Why bunt in baseball

It's fair to conclude that the downfall of the bunt has fed into this trend, as has another trend rhymes with "mikeouts" that we'll be discussing soon. But the big contributor is the increased emphasis on pitch counts. Hitters want pitchers to escalate their pitch counts so they can take advantage of either A a tired pitcher or B middle relievers. So for today's hitters, bunting is counterintuitive.

Bunts offer pitchers potentially easy outs, and they do them the favor of conserving their ammunition. Another reason why the bunt doesn't make a whole lot of sense for today's hitters has to do with the fact that, collectively, they're more powerful. The Steroid Era may be long gone, but the rate of home runs per game is still high relative to where it was in the late s and most of the s:. This is proof that pretty much everyone can hit for power these days.

And since pretty much everyone can hit for power, why settle for a bunt when a homer could be in the cards? That's choosing to try for one run the hard way instead of trying for one run the easy way.

Then there's the elephant in the room. In a league where home runs are more easily hit, it doesn't make sense to play for one run in most situations. Other teams can hit homers too, and that means one-run deficits are easily overcome.

There are other reasons why the bunt doesn't belong in today's MLB , and they have to do with the guys at the top and bottom of the league's lineups. The job of leadoff hitters is still the same today as it's ever been. They need to get on, get in scoring position and come home. The difference now is that they don't need as much help getting in scoring position, as leadoff men have become more powerful.

There are some peaks and valleys here, but generally what this graph shows is that leadoff slugging percentages have been higher lately. It's a little bit more clear if you consider the averages for the different time periods noted above:. Leadoff men have become less powerful in the last three-plus years, but they're still more powerful than they were in the late s, s and s.

As for bottom-of-the-order guys, non-pitcher hitters have tended to be more productive in recent years. Here's a graph that shows their OPSs since More peaks and valleys, but you can see that, even with the recent downturn in offense, bottom-of-the-order guys are still more productive now than they were in the late s and most of the s.

Since he won't know the outcome of the bunt until it is too late and he has already left the base, this is a very risky and rare play. Squeeze plays are usually only used late in the game when the score is very close, and it is crucial to drive in a runner in any way possible.

When do you have to run in baseball? Previous Next. Table of Contents. What is bunt in baseball? When To Bunt Bunting usually does not allow the batter himself to reach second base or third base , but it is very useful in advancing a runner who is already on base. Bunting Strategies There are lots of bunting strategies that baseball teams can use to score runs in difficult situations.

I still believe there is a place in the game for bunting other than against infield defensive shifts. Dan, I think this info is extremely interesting. What would be really great is if there was an analysis of college level baseball, with the assumption that the talent level is lower and how that might effect outcomes hitters not as good at situational hitting , infield defenses, etc.

Hey Desi, I completely agree — I read this stuff and constantly wonder how it applies, and how the numbers change in lower levels of baseball. In the Majors, outcomes are much more certain, as you know. And, the disparate levels of play makes run expectancy tables much less relevant.

Good point, but also consider the times where a bunt is attempted and a player cannot get it down and either pops out, or goes back to swinging with 2 strikes. Then you give up an out without any positive outcome. In fact, given that youth baseball scoring environment is generally higher than in MLB, I would expect that the true impact of sacrifice bunting is probably even more detrimental in youth baseball.

More passed balls and wild pitches, as well as increased SB rates, for example, would tend to further temper the impact of sac bunts. In other words, a lot of those runners are going to advance, anyway, so why give up outs with sac bunts?

Very interesting- every situation is different but knowledge is power. And an informed decision is a better decision. Thanks for reading! How do we factor in the running making it aboard, the runner swiping and extra base? Do we assume this is countered by the likely hood of the batter not executing the bunt? Also a follow up question. Whilst talks about run expectancy, this chart factors the likely hood of multiple runners scoring.

If this does increase the likely hood of the lead runner scoring, which I expect it would, comparing the influence this additional run has on the result of the game over rolling the dice for the additional runs? Run probability charts would be the stat to look to in that case, not expectancy. Probability just tracks the likelihood of at least one run scoring before the inning ends. I dont have a way of pasting one into this comment, but tangotiger.

This is all wrong. Look at the chart. You forget one very important thing. The result of the at bat. Runner on first with no outs the run expectancy is. Like the charts says if the sac bunt is sucessful then runner on 2b with 1 out is a. Of course if the batter hits into a DP again varibles with the type of pitcher on the mound. Played and managed this games for 40 plus years.

Run expectancy means nothing to me. So, the 0. They took all instances in MLB where there was a runner on 1st with 0 outs, and with every outcome that occurred after, the number was still 0.

So, the same is true for a runner on 2nd with 1 out: 0. This is the average of everything that comes after. Choosing 2nd with 1 out is choosing a situation in which less runs score over time. If you choose that situation times — by bunting to it, for example — it will cost your team 20 runs on average. Context still matters, and bunting in the final inning to put the winning run on 2nd increases win expectancy, even if run expectancy is diminished.

Context still matters. Sabermetrics and advanced statistics are challenging many of our long-held beliefs. Thanks for the comment. The lower the players batting avg. The more ground balls they hit. One rule to note is that if a batter has two strikes, and bunts a ball into foul territory, they are then ruled out and called a strikeout. This foul ball rule on the third strike only applies to bunting.

The numerous reasons why a batter would bunt a ball into play.