On this date in 1971, on the right bank of the Ohio River in the baseball stadium where I would eventually watch my first big league games, one of the finest lineups in baseball—the Big Red Machine—failed to get a hit against Cubs pitcher Ken Holtzman.
Holtzman had already pitched two of the nine complete games he would hurl that season, three of them shutouts counting this no-hitter, adding to the 45 complete games he’d already thrown in his previous five seasons with the Cubs. He would finish his 15-year career with 127 complete games. No slouch. But 1971 was an off season for Holtzman, who entered this game with a record of 3-6 and a 5.33 ERA. He would finish the season 9-15 with a 4.48 ERA, his worst finish yet, but on June 3rd, 1971, he was unstoppable. He walked four, struck out six, and scored the game’s only run.
He was so dominant that leading off the seventh inning, slugger Johnny Bench tried to reach first by laying down a bunt. Surprising everyone, it would have worked had the ball not slowly rolled just barely over the foul line before it stopped. After the first attempt Cubs third baseman Ron Santo played closer in so Bench had to swing away and flied out to right field.
Think about that: Bench bunted and Holtzman finished the game he started. The game sure was different then.
Compared to last night against the formerly-Oakland As, the Cubs down 2-1 in the bottom of the ninth managed to get runners on 1st and 2nd with nobody out. Textbook bunting situation: give up one out to get two men into scoring position with less than two out. Well, it’s textbook before the data-driven analytics era in which no one wants to “take the bat out of” their slugger’s hands. So, Alex Bregman swung away, and struck out, trading an out for nothing. Had he sacrificed the runners to second and third, one of the following two batters’ flyouts could have scored at least the tying run, but missed opportunities aren’t a stat that shows up in SABRmetrics.
When you play each game to win you play differently than when you play to manage statistics or manage how you play by statistics. Choices made based on averages work out over time, but sometimes you don’t have the time. You need that run right now. It’s like choosing to ride the bus to work when you can drive a Corvette. Sure a bus is reliable, costs less, and you don’t need a parking space, but wouldn’t you really rather drive the ‘Vette? Games managed by statistics are boring.
An Orthodox Priest Abroad 