{"id":719,"date":"2010-08-03T18:33:38","date_gmt":"2010-08-03T23:33:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/?p=719"},"modified":"2010-08-03T18:33:38","modified_gmt":"2010-08-03T23:33:38","slug":"response-to-buster-olneys-video-blog","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/archives\/719","title":{"rendered":"Response To Buster Olney’s Video Blog"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>In the game of baseball it is common place to hear somebody talking about \u201cplaying the game the right way.\u201d\u00a0 The right way means a few things.\u00a0 It means not taking a single pitch off.\u00a0 It means conducting yourself like a professional.\u00a0 It means that as a player, you are willing to sacrifice your body for the team\u2019s success.\u00a0 Today, on ESPN.com, I watched Buster Olney\u2019s video blog <\/a> and could not believe what I was hearing come from his mouth.<\/p>\n

In talking about the Indians rookie phenom catcher, Carlos Santana, Olney began to question the value of catchers blocking home plate.\u00a0 I get that he is talking about managing investments.\u00a0 From a business stand point, it makes logical sense.\u00a0 If this is the most important part of my organization, I need to protect my asset.\u00a0 In a day and age where first year professionals are touted as the greatest thing since sliced bread, owners have become much more conservative in their approach to player development.\u00a0 Just look at Stephen Strasburg.\u00a0 Shoulder stiffness, straight to the 15 day DL for you.\u00a0 Or look at the debate surrounding pitch counts.\u00a0 Are they throwing too much?\u00a0 Are they not throwing enough?<\/p>\n

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What Olney is suggesting is entirely different.\u00a0 He is talking about changing the way that the game is played.\u00a0 Buster asks if a chance at injury is worth it \u201cfor one run, on one play, in one game.\u201d\u00a0 Is this to say that in a close game with your team fighting to hold a lead in the late innings, with a guy headed towards home, you want the catcher to get out of the way, in order to preserve the future?\u00a0 Ludicrous.\u00a0 I refuse to believe that any coach in MLB would be willing to accept this mentality.\u00a0 As a coach myself, I want guys to go hard for 27 outs.\u00a0 I want a guy who refuses to take even one pitch off.\u00a0 If the team has a chance to prevent a run from scoring, then by all means, the team needs to prevent that run.\u00a0 How in the hell could any player in their right mind actually make sure that they don\u2019t prevent that run?\u00a0 It\u2019s just not the right way to play the game.<\/p>\n

Sure, rookie phenoms are important to an organization and its success.\u00a0 There is a lot of money invested in these guys and they do need some protecting.\u00a0 But to even throw out the idea that players should change the way they approach and play the game\u2026to question whether or not a catcher should even block the plate?\u00a0 C\u2019mon Buster.\u00a0 You must be out your mind.\u00a0 It is one thing to analyze how to practice and regulate player development.\u00a0 It is a completely different beast to try and change the way a professional baseball player approaches the game.\u00a0 My best wishes go out to the young Santana.\u00a0 And I hope all you younger guys out there see how he played the game.\u00a0 I also hope that you see the utter stupidity in Buster Olney\u2019s words.\u00a0 Play the game hard for 27 outs.\u00a0 Never take a pitch off.
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In the game of baseball it is common place to hear somebody talking about \u201cplaying the game the right way.\u201d\u00a0 The right way means a few things.\u00a0 It means not taking a single pitch off.\u00a0 It means conducting yourself like a professional.\u00a0 It means that as a player, you are willing to sacrifice your body […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[12,17,6,11,13,10,14],"tags":[664,239,654,42,151],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/719"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=719"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/719\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":722,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/719\/revisions\/722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=719"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=719"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=719"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}