Seth Smith does his job
The Rockies are down by two, they have men on first and second with nobody out, and they have Seth Smith bunt. Fuck the heck? Seth Smith with his 148 OPS+ is instructed to fucking bunt?
As expected, he made an out, and the idiot announcers declared that the Rockies now have two chances to tie the game. Well thank god for that bunt, or they’d have three chances.
Let’s make this short and sweet. According to the very first run expectancy matrix I found on Google, with runners on first and second with nobody out, you will score an average of 1.573 runs. With runners on second and third with one out, you will score an average of 1.467 runs. Wasting a batter that good on a bunt in that position just so you can give up an extra out and lower your expected number of runs is dumb, dumb, dumb.
And, yes, I realise the Rockies scored those runners. But they very likely would have scored anyhow, and the Rockies would have had an extra out with which they could maybe like score some more runs. Do you see?
Comedy addendum: One inning later, the Reds had men on first and second with no outs, and the announcers — who couldn’t praise the Smith bunt enough — had the lack of insight to talk about how foolish it would be for the inferior Jonny Gomes to bunt in that situation. Idiots.
