With one of the best pitching staffs in the major leagues and a roster plagued by injuries, the Washington Nationals have frequently found themselves in low-scoring, competitive games this season.
When run support is scarce, piecing together productive at bats becomes especially important. But coaxing production out of the bottom of National League lineups, particularly the pitcher’s spot, often requires some strategic maneuvering.
The sacrifice bunt may not be the most exciting play in baseball, but its execution can be the difference between winning and losing in the late innings of close ballgames. Despite its potential significance, the completion of a sacrifice bunt is often taken for granted.
“It’s just a big part of the game that gets overlooked,” Nationals bullpen coach Matt LeCroy said. “If you don’t practice it, you can’t expect good things to happen.”
National League pitchers are in a better position than any to appreciate the significance of the sacrifice bunt. Not only are they assigned the task with the most regularity, but they also play a key role in defending against them along with catchers, first basemen and third basemen.
“It’s huge. If there’s one out and your spot comes up, and there’s a runner on first, and you get the bunt over, and then there’s a base hit,” Nationals pitcher Tanner Roark said. “Most likely, you get the run in.”
The Nationals entered Thursday’s game against the Pittsburgh Pirates tied for the fifth in the majors with 32 sacrifice bunts.
To the casual baseball fan, bunting might look as simple as sticking the bat out over the plate and waiting for a pitch to hit it. But, like most feats at the major league level, it’s a difficult task saturated in nuance.
“It’s not easy,” Max Scherzer said. “It looks easy on TV, and I promise you it does, it looks easy. But, it is not easy to bunt major league pitching.”
After starting his career in the National League with the Arizona Diamondbacks, Scherzer spent the past five seasons with the Detroit Tigers of the American League, where designated hitters bat in place of pitchers.
Scherzer saw 18 total plate appearances during his five years with the Tigers. Regularly stepping into the batter’s box has been an adjustment for the 30-year-old all-star. He has 43 plate appearances since joining the Nationals this offseason, including three successful sacrifice bunts that tie him for third-most on the team.
Like any craft, bunting requires hard work and repetition to perfect. Washington’s starting pitchers get daily reps in with the guidance of LeCroy and third base coach Bob Henley.
“Since spring I’ve been bunting, bunting, bunting,” Scherzer said. “You really got to have a lot of touch to be able to do it.”
LeCroy and Henley try to mimic the in-game experience as much as possible. They use a pitching machine to simulate the high velocity of major league hurlers, and LeCroy occasionally pitches to give the players a chance to work on their timing while simulating the less predictable flight patterns of pitches from a live arm.
According to Henley, proper form is essential to laying down successful sacrifice bunts with regularity, but the process starts with selecting the right pitch.
“You can have the best form in the world, but if it’s not a very good pitch to bunt, then it doesn’t matter,” Henley said. “So, we want to try to get a good pitch we can bunt, something out over the plate.”
Bunting is all about precision. Which part of the bat makes contact determines how far the ball travels, and the bat’s angle determines what direction the ball travels. Limiting the range of motion in the batter’s box helps limit the variability of how far and what direction the ball travels in.
LeCroy and Henley teach Washington’s pitchers to start with their bodies in a well-balanced, athletic stance. They then position their bats with the proper angle at the top of the strike zone, which gives them a valuable reference point for the strike zone in the course of the at bat.
“Anything above that, we pull it back because we know it’s a ball, and then we utilize our legs,” Henley said. “If the pitch is lower than the top of the zone, we utilize our legs to get down to those pitches as opposed to tilting the bat.”
The techniques used by the Nationals pitchers may seem simple and pragmatic, but there is nothing pragmatic about deadening a 95 mph fastball with a compressed piece of wood. It only gets more complicated when off-speed pitches are thrown into the mix.
“You’ve got to actually get your nose down in there and get your head out over the plate just to get down there and make sure you get the bunt down,” Roark said. “You’re only helping out yourself and the team.”
The Nationals success with the sacrifice bunt this season has been fueled by the pitchers’ hard work in batting practice and the pride that they take in helping their team. Of course, moving runners into scoring position can also end up helping the pitchers on the mound.
The hyper-competitive nature of the team’s starting pitchers only adds motivation, according to Henley. Securing a team victory is the top priority. The bragging rights that come with laying down a perfect sacrifice bunt are an added bonus.
“We’re in the lineup to move runners over, and in a situation when we don’t have a runner on, it’s our job to get on base,” Doug Fister said. “We don’t take that lightly. We put the friendly competition in there to keep us honest and make us get our job done.”
• Dan Roth can be reached at droth@washingtontimes.com.
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