LOL. Take a look at the 1st inning tonight as exhibit A. Exclusively setting up away on LHBs while the bench has the defense in a deep pull shift. Either he needs to yell at the bench to change it up or he has to pretend he isn't blind and adjust his calls to the freaking defense. There's absolutely no excuse for the way Pudge refuses to change things up even when they aren't working.
Pitching away from LHB is not a problem at all considering most LHB are real dangerous on inside pitches (especially down and in). The point of pitching outside with the shift is to force the batter to pull a weak grounder.
Look at Ryan Howard's spray charts. Barely any balls to the left side or even in the middle.
http://mlb.mlb.com/stats/individual_player_hitting_chart.jsp?c_id=phi&playerID=429667&statType=1Here is a picture of Ryan Howard's groundball tendencies from the 2008 season:
Pitching inside to Chase Utley doesn't make any sense at all. He is probably the best inside hitter in baseball. Look at Utley's chart. Very few groundballs to the left or middle.
http://mlb.mlb.com/stats/individual_player_hitting_chart.jsp?c_id=phi&playerID=400284&statType=1Look at Ibanez chart. Not too many at the middle or on the left side.
http://mlb.mlb.com/stats/individual_player_hitting_chart.jsp?c_id=phi&playerID=116380&statType=1Pitching away was hardly the problem or was the shift. If I had to guess, not many pitchers throw inside vs. the Phillies LHB.
Look at how the last RH starter pitched vs. the Phillies LHB batters:
