to the wall.    Mancini recovered pretty quickly and retrieved it, throwing to Manny in short LF.   Manny made a relay throw home that short-hopped Caleb and popped over his shoulder behind home plate.   The play was backed up well but Simmons was able to advance to 3B on the play.    An error was charged to Manny, but in my opinion the throw was pretty good and Caleb should have caught it or at least stopped it.   One could question if Manny should have made the throw, which was a split-second late even if Joseph had caught it cleanly.   

The infield moved in for the next hitter, who slapped a sharp grounder over the 1B bag Davis made a tremdendous diving stab, then dove head first and tagged the bag with his bare hand a millisecond before the runner’s foot hit the bag.    The play was about as close as a play can possibly be, and withstood a replay challenge.    Tremendous play by Davis, partly atoning for his error earlier in the inning, but of course the runner scored from 3rd on the play.    

I saw the oriole post game this morning. Tom Davis said that a good right fielder would have caught  it 70% of the time. Put up some graphic.

Dempsey also said something absurd. He said over the last few years the Orioles had one of the best defenses in baseball history. If they replay the game again and have the postgame show ,watch him say that. Better then any comedy on TV now.