Wall Street Journal: Major League Baseball's Worst Ideas
Tom Tango, who I got this link from, feels title would be better substituting "dubious" for "worst." In any case, it's an interesting look at a set of established ideas.
Tall Catchers
Pulling Your Best Hitter for a Pinch Runner
Pitcher's Batting Ninth
Calling in the Closer with a Three Run Lead
Managers in Uniforms
The catcher one was the most brow-raising to me, because it concerns internet baseball's current favorite meme: Matt Wieters. It suggests he would be the tallest catcher to have an exceptional career if he doesn't end up busting. I hadn't considered that as an actual concern, and I don't know if there's necessarily enough data to support it as a real correllation, but it might make Wieters being the best catcher ever a little less of a sure thing.
As far as pitchers batting 9th, Tango had a pretty good response to that:
"For the pitcher-batting-ninth, I’d flip that to "reactions to pitcher batting 8th". The dubious aspect is not that the pitcher bats 9th. It’s justifiable. It’s not that pitcher bats 8th. That’s justifiable too. It’s the reaction of people who think it’s a bad idea for the pitcher to bat 8th. It’s that reaction that is bad."
Reliever usage continues to be one of the most baffling aspects of baseball management to me. I just cannot understand the logic. Is it all just about a weird fascination with a meaningless stat? Most bad baseball ideas I can understand the logic even if I disagree with it. I can't say that for bullpen use.
7 months ago
philkid3
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