Fracona loves the shift

[TheFens]

Why does Tito love the shift so much? It sems that whenever a lefty is up, pokey reese is standing waaaaay over next to second base and in the outfield, leaving a humungous gap where he is supposed to be.

This always makes me extremely nervous, especially in the later innings of a close game. I remember earlier in the season Rafael Palmeiro hit one through the gap created by a shift and the O's went on to win. That's exactly why I don't like the shift. It creates too big of a risk.

Is it really worth it to cover the right side of the infield when the left side is so open? Although you might get lefties trying to hit to the opposite field resulting in more outs, it still seems stupid. I've seen it happen countless times during games, and I don't recall ever having seen it happen this much during a season before.

[YanksHater213]

i think he did the shift a lot last night because of the fact that wakefield has a slower velocity on his pitches. this makes for the hitters to pull the ball more, thus using the shift will work most of the time with wakefield on the mound

[RoyNHSox]

I guess you have to look at the overall picture: how successful has using the shift been for Francona? Yeah, early on Plameiro did hit one through the big gap, but hasn't it worked more than not? I completely agree with YanksHater, it's up to the pitcher to throw something that will be pulled. Regarding the Palmeiro hit, I think it was Timlin who threw a bad pitch, allowing a crafty veteran like Raffy to find the hole.