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Monday, August 19, 2019
Brian Snitker Pulls Ronald Acuna Jr. for Lack of Hustle: ‘You’ve Got to Run’
Ronald Acuna Jr. is one of the most talented young players in baseball, but he had to be taught a hard lesson Sunday.
The outfielder hit a long fly ball off the wall in the third inning against the Los Angeles Dodgers but failed to run it out, thinking it was a home run. It ended up being a single, and he failed to score in the inning.
Manager Brian Snitker decided to pull him from the game to teach him to hustle on every ball in play
...
“You’ve got to run. That’s not going to be acceptable here,” Snitker said, per David O’Brien of The Athletic. “...The name on the front is a lot more important than the name on the back.”
Isn’t this sort of passive-aggressive warring against your best player usually the sort of thing that sabotages teams?
QLE
Posted: August 19, 2019 at 07:43 AM | 91 comment(s)
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Tags: brian snitker, hustle, ronald acuna
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1. The Duke Posted: August 19, 2019 at 08:29 AM (#5872474)Also, how is pulling someone for lack of hustle being passive-aggressive? Snitker was up-front about why he did it.
How is this passive-aggressive? It's just aggressive. He benched him and told him in no uncertain terms why he was being punished. There's nothing passive about it.
Passive-aggressive would be if Snitker didn't say a word, and later just kind of hovered near Acuna and made some vague morose statements about wishing that everyone on the team cared as much as he did.
This is also somewhere where the players' "Kangaroo Courts" should get involved. If it cost you a couple of grand when you loafed, players would probably learn the lesson even faster.
You want him to get in a physical fight with Acuna in the dugout, a la Billy Martin and Reggie?
Unless of course, the players don't see it as that big a deal, unless it's egregious, repeated, or a symptom of some larger issue.
It's true, they likely don't -- but that's a bug, not a feature and why teams have managers. Nor does something have to be a "big deal" for it to be a "deal." It's clearly a "deal" and the only perspective one can have that holds that it isn't is a political or quasi-political one whose ultimate source is found somewhere other than baseball.
I know this simple observation tends to trigger some, but workplaces do in fact tend to frown upon selfish and lazy workplace acts. RAJ is a terrific player and I like watching him, but like most people he isn't perfect.
Kangaroo courts were never about the egregious. They were about busting chops, and making fun of guys who screwed up. Acuna certainly screwed up; standing on first after hitting a ball off the wall.
You don't have to look too far to find sainted, beloved, hustlers who occasionally break into a trot prematurely - just off the top of my head, I can very much recall instances of my own belowed (Rizzo, Javy, KB, Schwarbs, etc) celebrating a long fly prematurely... to say nothing of instances where a ball sure didn't get out by much that could have turned into such a case.
It happens.
(*) And posing and loafing are self-centered, not team-centered, acts. Especially posing. Loafing, yeah -- it's a long season. Sometimes the legs are legitimately not there.
But that’s not what Acuna did. Acuna walked out of the box on a deep fly ball because he thought it was a homer. But...it hit the wall and he got stuck with a single.
I’m fine calling that out. Not saying you have to take off in a dead sprint like Pete Rose or whatever, but I’m with the Braves manager: “You’ve got to run.” He cost his team an extra base just because he wanted to admire his hit. Come on!
This is spot on, and it was against the best team in the league when you are down 3 and fighting in the early to mid-innings to get back into the game, and if he runs it is second and third with no outs. It was a terrible act under all circumstances, but you cannot even get the "forgive every player act crowd" to justify it as meaningless hustle; it was a really big moment in the game, series and season.
A lot of Braves fans get on Snitker for his lack of sabermetric awareness (him batting Inciarte near the top of the line-up was a favorite thing to [appropriately] criticize), but this seems exactly the way to handle a situation like this, and I applaud him for it.
Meh, in a game the Braves won 5-3.
Looking at the game log - I see Max Fried only made it to 3B on this (he doubled to lead off the inning). I see Acuna was then CS - probably a worse impact - while Albies followed up with a pop-up and Freeman K'd to end the inning.
I stand by the MEH. I emphasize the MEH.
Not this.
This.
Or this.
Different.
Yes, clearly this outcome was predestined by the 3rd inning. They were down 3-0 at the time.
I'd have handled it differently -- I mean, if this was an "IMPORTANT GAME!" because it's Braves/Dodgers jockeying for home field throughout in a rubber match finale of the set, I certainly wouldn't be yanking my best player out of the game in the 3rd inning.... thus costing the team a premium bat and glove while simultaneously shortening my bench unnecessarily.
Snitker's action was orders of magnitude more stupid than Acuna's.
Guess I'm not seeing it. If this were an elimination game, I might agree with you, but Snitker's clearly taking the long view here. (To turn your "meh" on its head, the Braves won the game despite Acuna's absence for most of it.)
Also despite his turning a double into a single.
I'm closer to Zonk on this one: it's a (moderately) bad thing to do, but I don't see why it merited yanking him from the game rather than just lecturing him in the dugout in front of his teammates, or some other non-substitution solution.
In addition to selfish and lazy acts by co-workers, actual workplaces also tend to frown on management playing favorites. This, too, is something that really shouldn't be necessary to have to explain or certainly to re-litigate.
This makes me wonder what Fried was doing. Also admiring? Tagging up? Unless he runs like me (in my 70s with bad knees) he could've been 2/3 the way to 3rd and could then return safely to 2nd should the ball be caught. From there he'd easily score even if the carom came straight to the fielder.
Because yanking him is a real consequence. Lecturing him is just words.
I don't think any part of this is a really big deal - not Acuna's infraction, not the loss of Acuna for half an important game, not Snitker's reaction - and I decline to make an armchair judgment about what should have been done. Sometimes leaders need to balance short-term success with long-term factors.
Wait, you think 'loafing' is more forgivable than 'posing'?
Seriously?
it's a three-pronged attack:
Fried is actually quite fast and is sometimes used as a pinch-runner, but as a pitcher, he has very little experience running the bases.
I think your break down is incorrect, though; if he thinks the ball has a chance of being caught, he has to stay close to 2B. Once the ball lands safely, there are zero outs in the inning, and thus percentages would be not to take a chance of getting thrown out at home. Acuna, if he is running from contact, has no risk of running as far and as fast as he can, as if the ball lands, Fried is on 3rsd at least.
Yeah, but a consequence to whom?
He's still getting paid for the game... and now he's got the afternoon off!
No, I lied on the internet to impress a bunch of people on the internet I don't really know.
Of course, seriously. It's really not even close. Posing is nothing but self-centered. Nothing else is involved.
As for his getting pulled, Snitker has had plenty of time to think this over. Acuna has gotten worse about admiring homers this year, doing so on balls that are closer and closer to not going out. I'm sure Snitker noticed and - I hope and assume - has said something to Acuna before. Well, it finally bit Acuna in the ass, as it was inevitably going to do. So, now is the time to act.
It's good managing and, unless he's a total dumbass (I don't think he is), Acuna will learn from it. Someone mentioned that they wouldn't do this in an elimination game, which is right. It's also why you do it now, so that you don't have to do it in a bigger game.
But sitting him for six innings is also an insignificant punishment. Hell, if he'd been given the full day off on Sunday for freshness sake, no one would think twice about it.
Where did I say it was a big deal?
I've consistently said the opposite (see: "meh").
All I'm saying is that I think pulling him was stupider than Acuna's... whatever.
I don't watch enough Braves baseball to know, but if this is a chronic problem with Acuna, I doubt pulling from a game is going to fix it (indeed, given that's he got a set-for-life, even if below market contract - probably the opposite).... and if it's a really rare thing and just a moment of vanity? I'd imagine he already felt sufficiently chastened anyway just by virtue of standing on 1B and answering the inevitable post-game questions about it.
So like I said.... double meh.
I'm just saying that in the grand scheme of things? I think pulling him out of the game was dumber.... but whatever.... managers do dumb things all the time. Hell, it happens occasionally that we see a manager end up in an "oops! I forgot to get a reliever up!" - I can recall this happening to both Gabe Kapler and Joe Maddon, at at minimum - should the GM march down to the dugout and pull him and have the bench coach manage the rest of the game?
How is giving up a base for either laziness or, in this instance, preening not a significant infraction? Running is in his job description. There is no reason this should ever happen.
I assume this is at least partially sarcasm, but do you really think players are happy to get pulled out of games and sit the bench? Have you ever been around athletes?
I imagine the chronic lollygaggers with guaranteed big ticket contracts don't mind it :-)
Not to mention that even if Acuna doesn't think it's a big deal, his teammates, fans, and sportswriters do. So he's going to get asked about it. And if he does it again, he'll get crucified by the fans and sportswriters. Now, maybe he wouldn't care about that either, but it's clearly more than just a day off.
They certainly can't get good, long looks at their home runs sitting on the bench. And bat flips during batting practice just aren't quite the same.
This is probably impossible to quantify but I'd guess players stupidly run themselves into outs more often than they do this, and while it's presumably happened, I can't recall someone getting yanked midgame for that offense.
Other than maybe Wade Boggs, virtually everyone has made a bad baserunning decision that resulted in an extra out. If it's a habit, then it needs to be addressed, if possible.
Loafing out of the box can be a habit, one that Snitker should rightfully want to nip in the bud.
Is the difference between trying and not trying really immaterial?
It's not the stupidity that's being "punished," it's the self-centered act that has no possibility of a countervailing payoff. Stupid has to do with making a poor judgment decision about costs and benefits; there's no judgment decision of any kind in posing, nothing that can be gained for the team in posing.
Well, you are right that the two things aren't even close.
Not trying hard when playing is absolutely inexcusable.
Enjoying what you do and celebrating when you accomplish something is a positive trait.
Your priorities are very screwed up.
Wasn't trying? He thought he hit a homerun! He was wrong! It's a boneheaded play, as is stupidly running into an out on the bases, but the latter is obviously more costly. I'll take what Acuna did any day over a guy like Nyjer Morgan racking up caught stealing numbers and getting thrown out on the basepaths being overly aggressive.
Gee, it's not like one of these is completely preventable with a tiny modicum of effort, while the other requires complex calculations of the fielder's position, your position, the strength of his are, your jump, etc.
On top of that, if a guy is routinely making bad baserunning reads, teams should absolutely try to address that. But it's a skill thing (or lack of it). If you're lucky, you can address it. OTOH, the guy might just be Jorge Posada and you have to live with it until he's no longer overcoming it elsewhere.
This play is strictly a bad habit, one that should be able to be addressed.
Correct. Also, no third base coach will send a pitcher home with no outs if there's a chance of a play at the plate where the pitcher might get hurt.
I'm just "running it out" like everyone wants.... hustling on even the meh arguments lest someone think I'm dogging it on the trifles and demand I get pulled from the thread!
Had not realized he was a pitcher. (AL fan - no excuse) That changes the calculus significantly. However, even an inexperienced runner could see that the outfielders were back by the wall over 200' from 2nd, and if Fried was halfway (I'll back off the 2/3 due to: pitcher) even prime Jesse Barfield couldn't catch/throw fast and hard enough to double him up. And as another already noted and I agree, you don't send your pitcher toward the next base with none out unless he can get there safely without sliding.
To add to the fact pattern, here, if Acuna just runs normally for his double, there are no outs, runners at second and third, and Albies; Freeman; and Donaldson coming to the plate. The third base coaches calculus has got to be to go easy on Fried and just let him walk in when at least 2 of the next 3 guys hit a homer.
I think we saw that in the same game. Bellinger didn't seem to be hustling out of the box on his homer, and it was so just-barely over the wall that Acuna got it in his glove briefly before it came back out.
But wouldn't the pitcher be tagging with no outs? If you're unlikely to send him home, there's no reason to not tag.
what did he accomplish, exactly, that was worth celebrating?
we sure do put a lot into a matter involving a ball that is in the air for not that long a period and a split-second decision, once it hits the wall. No one said there was some overriding decision that he would not score if the ball was not caught; the ball happened to carom right to another outfielder off the brick wall; without that carom right to the fielder, the ball goes to the left or right of the other OF, or it dies at the wall, I assume Fried gets sent home, as the calculus by the 3b coach is a lot easier, as he sees the balling rolling free in the outfield or sitting at the base of the wall and he knows where the runner is and how fast he is. At that point, it may no longer be risky to send Fried; he is home easily.
The only Brave who did anything wrong here is Acuna; the 3B coach and Fried both made correct choices.
Based on his post-game reaction, Acuna (and pretty much every other player who has done this) understands they messed up as soon as they realize the ball isn't going out. So you don't need to pull him to make that point. Maybe the manager thinks that although the player knows he messed up, he doesn't understand how serious this mistake is -- so pulling him will get that across. Or (relative to #1) the manager thinks this is the sort of player for which this behavior may become a bad habit -- so pulling him is a form of shock therapy.
I suspect this one fell more into the category where pulling him wasn't necessary -- Acuna knew he screwed up, making up for it might have been the motivation behind the steal attempt. As a manager I might have instead pulled him aside and said "you know you messed up not running that ball out and I know you hustle so that was just a one-time dumb move. What annoys me more is letting your self-frustration get to you and attempting that stupid steal. (if it was stupid) That won't be the last time you mess up in a game, don't let a mistake get you off your game again."
In the right context, yes, i.e. with your teammates once the play is over.
Acuna's play is far worse than a guy who gets thrown out trying to stretch plays. The latter is an error in judgment, which might be fixable with coaching, but also might just be who that player is. Acuna's error is one that no one should make, ever. Because while he also made a judgment error, it was a completely unnecessary judgment that could have been avoided with effort, something every major league baseball player is capable of giving and is expected to give.
Nyjer Morgan might not have had the physical or mental tools necessary to make the judgments that needed to be made in order to be an effective baserunner. Acuna definitely had the physical and mental tools to be able to reach second base on this play. He chose not to use them.
So to my mind it was really two back to back lapses in judgment. Acuna has the speed and got a good jump, if he'd taken a second to clear his head and pick a good time to go that base was there for him.
As to pulling him, I'm of the frame of mind that do what you want, just accept the consequences if you get it wrong. He took 6 steps at a walk and sat the bat down halfway down the line. Don't know how that's not showing off.
The way the runner on second played the ball is a good indication that it was likely to be a catch, so he needed to tag. If he was even halfway, he would have scored from a ball bouncing off the wall. Its not like the RF was facing the wall and got a good bounce so that he could make a strong throw to the plate. He jumped at the wall and the ball bounced off of it and he needed to chase it down. There was no way a fast baserunner, even a pitcher, wouldn't have scored from second unless he was standing on it getting ready to tag.
And if he'd just jogged it out I think that would be fair. They replayed it half a dozen times last night though, it was pretty clear he thought it was gone and was admiring it.
Armchair managing a decision that amounts to a minor disciplinary judgment call for a mental error by the "boss" who is actually sharing a dugout with a young player...I mean get yourself worked up that it's "dumb" if you want but I'll take his read and best guess on what was appropriate over any of the "knights of the keyboard" defending Acuna here.
Mentioned tagging up in #29. And thanks to #67 I learned that the ball was hit to RF, so tagging was the right play - a reasonably fast player would not even draw a throw on a deep fly to right.
Welcome to the internet; we have gone from being down on Acuna for not hustling out of the box on what would have been a double had he run, to absolving him and blaming the runner on second base for not...doing something other than what he did.
Give it time; Ozzie Albies is going to be blamed for something he didn't do or say in the on-deck circle, to better assist Acuna on his judgment on the fly ball.
Yes this is a completely rational description of this thread. Totally.
Actually, in time there's a better than decent chance it will still wind up as racist or white privileged. There are some precincts wherein it almost certainly already has.
You misunderstood my point about the runner on second. He did the right thing in tagging since it was extremely likely that the RF would catch the ball if it stayed in the park. I mentioned this just to reinforce the point that it was a probably a catch or a home run. He would have been halfway and scored if there was any reasonable chance that it was going to be a regular hit.
That is very funny.
This is a good idea, except they should punish their divisional rival the Mets, by trading him there.
what if Acuna stood at home plate admiring - sorry, celebrating - his "home run" and then got thrown out at first base, instead of only getting a single off the wall (and then erasing himself anyway with a CS)?
..........
would have been easy for someone to post, "ok, THAT would be a bridge too far, and I'd bench him for that."
but the posters who like to downplay every stupid baseball move don't ever seem eager to draw a line in the sand.
who knows, after all? in another year or two, maybe some player will do that - waving to his fans at the plate as the throw comes in to first base for the out. and if curmudgeons complain, it will be too tempting for others to wave it off as "Meh."
You said race.
Good point, Howie, but it's even easier to show how silly they are. If it's ok to "admire" and "celebrate" a homerun, why wouldn't it then also be ok to "admire" and "celebrate" a single?? Or a double??
The right is starting to get better at comedy and it's making lefties nervous.
:)
Luxury! We worked down the mill 29 hours a day, 12 days a week, had to walk down barefoot in the blizzards and that was before 17 hours of school before we could go home, and our house was nothing but a hole in the middle o' road...
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