Make The Routine Plays Look Routine

“The legendary shortstop Derek Jeter was a frequent subject of debate during the Moneyball era.  Broadcasters and scouts noticed that Jeter seemed to make an especially large number of diving plays and concluded that he was an exceptional shortstop for that reason.  Stat geeks crunched the numbers and detected a flaw in this thinking.  Although Jeter was a terrific athlete, he often got a slow jump on a ball and dove because he was making up for lost time.  In fact, the numbers suggested that Jeter was a fairly poor defensive shortstop, despite having won five Gold Glove awards.  The plays that Jeter had to dive for, a truly great defensive shortstop like Ozzie Smith might have made easily – perhaps receiving less credit for them because he made them look routine.”

– from the book The Signal and the Noise by Nate Silver

Sometimes great defensive plays can win a baseball game.  Throwing a runner out at home prevents a run from scoring.  A diving catch in the outfield robs a hitter of an extra base hit.  A backhand in the hole at short coupled with a strong throw keeps a potential runner off the basepaths.  A strikeout in a key situation can kill a rally.  Great plays are fun to watch.  They’re exciting.  They’re exhilarating.  As a spectator, they make you want to cheer.

But for every potential great play that could be made during a baseball game, there are at least a dozen routine plays to be made.  Great plays can win baseball games.  Not making the routine plays can lose them.

Our team has talked often in the past (and coach Eric reminded us a few times this past weekend) that we don’t want to give opposing teams more than three outs per inning.  Physical errors, mental mistakes, ill-advised throws, and the like does not make for a consistently winning formula in the game of baseball.

Whenever we play in tournaments, where the competitive pressure and the caliber of play is elevated, coach Brent reminds us that in order to win we’ll need to make the routine plays and we’ll need to make some great plays as well.  Great plays are needed because the overall caliber of play is elevated.  Routine plays are the foundation on which success is based however.  The routine plays need to be made simply because it’s a baseball game.

Making routine plays look routine has added competitive benefits beyond simply the making of the play itself.  A team that watches opposing fielders consistently make what look like easy plays wonders to themselves “how will we ever get a hit against a team like this?”  If an outfielder has to dive for a ball (even though he may make the catch) an opposing hitter might think “if I had only hit the ball a foot more to the left, I’d be on base.”  This opposing hitter has hope that the next time he bats, the outcome might be different.  If the same outfielder however on the same play got a good jump, tracked the ball effectively and made the same catch without diving, the opposing hitter has less hope (despite his own effort) that the outcome will be different when next he bats.

Individual confidence builds with each routine play successfully executed.  Collective team confidence builds with each routine play successfully executed.  As a player you should feel good when you make a great play.  Your teammates give you high fives and fans cheer.  But you should feel even better when you consistently make the routine plays look routine.  This too is worthy of high fives and cheers.

Make great plays when you need to.  Make everything else look routine.