Idiots Write About Sports

So I’m watching the A’s-Giants game on Saturday. It’s the bottom of the ninth inning, and the A’s are trying to protect a 7-5 lead made all the more tenuous by Huston Street’s decision to yield a lead-off hit to Mark Sweeney. That brings Barry Bonds to the plate, which is when Steve Lyons decides to let us sample some of the patented baseball knowledge that has made him the darling of deep thinkers everywhere.

Pitch around Bonds in this situation, Lyons advises. Sure, it moves Sweeney to second. But it takes the bat out of Bonds’ dangerous hands. After all, Lyons concludes, “you don’t want to let Barry Bonds beat you.”

“But Steve, you blithering chowderhead,” I reply, “there is only one runner on base, and the very worst thing that Barry Bonds can do in this situation is tie up the ball game. In other words, in this particular situation, it is impossible to let Barry Bonds beat you, even if you ask him where he wants the pitch before tossing up a batting-practice fastball.”

“Do you think he can actually hear what you’re saying to him?” my wife asks. And she has a good point.

So I put it to you folks out there in cyberspace that certain truths are indisputable:

1. That whatever you think of Bonds’ accomplishments, the days of him menancing pitchers at a 2000-2003-style clip are firmly in the rear view mirror.

2. That no matter how menancing a batter Bonds may or may not be at this point in his career, it is generally a really bad idea to put the tying run on base before you bother recording a single out in the ninth.

3. That, Barry Bonds’ considerable home-run-hitting prowess aside, not even he can hit a game-winning three-run homer with just one runner on base — whereas that becomes a much more distinct possiblity should you put Bonds on base, intentionally or un.

If you can recognize the simple wisdom contained in those three points, then congratulations — you are much smarter than Steve Lyons. Or to put it another way, you are not nearly so dumb as Huston Street and Ken Macha.

Because not long after my impassioned rebuttal to Steve Lyons’ unconventional “Put the Tying Run On” thesis, Huston Street issued a five-pitch free pass to Bonds in which none of the balls came within a three-zip code radius of the strike zone. And with two runners on base, Street threw a 1-2 pitch to Ray Durham that the Giants second baseman promptly golfed over the right field wall. Thanks, everybody, and drive home safely.

Street insisted afterwards that the Bonds at-bat wasn’t a cowardly pitch-around. “Obviously we have a tremendous amount of respect for Bonds, but I’m not trying to walk him there,” he was quoted as saying in the Chronicle. “I’m never going to try to put the tying run on base.” Well, if that’s true, he certainly put on a very convincing performance as a pitcher trying to walk the tying run. Because I’ve seen Huston Street go after Barry Bonds before — and the results are much more satisfying. Indeed, in this notes column appropriately titled “Macha Shows His Respect for Bonds” — apparently “Macha Crumbles Into the Fetal Position at the Mere Sight of Bonds” didn’t fit in the allotted space for the headline — we learn that Bonds walked seven times in 10 plate appearances against Oakland this weekend. The total number of walks Bonds had tallied for the rest of June? Eight.

Yup. Not trying to pitch around him at all.

I hate to keep repeating this point, but at this point in Bonds’ career, you are better off challenging him than you are simply escorting him to first base. These days, with a runner on base, Bonds is just as likely to hit into a rally-killing double play as he is to go yard. And considering that going yard in Saturday’s game would have, at the very worst, tied the ballgame, the decision to pitch daintily to Bonds makes even less sense. Were Street and Macha even paying attention to the game situation?

And that, in a nutshell, is my problem with the 2006 edition of the A’s — this is just not a very smart ballclub. Whether it’s showing to much deference to a past-his-prime home run hitter who can’t even win the game with a homer or swinging at the first pitch in a bases-loaded situation against a historically combustible reliever, if you put the A’s in a situation where they’re faced with a make-or-break decision, the odds are way too high that they’ll make the wrong one. From the manager on down, they commit mental errors that a contending baseball team has no business making.

I accept the fact that even the top teams are going to lose their share of ballgames. And I generally don’t get upset with a loss if the A’s are just flat-out beaten or outplayed. But I can’t stand it when they lose games because of mental mistakes or poor decision-making. Because that’s the sort of thing that leads to frustrating playoff losses — assuming you even get to the playoffs at all.

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