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We’re Going to Be Talking About Rob Thomson’s Decision to Sacrifice Bunt Until the End of All Time and Eternity
Published:
Here it is, in all of its glory:
Alright. The situation is Dodgers 4, Phillies 3, bottom of the ninth, no outs. Nick Castellanos on second base.
Castellanos is not a fast runner, as you know.
So why not pinch run for him?
Rob Thomson explained that it was a product of Harrison Bader’s groin injury:
“We knew we were probably going to pinch hit with Bader, we needed to have (Weston Wilson) there. Plus, if you pinch run (Wilson) for Castellanos, and then Bader hits, you have nobody to run for him and you don’t have another outfielder. Hands were tied.”
Well, technically they could have a pitcher or someone else run for Bader, and just take that risk, but the bottom line is that they didn’t have to bunt at all. Why play for a tie when you’ve got no outs in the bottom of the ninth with Bader on deck and Max Kepler coming up next, the same Max Kepler who hit an 8th-inning triple?
Consensus among Phillies fans is that you’re riding momentum here and have a contact hitter at the plate against a new LA pitcher in Alex Vesia, who was beaten up by the Reds in Game 1 of the wild card series. Stott is a lefty. If he pulls that ball, Castellanos has a chance to get to 3rd, and if he doesn’t, he stays at 2nd anyway and you keep your runner in scoring position. Sometimes you just gotta throw out the left/right matchup obsession and let your guys go up there and swing. Instead, they gave the Dodgers a cheap out and lost a bit of that spark.
Did the Dodgers play it well? Yeah of course, and credit where it’s due, but if the Phils were expecting them to play it aggressively, Stott could have pulled back and swung, or just taken the pitch:
There’s another thing no one is mentioning.
Castellanos should have been thrown out at 2nd base to begin with. He was super-lucky to even get in there safely when LA overplayed the tag and just whiffed despite beating him to the bag.
The thing about litigating head coach and manager decisions in any sport is that the results are oftentimes binary. You either succeed or fail, but the choice is accepted. Take Sean Payton’s decision to go for two on Sunday afternoon. The Broncos had all the momentum in the world, and even if they didn’t convert, it would have been very hard to question that aggression considering that the Broncos had just scored 13 unanswered points and had the Birds reeling. It was one of those things that ended up working, and so it looked great, but even if it didn’t work, it would have been supported based on the feel of the game at the time.
In this case, bunting just didn’t make sense to begin with. Playing for a tie? With zero outs in the bottom of the ninth? If you like your chances in extra innings at home, so be it, but it’s hard to find that opinion coming from anybody other than Rob Thomson.
Kevin has been writing about Philadelphia sports since 2009. He spent seven years in the CBS 3 sports department and started with the Union during the team's 2010 inaugural season. He went to the academic powerhouses of Boyertown High School and West Virginia University. email - k.kinkead@sportradar.com