The Buhner.com Blog

Ready for some fun, kids?� Let’s play “You’re The Manager.” � Baseball managers make very important decisions that their years of experience in baseball can give them insight that an outsider like you or me can only dream to have.� But let’s pretend, shall we?

Player A has eleven home runs, an OPS of .863, and is already in the game.

Player B has sixteen home runs, an OPS of .927, and is on the bench.

Eh - not much difference.� If looking solely at that, you’d take the player that’s in the game and leave the other player on the bench just in case.� Let’s look deeper.

Player B is a former MVP.� Player A has never received a MVP vote.

Well, awards are rewards for past performance.� What’s to say Player A won’t get MVP votes this year?� And it’s not like Player B is even a reigning MVP.

Player B has finished in the top 4 of the MVP race every year of his career, likely due to his career .330 batting average, 266 career home runs, and 1.037 career OPS.� Player A has a career batting average of .283 and has never finished a season with a batting average higher than .310.� He has 77 career home runs and a .791 career OPS, albeit in 242 less games.

Wow - a career .330 hitter?� Top four every season?� That’s pretty impressive.

Player B’s most similar batters through his age (thanks B-R) are Jimmie Foxx, Frank Robinson, and Joe DiMaggio.� Player A’s most similar batters through his age are Carl Everett, Shea Hillenbrand, and Milton Bradley.

Ew.� Keep in mind this is purely statistical though - if you think of things in common with Everett, Hillenbrand, and Bradley, it’s not their stat lines.

You know, maybe we’re looking at this too much in the past.� Baseball is about now - the hot hand, the live bat.� How about their last 40 games?

Player A: 4 HR, .289 BA, .807 OPS
Player B: 8 HR, .338 BA, 1.012 OPS

Um… their last 25 games?

Player A: 3 HR, .268 BA, .804 OPS
Player B: 1 HR, .337 BA, .893 OPS

Um… their last 10 games?

Player A: 1 HR, .241 BA, .729 OPS
Player B: 0 HR, .400 BA, .917 OPS

Yeah.� So back to “You’re The Manager”.� Bottom of the 9th, two out, bases loaded.� Down by one run.� Derrek Lee is on second, who has decent speed, so a base hit will probably get the winning run home.

If you’re the manager, who do you send up to the plate?� If you’re Tony LaRussa, you send up Player A, and you watch as Player A hits a fly ball to right field that is easily caught to end the game.� You lose, as Player B remains on the bench.

Perhaps Tony LaRussa was acting under misguided loyality, since this was an All-Star game and one of those players was from his team, the St. Louis Cardinals.� All-Star managers often stick to what is familiar to them.

Except that it was Player B who was on the Cardinals, not Player A.

For those who haven’t figured out by now, Player B is Albert Pujols, while Player A is Aaron Rowand.� Rowand, playing center field and 0-1 with a strikeout since coming in for Ken Griffey a few innings earlier, was scheduled to be the 8th batter in the NL lineup when the 9th inning started, and probably didn’t think he’d be batting when the first two NL batters were retired, leaving two outs with none on.� Then Dmitri Young, hitting for pitcher Trevor Hoffman, got an infield base hit, followed up by a two run home run from Alfonso Soriano.� Now it’s 5-4, with two outs and no one on.

J.J. Hardy walks.� Jim Leyland has enough, and pulls Seattle closer J.J. Putz for Anaheim closer Francisco Rodriguez.� Rodriguez walks Derrek Lee.� Rodriguez walks Orlando Hudson.� Rodriguez wets himself.

So now you have the bases loaded.� It’s the bottom of the ninth.� Since Lee has some speed, anything outside of an infield single will probably get him in from second to win the game.� A walk ties the game, and brings up Freddy Sanchez, who isn’t a horrible hitter.

So the question is who you’d rather have up to bat - the person more likely to get the base hit, or the person more likely to take advantage of the frazzled Rodriguez and take the walk to tie the game.

We’ve already stated that Pujols (Player B, for those not following) was the better career hitter, the better hitter the last few months, the better hitter the last month, and the better hitter over the last ten games.

Aaron Rowand has 29 walks this season.� Albert Pujols has 53.

So if you’re Tony LaRussa and you want the base hit, you go to Pujols.� If you want the walk, you go to Pujols.� If you want the guy you’re familiar with for the last six+ seasons, you go to Pujols.

But apparently, if you’re Tony LaRussa last night, you go with Aaron Rowand.

LaRussa justified keeping Pujols on the bench by saying that he needed him in case the game went into extra innings.� That’s a good strategy if you’re tied at the moment that decision needs to be made.� You know, if it’s currently possible to go into extra innings.� But when you’re down by a run and it’s the bottom of the 9th inning, extra innings isn’t the most likely of situations.

But not using your best hitter in a do-or-die situation is the equivalent of bringing a knife to a gunfight because you’ve only got one bullet, and you might have a gunfight tomorrow.

Tomorrow doesn’t matter if you’re dead today.

MLB.com’s game wrapup quoted Pujols:

“Maybe he was saving me for next year’s All-Star Game,” Pujols jokingly said.

Yeah, that “joking” didn’t last long:

“It’s the All-Star game. He can do what he wants,” Pujols said Tuesday night. “He does whatever he wants. If I wasn’t expecting to play, I wouldn’t have come up here.”

What’s that, Albert?� Did you just question managerial mastermind Tony LaRussa?

“If he wants to get upset, he can get upset,” La Russa said. “Whatever he wants to do, he can do. It’s America. That wasn’t the most important thing tonight.”

So keeping every player happy wasn’t the most important thing tonight, playing everyone wasn’t the most important thing tonight, and winning wasn’t the most important thing tonight.� Was there cancer research going on in the on-deck circle that hasn’t been announced to the media?� Was it a dying child’s wish to see Aaron Rowand bat twice in the All-Star game?

“Once we lost (Miguel) Cabrera and (Freddy) Sanchez, he [Pujols] was the guy we were going to use to protect ourselves in case we kept playing because of Albert’s versatility,” La Russa said. “I think we had the right guy at bat.”

I missed when Freddy Sanchez got hurt, apparently, because he was still in the lineup, and would have batted after Rowand.

Now defensive issues aside, had Rowand been taken out for Pujols and Pujols walked or taken an infield hit, leaving the game tied, then Freddy Sanchez (still alive) could have gotten out the following at-bat, putting the game into extra innings.� Pujols would have then had to move to left field, with Alfonso Soriano shifting over to center, leaving the National League with a less than desirable outfield defense.

However, under the scenario that LaRussa pictures, Pujols ends up at third base, a position he hadn’t played regularly since his rookie season, and at all since 2002.

So why is Freddy Sanchez gone?� Is LaRussa thinking too far ahead of himself, planning on pinch hitting for Sanchez with Pujols in the following at-bat?� Considering that Sanchez is arguably a better hitter than Rowand too, it seems like a severe case of either over-management, or just plain dropping the ball.