Interesting read on the inning that doomed our season

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/the-high-cost-of-the-dodgers-small-mistakes/

 

I can't

 

That inning has lasted 27 years.

 

Makes perfect sense to me

 

The thread merging Nazi will deal with one.

 

This all is true, but the reason we lost was the fact we score 2 runs for Greinke....and that has been consistent all season long with this team....

Can't generate runs, unclutch, RISP problems.....rinse repeat

 

2 runs for Greinke
4 total runs for Kershaw

Go get some people that can actually hit when it matters.

 

Or pitch better, carry the offense when they face a great pitcher too? Either way one has to occur to win these games, and usually doesn't for this team.

 

Looks like somebody else agrees Ethier should have dropped that fly ball...

 

I actually don't expect our team to play smart, so that wasn't surprising. For this team to also play shifts like that is playing with fire...Donnie is not the guy to be leadin these guys on shift strategy. It just makes the fact we didn't get Maddon all that more painful.

 

i was actually pointing it out for ChiefsDodgers since i think he was the one saying he should have dropped that ball in the game thread
it was met w some solid derision by myself and a few others since this would never occur to me as a salient thought
if you're running full tilt after a ball how do you know it would even be foul for certain?
i personally can't see intentionally allowing that one to drop but sounds like you would also agree it would be a smart play idk?

 

What to do if there's a foul ball is something he should be thinking about before the batter comes up in that situation. There's only a handful of situations he needs to think about, and that's one. The execution, on the other hand, is much tougher. He has about half a second at the end of that play to determine if the ball is foul or not. He can't take his eye off the ball while chasing it down to see exactly where he is, but he does have the warning track and the wall. In the end, accidentally catching the ball and letting the tying run score is much better than accidentally letting a fair ball land - so it's hard to put this on him too much.

 

Especially because you would've had to score again anyways to win. 2 runs wasn't going to do it.

 

There are "average" plays and "smart" or strategic plays. Ethier did the average play, so I'm not blaming him for taking the out. The play that would have gotten people to say "Hey, that's pretty smart" would have been to let the ball drop. But again, can't fault the guy for taking the average route. Even the author of the article says that.

The real brain fart was the lack of 3rd base coverage on the shift. There is NO excuse for that in a do or die playoff game. No runner on 3rd and we are not even talking about Ethier.

This is where Donnie or the other coaches or the players themselves were not prepared.

 

thats the thing
too many what ifs to even contemplate not taking the out
what if the ball drops fair because sure, in a perfect world he KNOWS its foul and backs away, but in reality its pretty risky
what if the guy then drills an extra base hit or HR or the ball that accidentally dropped fair suddenly turns into a HUGE inning
like IBB says 2 runs wasn't going to win it and we needed to score
i know you guys are saying it would have been the smart play and i respect your opinion (even if i didn't at the time) but i just personally wouldn't want my outfielders thinking about intentionally dropping anything
i get why they did it prior to infield fly and why they still do drop bunts to get the dp or force