2015 ROYALS—A Leader Steps Up

After I suggest that the Royals might have wanted to pitch around a hot hitter in a game against the Cubs, a concerned reader sends me an email questioning the wisdom of ever putting the winning run on base and before I started talking with Big League pitchers, I might have agreed with him.

As an amateur, I had a very simplistic point of view: all walks were bad.

Turns out the most confident Big League pitchers walk people—including people who represent the winning run—whenever it suits their purposes and here’s a story about that.

Greg Holland—2014

On May 17th of 2014 Kansas City Royals closer Greg Holland comes in to pitch the ninth inning against the Baltimore Orioles. Kansas City has a 1-0 lead so Greg can’t afford to make a mistake.

The inning starts OK when Holland strikes out pinch hitter Steve Clevenger. Greg then walks Nick Markakis. Third baseman Manny Machado singles and Markakis makes it to third. Next Holland strikes out Adam Jones.

Holland is one out away from saving the game, but the tying run is on third base and the winning run is on first.

With two outs Baltimore first baseman Chris Davis steps to the plate and walks on four pitches. That walk pushes the winning run into scoring position. But the inning and the Orioles threat ends when Holland strikes out Nelson Cruz for the third out, the win and the save.

Holland faced six batters, gave up a single, struck out three, but walked two and I’m wondering why. How did Greg have such good control he struck out three batters, but such bad control he walked two and put the tying and winning run in scoring position ?

After the game I catch Holland alone and we talk about his performance. Greg stands by his locker; his throwing arm wrapped in ice, a red solo cup in his left hand and explains his strategy:

If Greg got strike one on a hitter, he went right after him. Greg got strike one on Steve Clevenger and struck him out. But Holland fell behind Nick Markakis and walked him. Strike one on Manny Machado and Holland pitched aggressively, but still gave up a single. Strike one on Adam Jones and Greg once again pitched aggressively and struck Jones out. Ball one to Chris Davis and, once again, Holland issued a walk.

Once Holly explains what he was doing, it’s pretty simple: if Holland got ahead of the hitter he went after him, if he fell behind the hitter he worked around him.

Holland said he had a plan of attack for Chris Davis, but when he didn’t execute that plan in the first two pitches—when he fell behind in the count—he worked around the Orioles power-hitting first baseman and moved the winning run into scoring position.

With the bases loaded and the tying and winning run in scoring position, Holland had no more open bases and no more wiggle room so he went right after Nelson Cruz, striking him out to end the game.

At this level of baseball, not all walks are bad.

When they have a base open, smart Big League pitchers will use that open base and work around a guy who can hurt them—even if it means putting the winning run on base.

BTW:

As long as we’re talking about open bases and pitchers using walks to their advantage; when it suited their purposes, opposing pitchers would walk Billy Butler because Billy Butler on first base was still three singles away from scoring—Billy clogged the bases and put the Royals running game in low gear. You can’t go first to third when they guy in front of you is only going second to third.

So when you think about walks and whether they’re good or bad, you also need to think about who got walked and when they got walked.

Baseball can get really really complicated and that’s one of the things that make it great.

It’s also a great excuse to drink beer.

June 3, 2015—Indians

The score is Royals 4, Indians 2 and Greg Holland comes out to pitch the ninth inning. The first batter he faces is a lefty: Brandon Moss. Holland throws a slider down-and-in and Moss fouls it off his front leg. Moss is wearing a shin guard on that leg and the ball appears to catch more shin guard than leg, but that shin guard tells a pitcher something:

Moss tends to foul down-and-in pitches off his front leg.

In fact, before Frank White gets banished from the K and forced into local politics, he tells me Old-School players would not wear shin guards because it was like holding up a sign telling pitchers to throw down-and-in:

“Don’t worry, I’ll foul that pitch off my front leg.”

And when a batter fouls a ball off his front leg, pitchers—being spectacularly unsympathetic to hitters—tend to throw another pitch in the exact same location:

“Ooooh…that looked like it really hurt. Now here’s another one.”

That’s just what Holland and catcher Drew Butera do; they throw another down-and-in pitch to Moss and he fouls this one off his knee and this one looks like it hurts like hell.

The fake ambulance comes out (if a trainer comes out to check on a player and the player does not leave the game, the trainer is considered a “fake ambulance”). Moss hops around on one foot, waits for the pain to go away and finally gets back in the box.

So where do you think the next pitch is?

If you said down-and-in you’re starting to think like a Big League pitcher or possibly a serial killer. Moss either fouls this one off his foot or comes damn close because he’s shaking it around afterwards.

At some point, when a batter is slowing beating himself to death by fouling balls off his body, his will to live—or at least his will to hit—leaves him. The hitter just wants to get the at-bat over without another baseball hitting him in the shin. Moss has taken three shots off his front leg or foot and on the fourth down-and-in pitch Moss hit a lazy fly ball to centerfield.

After the game Eric Hosmer confirms what I already knew; foul a ball off your body and you better expect another pitch in the exact same spot. I ask Hosmer if he’s ever really smoked himself in the foot or leg and he says no, but then adds:

“Don’t jinx me.”

June 6, 2015—Rangers

The media likes calling Yordano Ventura “Ace” Ventura because it’s easy and cute, but unfortunately it’s also extremely inaccurate. Yordano has been inconsistent and emotionally erratic.

Going into the game Yordano is 4-6 with a 4.26 ERA.

One of the things a true ace does for his team is break up losing streaks. No matter how bad things are going, a team with an ace knows that they have an excellent chance to win every fifth day. The ace also takes pressure off the offense because they know it won’t take as much to win; scramble for two or three runs and the ace will take care of the rest.

True aces are rare and not every team has one.

Now here’s another way an ace can help you and I’m telling you this just in case you ever get called on to manage a Big League team:

I’m told that if you’re going to call a team meeting, do it right before an “ace” pitches—then the odds of it looking like your meeting accomplished something go way up. Call the meeting right before a bottom-of-the-rotation guy pitches and it’s probably going to look like your meeting was a failure.

When you hear about a team meeting, check the schedule and who’s pitching that night.

Coming into this game the Royals are 2-and-8 over the last 10 games; even they admit they’re in a funk. If Yordano Ventura really wants to be “Ace” Ventura, this game would be a good time to start—but it doesn’t happen.

Yordano lasts only three innings, gives up four runs and loses his composure again.

Ventura isn’t pitching well and his frustration shows. His body language is bad, between pitches he wanders around behind the mound, throws a pickoff attempt into centerfield and almost throws another one away at first base—but Eric Hosmer saves him.

Here’s more than any sane person (which probably excludes both of us) needs to know about pickoffs:

Most pickoffs are dart throws: the pitcher takes the ball out of the glove, gets his hand up and throws the ball like a dart; it’s a short, quick throw, without much backswing.

But on this pickoff attempt, Ventura takes the ball out of his glove and his hand goes down; he’s using a full arm motion; basically, Yordano’s throwing a pickoff using a windup.

At this point Hosmer knows he’s in trouble: the throw will take way too long so they won’t pick off the runner and the full arm swing tells Hosmer that the throw is coming in hot.

At this point Hos wants to accomplish two things:

1.) Stop the ball from getting past him.

2.) Keep the ball off his body.

Somehow Hosmer accomplishes both.

After that high-octane pickoff attempt, Hosmer pulls Ventura aside in the dugout and talks to him. Eric knows Yordano is frustrated, but encourages Ventura to handle his frustration in a way that doesn’t include 100 MPH, off-target pickoff throws.

Right now there’s not a lot of good news concerning the Royals, but Hosmer pulling Ventura aside and talking to him is a Big Deal. To understand why it’s a Big Deal, you need to understand big league culture.

Who Runs a Baseball Team?

When you come right down to it, Big League teams are run by Big League players.

Teams have managers and coaches, but if a Big League player with a guaranteed contract chooses not to listen to those managers and coaches, there’s not a whole lot anybody can do about it. The player can be fined, benched or demoted—and in rare cases that happens—but most teams don’t want to go to war with their players, so most teams rely on peer pressure. That’s why you hear so much about team leaders; good teams have to have them.

I once watched a pregame stretch (the team wasn’t the Royals) which the star players ignored and while their teammates stretched, the stars walked around laughing and talking. The message those star players were sending to their teammates was a bad one:

“Once you’re a big enough star, you can ignore the rules and do whatever the fuck you feel like doing.”

As someone smarter than me (which doesn’t do all that much to narrow down the possibilities) once said, the only kind of true leadership is leadership by example: everything else is just some guy talking and trying to convince you to do something he has no intention of doing himself.

But leading by example and being a team leader is a huge pain in the ass: it puts a target on your back.

• To be a team leader you have to play; nobody is going to listen to a guy who’s sitting on the bench.

• To be a team leader you have to produce; nobody is going to listen to a guy who’s scuffling.

• To be a team leader you have to set an example; nobody is going to listen to a guy who tells other people to run the ball out and then jogs down to first base.

Which is why a lot of players choose to keep their mouth shut and just take care of their own business; life’s much simpler that way. And when you look at that list of requirements, there aren’t many players who can be a team leader; most players don’t qualify.

So give Eric Hosmer a ton of credit: when Hosmer pulled Ventura aside to talk to him about keeping his composure, Hosmer put himself in the spotlight—you can’t tell someone else to stay composed and not do the same thing. It would have been easier to leave Yordano alone, but it was better for the team if someone talked to him and Eric Hosmer stepped up.

After the game I ask Hos about the pissed-off-pick-off and being a team leader Hos defends Yordano and asks me to understand: Yordano Ventura is a kid who’s had to fight for everything he’s ever gotten and right now, that’s his instinct when things don’t go well.

Eric Hosmer—the guy who got lit up by Jason Kendall for wearing a Hosmer-mania T-shirt his rookie year—is now the veteran talking to a less experienced player.

Next Up: The Royals turn things around, win eight of the next 10 games despite getting swept in St. Louis and I explain why hitting isn’t actually contagious.