2023 Defense Thread

[Can_of_corn]

Not a great first effort.

Nice double play early tho.

[spleen1015]

Hopefully they got it all out of their system.

[Natty]

Our defense cost us 5 runs today. 

[RVAOsFan]

I think the defense is going to be fine. It was opening day, freezing cold, weird afternoon shadows and new rules. When Henderson is your DH you have some solid options on the infield. The outfield was concerning today but I think that will improve. I would think Stowers should be an improvement over Santander when he is out there too? 

[maybenxtyr]

Unfortunately I had to listen on XM today, which was the Boston feed. Their guys said that the defense was rough today for Baltimore. Hopefully they can get it straight.

[linedrive]

Ugh, the D looked terrible. But I do expect it to improve. Santander's play was disappointing, but hopefully he won't be in LF very often. Mountcastle is my main concern going forward. I thought he looked bad last year, and it appears like he didn't work at 1B much in the offseason. I figured that was one of the reasons why they brought in all those first basemen during spring training, and I was a bit surprised they didn't settle on one of them.

[Tony-OH]

Poor plays in the opener:

Santander misplayed at least three balls costing several runs.
Mateo short hopped an easy, game ending DP throw
On same play, Mountcastle was unable to pick the Mateo throw
Mullins mistimed a jump in center costing a triple and a run eventually

Here are the Santander and Mullins follies: https://www.mlb.com/video/00u7jzgkdtP9kH55c356/reels/of-follies?partnerId=web_multimedia-search_video-share

 

[Winter]

lets hope Hyde got that defensive set up out of his system... 

[baltfan]

Santander cannot play anything but right. He is not a natural athlete so he cannot adjust to left so he should DH at Fenway. 

[Sports Guy]

1 minute ago, baltfan said:

Santander cannot play anything but right. He is not a natural athlete so he cannot adjust to left so he should DH at Fenway. 

He should be the DH in any park..maybe occasional first baseman.

[HakunaSakata]

I get wanting to get both of Mateo and Urias' gloves in the lineup, but not if it means you have to DH Henderson (over Santander). Really questionable decisions by Hyde that almost cost us the game. Frazier is the player who needs to sit when you  he wants to play both Ortiz and Mateo, and Santander should be penciled in as the DH for 90% of the games. 

[Camden_yardbird]

1 hour ago, Tony-OH said:

Poor plays in the opener:

Santander misplayed at least three balls costing several runs.
Mateo short hopped an easy, game ending DP throw
On same play, Mountcastle was unable to pick the Mateo throw
Mullins mistimed a jump in center costing a triple and a run eventually

 

I think you could add Frazier failing to get to a few balls.  

I dont hate him as much as some people here and fully expect some to use it to justify the narrative but you do have to recognize he had a hell of a day at the plate.

The biggest mishap though was Santander, and then not taking Santander out.  Defensive replacements don't just have to be 9th inning subs.

[Tony-OH]

12 minutes ago, Camden_yardbird said:

I think you could add Frazier failing to get to a few balls.  

I dont hate him as much as some people here and fully expect some to use it to justify the narrative but you do have to recognize he had a hell of a day at the plate.

The biggest mishap though was Santander, and then not taking Santander out.  Defensive replacements don't just have to be 9th inning subs.

I was going to mention the Yoshida hit off Akin that went off his glove, but that ball was hit pretty hard and he did lay out. It took a weird hop and stayed down but once a guy goes horizontal it's hard to call it a misplay. 

https://www.mlb.com/video/masatak-yoshida-s-rbi-single?q=GamePk %3D [718782] AND PitchSpeed %3D {{ 36%2C 105 }} AND PlayerId %3D%3D [807799] Order By Timestamp DESC&cp=MIXED&p=0

 

[PHRESH]

1 hour ago, Camden_yardbird said:

I think you could add Frazier failing to get to a few balls.  

I dont hate him as much as some people here and fully expect some to use it to justify the narrative but you do have to recognize he had a hell of a day at the plate.

The biggest mishap though was Santander, and then not taking Santander out.  Defensive replacements don't just have to be 9th inning subs.

I got to watch bits and pieces of the game today during work. I feel like every time I turned it back on, Frazier was unsuccessfully diving for a ball

[Frobby]

Let’s catalogue it, good and bad. 

- in the first batter of the game, Mullins either misjudged where the wall was or mistimed his jump, and a catchable ball hit the wall.  Santander was slow backing up and the resultant play was scored a triple.  Not an easy play for Mullins, but one he had a chance to make.  

- Leading off the third inning, Devers hit a rope that Hays briefly misjudged and it hit over his head and bounced into the stands for a ground rule double.  

- In the fourth inning, bases loaded and one out, Frazier handled a hard hit ball and made a quick backhand flip to Mateo, who made a clean relay for a rally-killing DP.

- In the fifth, runner on 1st and nobody out, Mateo fielded a ground ball a bit to his backhand side.  Mateo appeared to have a delay getting the ball out of his glove and then whipped a throw to Frazier that was a bit low.  Frazier caught it and thought about throwing but put the ball in his pocket.  To my eye, it was on Mateo that the DP was not completed.  

- The very next play was a grounder to Frazier to made a similar throw as the inning before and the inning ending DP was completed.   

- In the sixth, with a runner on, the  hitter hit what appeared to be a routine fly to LF, but Santander broke back and couldn’t recover and it fell in for a single.  Akin then entered the game, and induced a grounder towards the middle that glanced off Frazier’s glove.  Definitely a single, but a play a 2B will sometimes make.  Later in the inning, with runners on 1st and 3rd and one out, Mountcastle fielded a grounder in front of 1B, thought about throwing to 2B or throwing home, but chose to step on 1B, allowing a run to score.  Not necessarily a bad decision with a 5 run lead in the 6th, but if the game had been close, not the play you’d want to see.  

- In the 8th, two outs and bases loaded, Arroyo hit a line drive to LF that Santander appeared to misjudge and it got over his head for a two-run double, resulting in the O’s lead being cut to 10-7.

- In the 9th, runner on 1st and no outs, Verdugo hit a single that could have been fielded by either Mullins or McKenna, but McKenna cut off Mullins’ line of sight and Mullins bobbled the ball, allowing both runners to advance a base.  

- After a strikeout, Turner hit a chopper down the 3B line.  Urias raced over and fielded it cleanly, but his throw bounced and was a few steps to the home plate side of 1B, and Mountcastle had to come off the bag to field it.   Not an error and a difficult throw to make, but perhaps a Machado makes that throw in time to beat the runner.   A run scored and there were runners on 1st and 3rd, one out, score 10-8.

- Next play is a grounder to Mateo five feet away from 2B.   He steps on the bag, plenty of time, and bounces the throw to 2B.  Mountcastle can’t handle the bounce, it gets away, and now it’s 10-9 with 2 outs and a runner on 2B.  Terrible throw by Mateo on a very easy play, and Mountcastle’s failure to handle the hop wasn’t great, either.  

Thankfully Bautista struck out Adam Duvall  to end this nonsense.  

By my count, we had five poor plays in the outfield, two in the infield, and three other infield plays that weren’t necessarily poor but weren’t made.  There were two DP’s that were nicely turned, but both were plays I’d expect to be made.  

Not a great start for the defense, but I’ll chalk some of it up to it being the first game of the year, on a very cold day, with some bad sun/shadow conditions.  I’m hoping for better next time.