Quade goes off on Castro, Barney

[Ding Dong Johnson]

The man hustled his way to more hits than any other player to ever play the game. Sabremetricize THAT!

Easy: he batted a billion times.

[MSG T]

The man hustled his way to more hits than any other player to ever play the game. Sabremetricize THAT!

 

 

118 OPS+ - tied for 391st all-time w/ such luminaries as Don Baylor, Charlie Bennett, Mike Easler, Wally Moon, Ben Olgilvie, Lonnie Smith and (I'm not making this up) Chicken Wolf

 

.3751 OBP - good for 212th all-time - behind players such as Adam Dunn, Jim Edmonds, Chuck Knoblaugh, Henry (not Barry) Larkin, Merv Rettenmund, Mark Grace(!), Minnie Minoso, Augie Galan and so on and so forth.

 

Rose got so many hits because he played so freakin long. He has almost 2,000 more AB than Hank Aaron, that's like 3+ seasons worth and Aaron played forever. And that's just to get to second all-time. I'm not trying to say he was not good, but he isn't even in the top 50 (maybe 100) hitters ever. He may have hustled, but there's a bunch of guys, at every position he ever played, that I'd take over Rose without even thinking.

[Abe Frohman]

No one had better hair than Rose.

[davearm2]

The question becomes is if that you don't hustle, do your teammates perform worse? If they do, they're not doing their jobs correctly. If they don't, then not hustling doesn't have nearly as big of an impact.

By regularly not hustling, a player contributes to an environment where giving less than 100% effort is acceptable. Other players notice, and they notice how the coaches react. So yes, to the extent that other players adopt this same mindset, because they see other guys do it and get away with it, it leads to them performing worse.

 

Can hustling make a ballplayer better? Absolutely. Is seeing a player not hustling and knowing he could be better if he would just try harder frustrating? Sure.

This is the problem right here. The entire premise is, Soriano would be a better player if he hustled more.

 

The comparison to Reed Johnson is not based on absolute production, but based on production relative to potential. Johnson is playing to his potential, maximizing his talents, etc. Soriano is not... or at a minimum, creates that perception by his body language and the way he plays.

[SouthSideRyan]

I don't know how many times it needs to be said that they're not 8 year old little leaguers, but they're not 8 year old little leaguers.

[Benchwarmer]

by no means should players be going "all out" every single time they make a play.

 

ARAM buys into this philosophy, it seems to fit others on the team.

[Sammy Sofa]

Reed Johnson has to play to his limits because he's a much worse player. He's effectively destroying himself because he's not as at baseball to keep his job.

[Benchwarmer]

No one had better hair than Rose.

 

Oscar Gamble

[Sammy Sofa]

by no means should players be going "all out" every single time they make a play.

 

ARAM buys into this philosophy, it seems to fit others on the team.

 

And the Cubs would be a much, much better team if they players as naturally good as Aramis instead of ones that have to grit and hustle to maximize what relatively little value they have.

[Guest]

by no means should players be going "all out" every single time they make a play.

 

ARAM buys into this philosophy, it seems to fit others on the team.

 

And Ramirez happens to be the player producing the most of anyone on the team. Correlations are fun!

[NCCubFan]

HUSTLE is a way you play the game. You milk everything you got, put it all out there for your teammates. If you hustle, you are respected. You either do it, or you don't. It has everything to do with the way a ballplayer does his job.

 

Well now you're just listing off cliches.

Crash Davis taught him well.

[MSG T]

HUSTLE is a way you play the game. You milk everything you got, put it all out there for your teammates. If you hustle, you are respected. You either do it, or you don't. It has everything to do with the way a ballplayer does his job.

 

Well now you're just listing off cliches.

Crash Davis taught him well.

 

You lollygag the ball around the infield, you lollygag your way down to first, you lollygag in and out of the dugout. You know what that makes you? Lar?

 

 

 

 

BTW, I know it was Joe Riggins, but the quote fit the topic.

[jersey cubs fan]

This is the problem right here. The entire premise is, Soriano would be a better player if he hustled more.

 

And that entire promise is probably absolutely wrong.

 

Soriano going balls to the wall on defense would probably be a much worse fielder and would probably get injured immediately. Soriano going balls to the wall on offense really doesn't mean anything.

 

He's a brittle old player who started playing OF in his 30's. He relied on his speed and power as a young man and doesn't have much speed left and only has some of his power left. Effort isn't the issue.

[Old Style]

I love the fact that my posts were taken seriously. :)

[woodchip2153]

Reed Johnson has to play to his limits because he's a much worse player. He's effectively destroying himself because he's not as at baseball to keep his job.

 

and Reed Johnson has the luxury of only playing a couple of times a week.

 

I think a lot people don't realize how exhausting a 162 game schedule over the hottest months of the year is for an everyday player. If not playing balls to the wall all the time means they can play a couple of extra games a year (not even factoring risk of injury) i'm all for it. Every player needs to find a balance. The better you are the more valuable to the team you are so it's less important to run out every routine grounder or pop out for the .1% chance of an error that is difference between being safe and out or getting an extra base.

[CubColtPacer]

This is the problem right here. The entire premise is, Soriano would be a better player if he hustled more.

 

And that entire promise is probably absolutely wrong.

 

Soriano going balls to the wall on defense would probably be a much worse fielder and would probably get injured immediately. Soriano going balls to the wall on offense really doesn't mean anything.

 

He's a brittle old player who started playing OF in his 30's. He relied on his speed and power as a young man and doesn't have much speed left and only has some of his power left. Effort isn't the issue.

 

Soriano having to suddenly accelerate because he's seen that ball was mishandled or because a runner is trying to take an extra base is much more likely to cause an injury than just running hard for the ball from the beginning. Even the people who want him hustling more don't necessarily want him diving/crashing into walls. The only way that I would buy that his not hustling doesn't hurt the Cubs is if you feel that his not hustling fakes runners into trying to take bases they shouldn't, and then Soriano guns them down. Other than that though, he's probably lost 20-30 bases so far this season on both sides of the ball just from lack of hustle (although I still believe his hustle issues are overstated because the way he runs it sometimes look like he's not running as hard as he actually is-but sometimes he does lollygag).

[Hairyducked Idiot]

20-30 bases?

[Guest]

You're saying that nearly once a series Soriano loses a base strictly from lack of hustle? I don't believe that at all. Fangraphs has his baserunning as -3.8 so far this year and his defensive range as +3.1.

[SouthSideRyan]

Other than that though, he's probably lost 20-30 bases so far this season on both sides of the ball just from lack of hustle (although I still believe his hustle issues are overstated because the way he runs it sometimes look like he's not running as hard as he actually is-but sometimes he does lollygag).

 

These 2 statements don't seem to go together. I have no idea how you could come up with even a guesstimate of 20-30 bases. That's a base every 20-30 innings.

[WilcoFan]

by no means should players be going "all out" every single time they make a play.

 

ARAM buys into this philosophy, it seems to fit others on the team.

 

And the Cubs would be a much, much better team if they players as naturally good as Aramis instead of ones that have to grit and hustle to maximize what relatively little value they have.

 

 

 

Yay for False Choices!

[XZero771679666304]

Reed Johnson has to play to his limits because he's a much worse player. He's effectively destroying himself because he's not as at baseball to keep his job.

 

and Reed Johnson has the luxury of only playing a couple of times a week.

 

I think a lot people don't realize how exhausting a 162 game schedule over the hottest months of the year is for an everyday player. If not playing balls to the wall all the time means they can play a couple of extra games a year (not even factoring risk of injury) i'm all for it. Every player needs to find a balance. The better you are the more valuable to the team you are so it's less important to run out every routine grounder or pop out for the .1% chance of an error that is difference between being safe and out or getting an extra base.

 

This is what a lot of people don't consider. Soriano has a recent history of leg injuries. ARam has a history of leg injuries (we once lost him for a good chunk of time because he hurt himself busting it down the 1B line). Speed is not a part of either's game. What are we going to gain from seeing them put the pedal to the metal on every play? Nothing. What do we stand to lose? A lot more. There are numerous star quality players around the league who don't play all out all the time, and there's a reason they aren't being castigated for it. You want your great players on the field as much as possible, and the season is a grind.

 

If busting ass melds well into your game (Marlon Byrd, for example), that's great. As others have pointed out, a lot of players have to kill themselves to have any value. But to say your sluggers should run full bore all the time or dive and crash at every opportunity the same as your part time scrappers is nothing but short sighted, dogmatic little league horse [expletive].

 

Every player is different, and you simply can't hold them all to some blanket hustle standard. Well you can, but to your team's detriment.

[SouthSideRyan]

Where did the Ramirez talking point even come from? Is it all still carryover from Pittsburgh when he was playing on a broken [expletive] ankle?

[MSG T]

Where did the Ramirez talking point even come from? Is it all still carryover from Pittsburgh when he was playing on a broken [expletive] ankle?

 

 

It may have started there, I don't know. But it definitely picked up steam a few years ago when he didn't run out a grounder to first, IIRC because he was having hamstring issues at the time. I think it was Kaplan or one of the local writers that called him out for not hustling. I don't remember the specifics, but I do remember the complaints being in the Trib.

[davearm2]

Reed Johnson has to play to his limits because he's a much worse player. He's effectively destroying himself because he's not as at baseball to keep his job.

 

and Reed Johnson has the luxury of only playing a couple of times a week.

 

I think a lot people don't realize how exhausting a 162 game schedule over the hottest months of the year is for an everyday player. If not playing balls to the wall all the time means they can play a couple of extra games a year (not even factoring risk of injury) i'm all for it. Every player needs to find a balance. The better you are the more valuable to the team you are so it's less important to run out every routine grounder or pop out for the .1% chance of an error that is difference between being safe and out or getting an extra base.

Of course there's a balance. I'm not saying a guy needs to full-out sprint to first on an infield popup, or go crashing headfirst into the dugout chasing a foul popup.

 

IMO Soriano hasn't struck that balance. He's got plenty of room before he's approaching "balls to the wall at all times" territory, and he could stand to move in that direction a bit.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

Where did the Ramirez talking point even come from? Is it all still carryover from Pittsburgh when he was playing on a broken [expletive] ankle?

 

It started when he wasn't born white.