The 2021 season was over. The Braves won the World Series title. There are several impressive plays in the postseason. For me, one of many important plays was that Aaron Judge was thrown out at home in the American League Wild Card game.
In the end, the Yankees fell 6-2 to the Red Sox. And, I was just wondering whether the Yankees made the same mistake again.
Well, the Royals and the Yankees each had 22 outs at home during the 2021 regular season. Hence, there might be some problems with baserunning in these two teams. In the Yankees, Brett Gardner, Aaron Judge and Gio Urshela each were thrown out at home plate 4 times in the 2021 season. This season, Adam Frazier and Colin Moran each were thrown out at home plate 5 times, most in the majors. By the way, the Pirates had seen 19 times that their baserunners were out at home. As we can see, Aaron Judge was thrown out at home plate 4 times, tying 3rd most in majors. The third-base coach probably had to be more cautious to advise Judge on whether to stop him at third base or to continue running home. Unfortunately, the result wasn’t the Yankees fans would like to see. The Yankees will have to solve this problem in 2022. Meanwhile, no player from the Royals was thrown out at home 4 times this year. However, Andrew Benintendi, Whit Merrifield and Carlos Santana each were thrown out at home 3 times during the regular season.
We might still remember the amazing baserunning from Javier Baez to help the Cubs create an extra run against the Pirates. However, not everyone can run as Baez does. The Cubs were actually thrown out at home plate 18 times this year. Willson Contreras was thrown out at home 4 times and Anthony Rizzo was out at home 3 times. At the same time, the other team in Chicago also had 18 outs at home plate. The White Sox got 93 wins in 2021 and won the AL Central title for the first time since 2008. But, 18 outs at home just didn’t look very good. Zack Collins and Gavin Sheets each were thrown out at home plate 3 times this year. Meanwhile, the Tigers had 18 outs at home plate as well. The Tigers won 77 games this season and with several top prospects, their future looks promising. Nonetheless, they might still have to improve base running because they also had 14 outs at third base, second most among 30 MLB teams. Jeimer Candelario and Niko Goodrum each were thrown out at home 3 times. Moreover, Goodrum had 3 outs at third base.
Finally, 6 teams each had 16 outs at home plate during the regular season.
There are more home runs, walks and strikeouts in today’s baseball games. Nonetheless, we can’t ignore the importance of baserunning, in particular, you have to avoid baserunning mistakes. Aaron Judge got thrown out at home plate and the Yankees were eliminated. However, Ron Washington, third-base coach of the Braves, aggressively sent Eddie Rosario and Ozzie Albies home in Game 2 of the NLCS and the results were great. The Braves defeated the Dodgers in the NLCS and won the 2021 World Series Champions.
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