Molina Concussion

On today's St. Louis v. Boston game, Tim McCarver said the play resulting in Yadier Molina's concussion was a clean play by Eric Bruntlett. Bruntlett ran Molina over when Molina had his back to him attempting to catch a ball from 1B Albert Pujols.

I won't go into detail on my thoughts regarding blocking the plate and collisions. Personally, I don't see why catchers should be allowed to block home. If they weren't allowed to do it, there would be no need for people to try to run them over (except to knock the ball loose) ... so that shouldn't be allowed either. If MLB wants to limit injuries, don't let catchers (or players at any base) block the base/plate and suspend any runner who causes a major collision.

Getting back to the Molina play, it might not have been illegal, but it definitely wasn't "clean." There was no reason for Bruntlett to knock Molina over. One could argue that Bruntlett had to make up his mind before it was apparent whether or not Molina would be able to tag him. Maybe. But, I think Bruntlett screwed up. Molina wasn't blocking the plate. He was out in front of home waiting to accept the throw. He reached back around to his right (without turning around to face Bruntlett) to try to apply the tag. All Bruntlett had to do was slide in ... home plate was wide open. While it might not be an extremely "dirty" play, it was by no means "clean."

Moving on to other things, after a two-out, two-run single, McCarver mentioned that he tries not to give too many stats but wanted to point out that the Cardinals lead the majors in two-out hits. Joe Buck supported the importance of the stat by saying that two-out hits and RBI's are pointed to my coaches and managers as one of the most underrated stats. Then, Joe Buck gave the following jewel:

"For the Cardinals, they have 145 RBI's with two outs this season, second most in all of baseball. I guess a part that's interesting, and maybe it throws that theory out the window is the only team that leads them the Pittsburgh Pirates and the team right behind them the Texas Rangers."

Texas leads the league in runs scored. Pittsburgh is tied for 6th (out of 30 teams) in the league in runs despite ranking 21st in OBP and 18th in SLG. Texas is right behind Boston and the Chicago Cubs in OPS; Pittsburgh has the 18th best OPS in the league. The reason both Texas and Pittsburgh are hovering just below .500 is because they don't have any pitching. Texas ranks 29th in the league in ERA (4.99). What is the only team below them? You guessed it ... the Pittsburgh Pirates (5.05).

Texas and Pittsburgh not pitching well (to put it mildly) doesn't diminish the importance of two-out hits by the offense. If anything, it makes them more important (you need to capitalize on every opportunity because the pitching staff is sure to give up more runs). If anything, this points to the idea that no one baseball stat will correlate directly to W-L record. Toronto has the third best ERA in baseball. However, they just fired their manager and are below .500 and in last place in the AL East. Baltimore and Toronto are in the top 5 in Saves (a stat you can only get in a game you win), but they are 4th and 5th, respectively, in the AL East. SD has the 3rd fewest errors in the league, yet they are half a game out of the cellar in the NL West. Cincy is 12.5 games back in the NL Central, despite being 7th in the league in HR's.

I'm guessing that if you look at normal stats (OPS, ERA, etc.) and there is a disconnect between those stats and a team's record, you might be able to find that less flashy stats can explain some of it.