There seems to be a school of thought that if you bunt and try to go the other way more, you're doing exactly what the defense wants you to do. I dunno the answer.
I'm talking about the obvious trends of increased home runs and increased strikeouts at the same time as increased shifting. Surely there is some correlation.
Offenses already have responded to the shift. Hitters focusing on launch angle, swinging for the fences, if you strike out it's no big deal. That's your response right there.
I agree with you. The relentless shifting has steered the game in a bad direction.
I believe that Manfred is definitely going to bring in some rule changes in response.
Things could be worse, Kimmi, at least they don't have horrible jokes about them like the ones about lawyers.
Q: What's the difference between a dead skunk in the road and a dead lawyer in the road?
A: There are skid marks in front of the skunk.
So after the game Cora says, 'Brian, we really needed you to give us 7 and you delivered the goods. Normally I would have gotten you out of there a little earlier but everything worked out. Great job, big guy.' (Hugs him.)
You can try to figure that out from Moon's list above. What's the best configuration of 12 you can come up with? With many of these guys a lot depends on how they look between now and the end of the season.
Certainly it would be nice to have at least 1 guy in the bullpen (such as E-Rod) who can go long.