Williamsport Sun-Gazette: To bunt or not to bunt?

Moneyball comes to the Little League WS.

Not every team utilizes it, but the strategy most often is found in Little League Baseball. And the Little League World Series is no exception.

“You better believe we are going to bunt,” Texas manager Jack Wideman said before the start of the tournament. “If there are runners on first or second base with less than two outs we are going to bunt.”

Not every team buys into the strategy, though. In the wake of Michael Lewis’ book, “Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game,” many coaches and players have given bunting a second thought.

“We aren’t going to bunt with one out because I think outs are harder to get than anything,” Connecticut manager Bill Meury said before the World Series started. “We won’t give them an out in order to get a runner to second base.”

The book, which focuses around the Oakland Athletics and the team’s use of Sabermetrics - the analysis of baseball using objective evidence such as statistics - has brought the art of bunting into new light and has created criticism from coaches and players at every level of play.