Still too dumb and undisciplined (Gomez) and passive (Roenicke) [See mod note in post #160]

[Thurston Fluff]

I don't know that this is an organizational issue and not just the fact we have some players who are just too aggressive.

 

It's an organizational issue because Sedar makes far too many mistakes under the guise of "being aggressive" and he is rewarded for it because it's exactly what RR wants his team to do.

 

I do agree, we notice the Brewers mistakes more since we see every game. I'm sure many teams have lots of mental errors also. With that said, I dismiss any stats trying to quantify base running, since it's just too subjective.

 

Considering how many times I saw them run through stop signs last year I think it's a bit harsh to put it on Sedar. Setting that aside I think RRR is more willing to forgive a mistake made in the heat of the moment if it was an aggressive one as opposed to passive. The thing that won't happen is perfection. There will be times when you think you see something that wasn't there or you are unsure of which way to go. Yet in those moments you still have to make a choice. So when those times come RRR wants them to error on the aggressive side as opposed to the passive. I have absolutely no qualms about that.

What I don't think is going on is RRR saying lets not even try to lessen those instances of uncertainty. I have no doubt he talks over mistakes and works to reduce the number of uncertain times. Nor do I believe he would put up with a coach who had an unusually high number of those times. After last year's meltdown if there was an egregious amount of mistakes made by a coach that would have cost them their job. That Sedar is back after the coach blood letting last year I think it's clear they do not believe he had to many of them.

[rickh150]

"What I don't think is going on is RRR saying lets not even try to lessen those instances of uncertainty. I have no doubt he talks over mistakes and works to reduce the number of uncertain times. Nor do I believe he would put up with a coach who had an unusually high number of those times."

 

I have no info/proof/newspaper clippings to back any of this up..... What coaching is being done on the basepads? Anyone? Does anyone have an article with any Brewers coach over RR's time as manager discussing teaching tactics on the basepads? Sorry....Being aggressive can not be an answer. Specifics. I hear Schroeder talking about how a pitching coach or hitting coach helps a pitcher/hitter from time to time with a certain grip of the ball or changing the batting stance.... not a baserunner, however. Just be aggressive, right? What coaching is going into teaching guys how to run the bases with risk/reward in mind? Seems like we could have an article or fifty about this important issue when Hank THE DOG has had a few hundred. Since I presume there is none out there (or I would have read about it somewhere), I'll assume it isn't a priority in the organization. Easy to make that point and super sad to see idiots play the game the wrong way.

 

Again, I am all for being aggressive on the bases when risk/reward is in our favor. Basically, I'm not for it in these situations:

1. making an out at 3b for the 1st or 3rd out

2. making an out at home for the first out

3. making an out on the bases when trailing big

4. making an out at 3rd on a routine grounder to SS

5. making an out on 1st, 2nd or 3rd on a liner, bunt pop up to an infielder (unless SB or hit/run called)

 

Also, on a side note, I just talked to another Brewers fan.... I see him about twice a month. I asked him if he was watching many Brewers Cactus League games. He said, "Yeah, they haven't been winning much, have they?" I said, "Not yet." He finished the conversation with, " Yeah, and there baserunning is terrible!" To me it's been obvious.... the lack of smarts out there. I play in a co-ed league, and the worst teams in it do not make the mental mistakes like the Brewers do. Mind you, the Brewers play eight times more than we do and are three times as fast as most of us, but their aggressiveness which can be beneficial at times, often kills a rally and takes the air out of the sails of the entire club, especially when one of the Risk/Reward Rules are broken.

[Thurston Fluff]

I have no info/proof/newspaper clippings to back any of this up..... What coaching is being done on the basepads? Anyone? Does anyone have an article with any Brewers coach over RR's time as manager discussing teaching tactics on the basepads? Sorry....Being aggressive can not be an answer. Specifics. I hear Schroeder talking about how a pitching coach or hitting coach helps a pitcher/hitter from time to time with a certain grip of the ball or changing the batting stance.... not a baserunner, however. Just be aggressive, right? What coaching is going into teaching guys how to run the bases with risk/reward in mind? Seems like we could have an article or fifty about this important issue when Hank THE DOG has had a few hundred. Since I presume there is none out there (or I would have read about it somewhere), I'll assume it isn't a priority in the organization. Easy to make that point and super sad to see idiots play the game the wrong way.

 

Are you asking what specific drills they use to teach a runner when to take the extra base and such? I honesty don't know if anyone ever wrote about that. Probably because it would be about as interesting as watching paint dry. It seems like there is a drill or two for every aspect of the game so I imagine there is something. It's probably in some book about coaching baseball somewhere. I also think it would be about as mundane and league wide as every other drill every team does. I doubt there is something the Brewers are doing differently that somehow makes them worse at it than others.

If you want something that I think can be pointed to that shows how a manager can set the tone look at how Matt Williams handled Bryce Harper for baiting a player into an out on the base paths. http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/mlb-big-league-stew/bryce-harper-throws-out-runner--draws-ire-of-his-manager-023644876.html There are a few things that stand out to me.

First it goes to show players on other teams make mistakes on the base paths.

Second I am not so sure doing it publicly is the right way to go. I think I'd rather it be kept in house. Even if you get accused of not trying to fix it.

Third it shows how managers address things to get certain styles of play. It didn't take a specific spring training drill to get the message across that Williams prefers the passive safe plays over the aggressive ones. That doesn't mean Harper will suddenly stop being Harper. But he knows he will have a harder time explaining an aggressive mistake than a passive one in the future. That is pretty much all a manager can do. He certainly isn't going to bench one of his best players or something equally silly. If he does he sure as heck better win without him. Or he will be gone way before the player will.

On a side note much like Gomez, I don't think it is how you get the most out of Harper.

[rickh150]

I don't want the MOST out of Gomez, just his BEST.

Being more disciplined on the bases(by now) shouldn't be optional. It should be expected and positive change should be seen yearly.

[jerichoholicninja]

I have no info/proof/newspaper clippings to back any of this up..... What coaching is being done on the basepads? Anyone? Does anyone have an article with any Brewers coach over RR's time as manager discussing teaching tactics on the basepads? Sorry....Being aggressive can not be an answer. Specifics. I hear Schroeder talking about how a pitching coach or hitting coach helps a pitcher/hitter from time to time with a certain grip of the ball or changing the batting stance.... not a baserunner, however. Just be aggressive, right? What coaching is going into teaching guys how to run the bases with risk/reward in mind? Seems like we could have an article or fifty about this important issue when Hank THE DOG has had a few hundred. Since I presume there is none out there (or I would have read about it somewhere), I'll assume it isn't a priority in the organization. Easy to make that point and super sad to see idiots play the game the wrong way.

 

Are you asking what specific drills they use to teach a runner when to take the extra base and such? I honesty don't know if anyone ever wrote about that. Probably because it would be about as interesting as watching paint dry. It seems like there is a drill or two for every aspect of the game so I imagine there is something. It's probably in some book about coaching baseball somewhere. I also think it would be about as mundane and league wide as every other drill every team does. I doubt there is something the Brewers are doing differently that somehow makes them worse at it than others.

If you want something that I think can be pointed to that shows how a manager can set the tone look at how Matt Williams handled Bryce Harper for baiting a player into an out on the base paths. http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/mlb-big-league-stew/bryce-harper-throws-out-runner--draws-ire-of-his-manager-023644876.html There are a few things that stand out to me.

First it goes to show players on other teams make mistakes on the base paths.

Second I am not so sure doing it publicly is the right way to go. I think I'd rather it be kept in house. Even if you get accused of not trying to fix it.

Third it shows how managers address things to get certain styles of play. It didn't take a specific spring training drill to get the message across that Williams prefers the passive safe plays over the aggressive ones. That doesn't mean Harper will suddenly stop being Harper. But he knows he will have a harder time explaining an aggressive mistake than a passive one in the future. That is pretty much all a manager can do. He certainly isn't going to bench one of his best players or something equally silly. If he does he sure as heck better win without him. Or he will be gone way before the player will.

On a side note much like Gomez, I don't think it is how you get the most out of Harper.

 

After watching that clip I don't see what problem Williams would have. The baserunner did something stupid and Harper threw him out. Harper may have goated him a little bit but most of what happened was on the runner. Sounds to me it's more like Williams trying to act big and put on a show to show that's he's the boss.

[MrTPlush]

I can't believe this conversation and especially about Gomez is still going on...

[tmwiese55]

2. making an out at home for the first out

 

This is another one, absolute must not have this happen. Really you should never even have to slide when going home if there's nobody out.

 

I'm not sure what the word is on the expected lineup yet but I just hope Gomez gets put in the middle of the order rather than at leadoff. These mistakes are a lot more acceptable when you have your #7 or 8 hitter at the plate. batting him lower would allow him greater freedom and it would get the most out of his power rather than hitting solo HRs.

[rickh150]

Opening day....... Davis doesn't run out blooper that falls behind 1B- has to stay on first

2nd day.... Lind chucked at third for the first out of inning (down 3-0 in fourth)

 

Par for course.....

[rickh150]

2nd game..... Garza either forgot the outs or can't throw a come backer to 2nd base

[MrTPlush]

2nd game..... Garza either forgot the outs or can't throw a come backer to 2nd base

 

knowing the defense Garza has...he probably made the right choice.

[tmwiese55]

I believe I saw Gomez miss a cutoff on opening day, instead chucking it all the way to 3B, ball didn't get in clean and bounced around for a second, but not enough for the guy to advance. If I recall it wasn't a speedy runner and not a real threat to go for the triple, but he still blasted it out there risking the throw away.

[MrTPlush]

I like how everyone is not picking Gomez, but fails to(mostly) mention how bad the team is in general. I don't know what they coach in practice, but it isn't cmvery good. Not to mention Sedar should shoulder a lot of blame.

 

As far as missing cutoffs throws...Khris Davis is who you should be worried about....he barely can get it to the infield.

[Thurston Fluff]

Gomez with a man on and two out. Double, runs scores. If you really want to document every bad play I'll document every good play. Lets see who has more when the year is done.

[fondybrewfan]

It isn't dumb or undisciplined but holy hell does Davis have a wet noodle out their in LF. I don't understand how a good athlete like that who shows good power at the plate can have such a poor arm.

 

Hopefully they can get a W tonight so we can talk about something good.

[3and2Fastball]

It isn't dumb or undisciplined but holy hell does Davis have a wet noodle out their in LF. I don't understand how a good athlete like that who shows good power at the plate can have such a poor arm.

 

I coach a 12 year old kid on our youth Baseball team that has a stronger arm than Davis. And I've seen several 12 year olds in southern Wisconsin with stronger arms

[TURBO]

Gomez with a man on and two out. Double, runs scores. If you really want to document every bad play I'll document every good play. Lets see who has more when the year is done.

 

The point of this thread isn't that we do good things, it is that we do an excessive amount of bad things, undisciplined things, things that make us go....hmmm.

 

We darn well better have more good plays than bad, if not, we are doomed before we even start.

 

As a fan of the team, it is only normal to expect less dumb and undisciplined plays from an experienced squad and an experienced manager. The real shocker in my book is the fact that our manager still has a job in this organization at all. I'll never understand why we put up with a bumbling manager, there is nothing wrong with expecting better than what we get each and every day with this guy.

 

As far as Gomez goes, he is maddening to say the least, but he sure is exciting to watch. His base running errors should be fewer each year, but that hasn't been the case. Swinging out of his helmet at least once per at bat is just plain stupid, yet it continues. I love the guy, but there are times when I can't stand to watch him too...

[danzig6767]

Swinging out of his helmet at least once per at bat is just plain stupid, yet it continues. I love the guy, but there are times when I can't stand to watch him too...

I hear others also complain about Gomez sometimes swinging out of his helmet and i just don't get why people care about this given his production?

 

He always swings super hard and this leads sometimes to his helmet flying off. So what. It was that all out change in his approach at the plate which has lead to him going from being a bad hitter to one of the best at his position.

 

There are erratic things Carlos does at times which i get why it can frustrate fans even though he's overall turned into an elite player, but i don't get being bothered by his helmet flying off on swing and misses sometimes. It's still a strike regardless if the helmet stays on and his swinging super hard at all times has played a major factor in the guy going from a near automatic out to best CF in the game not named Mike Trout.

[tmwiese55]

Yea I don't see swinging out of his helmet as a bad thing. I actually love it and it shows how hard he plays and I usually get a good laugh out of it.

 

And yea of course he's going to have more good than bad, that's not the point, no one on here denies that he's a great player and probably our best right now. The point is these are easily correctable things that were a big problem last year, so you'd think the manager would've cleaned this up in spring training yet in the first few games nothing has changed.

 

No denying Davis has a noodle out there, almost needs his whole body to get into the infield.

[fondybrewfan]

Other teams do stupid stuff too; look at the stupid hit and run Colorado tried to pull off yesterday. They ended up still getting the run in from 3rd with two outs; but the decision was still dumb the AB prior.

[Pugger]

This is a dumb complaint. Gomez wins far more games with his style than he loses. Yes, he can drive us crazy. At least he's a good player now. Remember when he was crappy and rarely ever won games for us? If his offense/defense wins us more games than it loses (which it does) then I'll take it.

 

But it isn't just Gomez. Lind had no business getting thrown out at 3rd the other night. Why are you pitching to a guy who has been hitting the snot out of the ball for 3 days instead of letting him walk with the pitcher coming up last night? It is boneheaded decisions by a lot of people on this team that can make you pull your hair out.

[Thurston Fluff]

The point of this thread isn't that we do good things, it is that we do an excessive amount of bad things, undisciplined things, things that make us go....hmmm.

 

And my point is it isn't excessive. If you only point out the bad and never point out A- other teams do stupid things as well and B- they do far more good things than bad, it would make them look far worse than they really are. All you are really doing is trying to validate your preconceived notion. If you only look for things that do that what other conclusion do you think would be drawn? If they really are as bad as you claim then there should be a lot more instances of us doing bad things than either good things or other teams doing bad things. Having a thread dedicated to only showing one side of the argument does not prove your point.

[tmwiese55]

I think the point that everyone else does it too was discussed plenty. And people like myself's take is that we do it more than others, which is hard to quantify since we watch Brewers way more than everyone else. I watch a ton of MLB network games though, which bounces to runner on situations (which is kind of the main beef we're all talking about) and I almost never see this stuff.

 

Forgetting that though since it's still a diffucult comparison, just take how bad it was last year versus past Brewers seasons (since that is an easy comparison) and can anyone really not agree that it was noticeably worse last year? Three games is obviously too soon to say anything but early returns this year aren't great.

[Thurston Fluff]

I think it is also hard to determine how many times conservative base running teams lose runs but never gets noticed. If Gomez gets thrown out at third because he was over aggressive we see it. If a conservative base runner stays at second when they could made it to third it doesn't get counted as a mistake. Yet it really is equally bad base running. If you stay at second with one out and the next guy hits a fly ball you score. If you stayed at second you don't. So in those instances the run never scores but the guy who failed to take third when he could have doesn't appear to have made a mistake. But he did and it cost his team a run.

[tmwiese55]

Wasn't a big lesson of Moneyball to not give a way outs because you only get so many per game? Your point is true but overall big picture and mathematically it's better to conserve the outs.

 

And really the whole point here was the times when they're massively thrown out or when the situation makes it completely wrong to take any risk. I think we're all fine with generally being aggressive since we have speedy players for the most part and it creates a more entertaining game. In your situation, I think we all agree to be aggressive if there's 1 out and try to get to 3rd and if it's a bang bang play then so be it. If you're thrown out by 4 steps you were clearly wrong or if you get thrown out going for 3rd with 0 outs (lind the other day) then you're wrong. Or if you're thrown out at 3rd with two outs with Braun coming up next, you're wrong.

[Thurston Fluff]

Wasn't a big lesson of Moneyball to not give a way outs because you only get so many per game? Your point is true but overall big picture and mathematically it's better to conserve the outs.

 

Actually the big lesson I learned was to look for undervalued assets. Those things change as the game does. As a matter of fact I just read this past winter an article about how stolen bases were more valuable last season than in years past. That the presumed 75% success rate to be worth it was actually somewhat lower. While that may be an anomaly we do have less runs scoring so it does make some amount of sense. I'd guess defensive shifts and better overall pitching have something to do with that. If it's harder to get consecutive hits it makes doing more with the few you get more valuable than it used to be.

Personal opinion here but I think sometimes advanced metrics get misused when it comes to managing. It isn't as simple as plugging in a generic formula based on all teams over a decade of play and determine how this team will score the most runs. Sabre metrics are great to use to build a team. I don't think those type of analysis are as good at maximizing a particular team's potential. Not unless you can spend all you want to build the perfect team specifically for those metrics.

As far as giving up outs yes it is bad. But so is giving up a run to save an out in an age where runs are harder to come by. Ultimately we are talking about what an acceptable rate of stupidity that is bound to happen with any philosophy. Be it stupidly stopping at second when you could have taken third or stupidly running into an out at third. If we had a bunch of high OBP guys I would be fine with station to station baseball. Then a conservative mistake would be less costly over time. We don't so I am not.

 

And really the whole point here was the times when they're massively thrown out or when the situation makes it completely wrong to take any risk. I think we're all fine with generally being aggressive since we have speedy players for the most part and it creates a more entertaining game. In your situation, I think we all agree to be aggressive if there's 1 out and try to get to 3rd and if it's a bang bang play then so be it. If you're thrown out by 4 steps you were clearly wrong or if you get thrown out going for 3rd with 0 outs (lind the other day) then you're wrong. Or if you're thrown out at 3rd with two outs with Braun coming up next, you're wrong.

 

Yes obvious bad plays are bad. I get aggravated like everyone else when they happen. Not arguing they are not. But mistakes will happen when you are aggressive just like good plays fail to happen when you are overly conservative on the base paths. They are just less obvious. We should work very hard to cut down all types of mistakes. However I have seen perfect throws being made that makes some bad plays look worse than they really are. I have also seen what would have been a bad play turn out well because the defender bobbled the ball or threw off line or missed his cutoff man. With our team I think we need to force the other team's hand a little bit. Make them be perfect. Because we know we are not going to be.