So, my years of watching the old ballgame have a chunk missing in it. I was an avid if not rabid fan of MLB from 1986-ish (when I saw Tim Raines hit the Cocoa-Cola Sign at the Big O) until 2004 when the Expos left and now have resumed fanhood (albeit in less avid fashion mind you) as of 2015.
So for me, 2005 to 2014 is sort of like a big hole for me in the baseball world ... and there's things in the game now that I do need to wrap my head around because there's some new stuff in there.
One big one is The Shift, which can be written as in Caps because it is a big deal in the league now which it surely was not during my avid fanhood years. I'm gonna do some thinking about The Shift right now and you can follow me on this exciting journey if you wish...
The Basics of the Shift
I'm not gonna "term define" The Shift because if anyone is gonna read a barn burner article about it I am quite sure they are familiar as to what it is. It just refers to when a team moves its infielders lopsidingly to one portion of the infield against a certain hitter.
There's two reasons why the shift is a good strategy in some cases. The first is as a defensive stratagem, yes indeed, some hitters tend to hit to one side of the infield when they hit grounders or liners or choppers .... and placing all your infielders there should make more of these batted balls into outs. That one everyone knows because it is self evident.
The other factor of why the shift works is mental. It is a tactic designed to sew uncertainty and panic into the hitter's mind. Historians of the game tend to know this, as they point to the first instance of The Shift, being when Lou Boudreau used it in the days of yore to throw Ted Williams off his game.
Personally, I believe it is the mental aspect of the Shift as why it works. I think it has gotten into a lot of hitters minds and threw them off their game.
To me what the shift says to the hitter is, "Hey man, you are such a bum even if I give you half the field open you still couldn't get a hit." I mean the pinnacle full-escalated version to show this (I doubt any manager would ever do this) would be to take all of your fielders off the field except for the pitcher and catcher to send the message of "Hey man, you're such a bum ... if I give you the WHOLE field you still can't get on base!"
If the hitter makes an out while that affront is on him ... he can come out of that situation pretty defeated-feeling and prime himself to go into a prolonged slump. Every time after when he sees the infielders going to huddle on one side of the field he's gonna be like "oh crap not this again."
I can think of two players who the Shift got them. Belt and Smoak. I watched a few Blue Jay games in 2016 (Jays games are on TV in my region all the time) and Justin Smoak was devastated by the dopey shift .. and I am 100% sure it was mental. He had a .705 OPS in 2016 and he was brutal out there. Fast forward to 2017 and where was he? He was at the ALL STAR GAME! Why? Because he adjusted mentally in his approach to the plate.
Same thing with Brandon Belt, he's a big name that I think got hoodwinked by that stratagem but this season he's not letting it get to him and is hitting very well.
So yes, to give it some credit, it can and does work ... but I believe only in a more mental way in which some hitters are thrown off by it.
Criticism
This article was titled "Silly Shift" so this section as you can guess will be longer. It was titled "Dumb Shift" but I changed it because it isn't really dumb it's more silly than dumb.
Let's start at a big critique of the Shift now ... and that's that it only works on ONE particular version of hitter and that's two-tool left handed hitters. Their two tools being power and eye.
I've always been a fan of 5-tool players because they always have something to fall back on if the opposition figures out a weakness on them. The two-tool lefty power n' walks hitter can't fall back on anything when their weaknesses are singled out and pounced on. A TTLPW (two-tool-lefty-power-walker) is out of baseball if his tools are isolated and destroyed. He's usually a firstbaseman or DH so he can't fall back on his defense when goings get tough and stay on the roster because of solid defense. He can't let his speed do the brunt of the work and break out of the slump by stopping his power approach, going for a pure contact approach, and be productive with base running. If you can isolate and punch holes in the TTLPW's game ... he's out of baseball for good. If you stop him from doing the only two things he does well, he's walking the lonely road to Palookaville ..... just him, his dog, and his equipment bag ... walking the long road down to Nowherestown, USA.
 |
| This scene and "firing" Boco in Final Fantasy Tactics made me almost weep openly. |
Truth be told, not many TTLPWs are out of baseball because of the shift. Why? Because it barely even stifles their ability to do what they do ... and that's draw walks and hit extra base hits. Once they overcome the mental aspect of the shift it barely even affects their game. You think David Ortiz gave a human crap or even a pile of horse crap that they put the infielders to one side of the field? NO! The guy's job was to either walk, strikeout, or blast an extra base hit on or over the wall. He's not giving ten pounds of cat crap about the stupid shift ... and if the mental aspect doesn't work then what good is it? None. You think Ortiz cared how many guys were standing on first base after he hit homerun number 30 of the season? No, he really did not.
That's one way to overcome the mental voodoo of the shift that can enter the hitter's head ... literally to not care about it and keep swinging for the fences. You're a left handed, slow as molasses, DH, power hitter ... you hit homers ... that's what you do. That's your job. You don't have to pretend to care about the silly shift. Don't let it get to you.
The other way you can say Gimme-a-Break to a manager shiftin' on you is to take a breath every 5th shift on you or so ... and tell them ... look .... I know I'm a lefty power hitter who is slower than my grandma at base running but look at this, man, I'm gonna pull a fast one on you. Take two steps back in the batter's box and lunge-slap an opposite field liner into left field. If you can't master the lunge-slap hittin' style then just throw a bunt down the third base line every 5th shift or so just to tell the opposing manager ... "yo, I'm not a Statue, okay? I'm not a Stone Golem here, ok? I can employ other tools if I have to ... don't run this shit on me, man, okay?
I saw Rizzo on the Cubs bunt for a single once. That's rare for him but if there's no thirdbaseman at third base a bunt there is basically a 100% method of getting on base and not making an out. I know with the TTLPWs they don't pay them for bunt singles but pay them to homer ... but if you feel the opposing manager's shift is getting to you then it's not a bad idea to let them know that you're not a Stone Golem every now and then and slap something to third, you know? Hoist the petard on those former back-up catcher nerd managers who think you are nothing but mere one-tool ham-fisted statues.
Can you imagine if 80s or 90s pure hitters had shifts on them? They'd laugh at it. If you did this back then on lefties like George Brett, Tony Gwynn, Al Oliver, etc., etc.,? They'd hit a double off you EVERY TIME. You think they had trouble slappin' to opposite field? No, they were pure hitters. They could hit anything. If you pulled this bush league cow crap on those guys they would have LAUGHED and LAUGHED and LAUGHED. They would have regarded The Shift as ridiculous.
So to sum up my criticism of The Shift....
-It basically stops singles.
-It only works on Slow as Molasses Left Handed Power Pull Hitters who have no plan-B auxiliary tools to fall back on (i.e. opposite field lunge-slaps or bunting/speed attempts)
Left Handed Power hitters are usually hitting 3, 4, or 5 in the lineup and are not paid to hit singles ... they are paid to drive in runners with powerful wallops to the outfield (NOT THE INFIELD EVEN). So, even if the shift does work .... how much difference is it actually making?
-It can be countered by something as simple as not caring about it (i.e. David Ortiz not caring that there were 5 guys standing on first base whilst he circled the bases after a 430 foot homerun)
-It can be countered by just using your brain sometimes and putting a ball where the fielders aren't.
I really think the success of the Shift is mental, that it gets into some hitters minds, and throws them off their shtick ... but as we've seen with even some of the most two-tooled of two-tooled lefty power n' walks hitters (Smoak and Belt) .... even guys who it worked on got out of it. Smoak is smashing balls, Belt is smashing balls. Whatever mental affects it had on them have warn off already.
One other thing that should be noted is that the appeal it has with the fans ... and it does have decent appeal with some fans ... is that it is from the cross-over between NFL fans and MLB fans (which is pretty large). In football, defensive formations is paramount to the game. I mean, if you are set up to stop the offensive play of the opposing coach in football you're gonna win a lot of games. In baseball, defensive formations are part of the game but not NEARLY to the scale of football. Fans should keep in mind that baseball and football ... though both great .... are pretty different cups of tea. They really are.
Different cups of tea.
