Windmill them in: The Fire Bob Sendley Thread

[DCFan]

Howie better get his legs ready.

[imref]

haven't they been testing the stealing of first base in the minors?

[bluestreak]

Trea Turner to steal 175 bases in 2020

[JCA-CrystalCity]

I am guesting they want to stretch some infield singles into doubles

[Slateman]

I am guesting they want to stretch some infield singles into inside-the-park home runs

Fixed

[JCA-CrystalCity]

Fixed

well, inside the park would be on Hale at 3d.

[Slateman]

well, inside the park would be on Hale at 3d.

Not if Sendley is sending them home from first base.

[RobDibblesGhost]

Bump.

Bad call to send Schwarber on that shallow fly ball.

[Five Banners]

Why couldn’t they just leave him at first base

[KnorrForYourMoney]

Wow, this might be the late BiL's best thread (and by far his most LOD thread, coincidentally ).

And also, this comment is still true:

A monkey can do better then Henley.  I don't understand why he survived the 2017 NLDS.

[Smithian]

I spent my early years watching the Nationals never thinking twice about Pat Listach, Bo Porter, and Trent Jewett. Occasional strange send call, but I never once wondered if they were "good" or "bad". More often than not, their decisions made sense.

Bob Henley must be a genius behind the scenes, or the Nationals analytics staff must believe conservative third base coaches are an MLB inefficiency. Henley has had four managers keep him around and in that role, other than his brief stint last year at first base.

I've spent over half a decade either in the Park shocked seeing his send calls or watching TV and mentally thinking after a hit, "This will set Nats up 1st and 3rd!" a half moment before Bob Carpenter or FP screams about Henley sending a runner.

It has to be an organizational approach at third. There is no other reason four managers have allowed who knows how many Nats runners get thrown out at the plate with a few steps to spare.

[Natsinpwc]

I didn’t have a major problem with the send last night.  Up three runs.

[rbw5t]

I spent my early years watching the Nationals never thinking twice about Pat Listach, Bo Porter, and Trent Jewett. Occasional strange send call, but I never once wondered if they were "good" or "bad". More often than not, their decisions made sense.

Bob Henley must be a genius behind the scenes, or the Nationals analytics staff must believe conservative third base coaches are an MLB inefficiency. Henley has had four managers keep him around and in that role, other than his brief stint last year at first base.

I've spent over half a decade either in the Park shocked seeing his send calls or watching TV and mentally thinking after a hit, "This will set Nats up 1st and 3rd!" a half moment before Bob Carpenter or FP screams about Henley sending a runner.

It has to be an organizational approach at third. There is no other reason four managers have allowed who knows how many Nats runners get thrown out at the plate with a few steps to spare.

I don't know if the Nats baseball believe this, but I certainly do.  When you send someone aggressively and the throw is good and they are out easily, you look dumb, but sooo many throws are off line, too weak, too strong, etc, and what could have been a close play with a good throw ends up with the runner cruising in standing up.  I of course don't have stats to back it up, but it is perfectly plausible to me that based on data the team has decided to be affirmatively aggressive, knowing that we'll run into some outs, on the theory that a high percentage of throws won't be good enough to get the runner.  I do think whether or not to go should be informed by the situation as well.

[bluestreak]

If you don’t have some runners thrown out at home, you’re likely not sending enough runners and leaving runs on the table.

A guy thrown out trying to score nets the same as a guy stranded on third. Human nature being what it is, people blame the coach for the former and not the latter.

And if Henley had been the Royals 3rd base coach in 2014, we wouldn’t have been robbed of what would have been the most exciting and highest leverage play in the history of baseball, regardless of the outcome.

[Ali the Baseball Cat]

Yabut the guy behind the plate has more arms than Shiva and can catch almost any throw.

[JCA-CrystalCity]

Yabut the guy behind the plate has more arms than Shiva and can catch almost any throw.

you know, Molina means windmill in Spanish.  Modern windmills have 3 arms.  I think it is the extra arm on Molina that makes him so good.

[KnorrForYourMoney]

I spent my early years watching the Nationals never thinking twice about Pat Listach, Bo Porter, and Trent Jewett. Occasional strange send call, but I never once wondered if they were "good" or "bad". More often than not, their decisions made sense.

It's interesting you list those guys because there was one third base coach from the down years who was especially, noticeably bad. 

Remember Tim Tolman?  He was Manny Acta's boy so he survived a lot longer than he had any right to, although he didn't survive half as long as Sendley.  Tolman used to send runners in the dumbest situations.  There would be an outfielder with a rocket for an arm, and the ball would be hit almost right at them, and he'd send some slow, plodding runner home to try to beat the throw.

Sendley is like a vaguely less incompetent version of Tolman.

[Smithian]

It's interesting you list those guys because there was one third base coach from the down years who was especially, noticeably bad. 

Remember Tim Tolman?  He was Manny Acta's boy so he survived a lot longer than he had any right to, although he didn't survive half as long as Sendley.  Tolman used to send runners in the dumbest situations.  There would be an outfielder with a rocket for an arm, and the ball would be hit almost right at them, and he'd send some slow, plodding runner home to try to beat the throw.

Sendley is like a vaguely less incompetent version of Tolman.

Definitely forgot about Tolman.

Henley has just had so many big moments where he sent someone too aggressively and it turned out poorly. But darn if they didn't fire Chip Hale and move Henley right back over there. If Martinez didn't think he did a good job they could have put Knorr over there.

[bluestreak]

Yesterday’s game is the prime example of why you are aggressive. Sendley is the reason they won that game.

[Smithian]

Yesterday’s game is the prime example of why you are aggressive. Sendley is the reason they won that game.

If you're always aggressive, you'll get lucky sometimes.

[Copecwby20]

Yesterday’s game is the prime example of why you are aggressive. Sendley is the reason they won that game.

Even a broken clock is right twice a day.

[DPMOmaha]

I'm on Team Sendley...usually...

[bluestreak]

If you're always aggressive, you'll get lucky sometimes.

But what happens is if Harrison is held up at third and is stranded, people don’t blame Henley. They blame the next batter for not bringing him in. But he gets excoriated if he’s thrown out trying score. The value of both outcomes are the same. But the above incentivizes coaches to hold the person up unless he’s certain to score.  Which definitely results in less runs being scored.

So you’ve got to decide, do you want to lose runs with guys sitting on third? Or do you want to do it with guys thrown out at plate? I prefer the latter.

[Elvir Ovcina]

But what happens is if Harrison is held up at third and is stranded, people don’t blame Henley. They blame the next batter for not bringing him in. But he gets excoriated if he’s thrown out trying score. The value of both outcomes are the same. But the above incentivizes coaches to hold the person up unless he’s certain to score.  Which definitely results in less runs being scored.

So you’ve got to decide, do you want to lose runs with guys sitting on third? Or do you want to do it with guys thrown out at plate? I prefer the latter.

I think most people want the risk of sending guys measured against the chances of the next hitter or hitters driving them in.  I'm a lot more annoyed by guys getting thrown out at the plate with good hitters on deck or for the first out.   But I still land on the more windmilly side just because it seems every MF and his neighbor now strikes out once a game like it's no big inconvenience. 

[Natsinpwc]