The growing angst in baseball appears to be directed at the use of the defensive shift and its increasing presence in the game. It seems the only people you hear complain about it are the ones who are affected the most by it in a negative way. Feel free to file New York Yankees skipper Joe Girardi in that category.
“It’s illegal defense, just like basketball,” Girardi said this week to reporters when asked about the shift. “Guard your man. Guard your spot. If I were commissioner, they’d be illegal. As long as it’s legal, I’m gonna play it.”
Girardi is not the commissioner, and there appears to be no way of having baseball change the rules to make Girardi happy on this one. There is nothing wrong with putting your players in the best possible position to win, so if putting your shortstop or third baseman in a completekly different part of the field helps your chances of winning, then so be it. Heck, put all your fielders on the right side of the field if you want. There are no boundaries for where a fielder may or may not be, so long as they remain on the grass or infield dirt and out of the way of a pitch from the mound. There are no rules against doing so.
“I just think the field was built this way for a reason,” Girardi said. “Two on one side, two on the other.”
It was built that way for a reason… in the 19th century. You see, Joe, things change. Over time the game evolves. New methods and strategies come and go, depending on how effective they happen to be. Beneficial strategies will linger longer than fads that show no dramatic impact on the game. It is up to you, the manager, to find a way to respond. Just like in basketball. If a team is raining threes on you, maybe change up your defense. The NBA has pushed back the three-point line before, but there is next to nothing that can be done in baseball to keep a defensive position player from being moved to any other spot on the field for a batter. Not yet, at least. Unless MLB is going to paint more line son the field and tell a third baseman he is to not leave that section of the field until the crack of the bat, nothing is changing.
Then again, since when did those lines painted on the field do their job in keeping people in their spots? For example, when was the last time you saw a third base coach actually stay inside his box?
As our Joe Lucia pointed out on Twitter, the Yankees are no strangers to using the defensive shift. They just happen to not get the same results they see used against them.
https://twitter.com/Joe_TOC/status/725100367827054592
So maybe Girardi is just frustrated. The Yankees can’t hit against the shift and they can’t field using it.
