Red Sox Defensive Gifs

Savin Hillbilly

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The wrong side of the bridge....


Fantastic play by Leon with the bases loaded to save a run.
Three tricky things he had to do there: (1) correctly read that he had just enough time to get to the ball and make the tag before the runner passed him, (2) pick it cleanly off the dirt, and (3) hang onto the ball as the runner banged into his glove. Any one of those things could have gone wrong, and then it's a bad play. He could have played it safe and hoped it rolled foul; nobody would have second-guessed him. But he saw the chance, took it, and executed. Magnificent clutch defense.
 

Dewey'sCannon

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It was really a brilliant split-second decision there by Sandy. Just a smart, aggressive play - he really shot out of the box and pounced on it. As someone who spent some time behind the plate, I really appreciated how he went after that ball - it displays a lot of confidence.
 

Minneapolis Millers

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I think I see him glancing to see where the runner is. I bet if he saw that the runner was too close, he'd have pulled off to see if the ball would roll foul. So that was part of the great, split-second decision-making.
 

pantsparty

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Great play by Devers to reach this and get rid of it quickly, even better play by Pearce to keep his toe on the bag until the ball was caught on Devers' imperfect throw.
 

Savin Hillbilly

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The wrong side of the bridge....
Not with his OPS. (And yes, I know that a Gold Glove is a “fielding” award.)
It seems like the legit candidates are JBJ, Hicks, and Leonys Martin (who should probably be the frontrunner going by advanced metrics). Hicks is obviously having a much better offensive year, and a very solid defensive year, so it's certainly possible it goes that way, but I don't get the sense that Hicks has the kind of star perception that makes this anywhere near a lock. (Maybe this is parochial Boston thinking.)

Kiermaier is racking up crazy DRS and UZR numbers as always, but given that he's missed so much time and has been hitting terribly, I doubt he'll get serious consideration. I don't think there are any other likely candidates.

I think there's a solid chance that JBJ finally gets it this time.
 

grimshaw

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Kiermaier is racking up crazy DRS and UZR numbers as always, but given that he's missed so much time and has been hitting terribly, I doubt he'll get serious consideration. I don't think there are any other likely candidates.

I think there's a solid chance that JBJ finally gets it this time.
Agree it's his best chance so far. And Kiermaier is inhuman.

Kiermaier' last three seasons, minimum 2500 innings.

UZR/150 of 17.3. Next best are three others right near 11.
DRS of 96 The next best is half of that at 48. He is doubling up Lorenzo Cain in 600 fewer innings in the field.

Then again Mookie is at 18.4 and 75 in right field respectively in those two categories so f that guy.

Not a huge sample of players, but I'm pretty confident no center fielder is in the same galaxy right now.
 
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simplicio

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I could watch that all night. Love that he plays it in the middle of a jump toward the infield to set up the throw.

Props to Kinsler on the reception too. Both those guys making it look easy.
 

Soxfan in Fla

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I personally enjoy how he lined up where the carom would be coming off the wall before the ball hit it. Knew exactly where it was going.
 

Minneapolis Millers

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Gomes isn’t the fastest guy around, but you hit a ball off the CF wall and that’s a double. Unless JBJ...

That play was ridiculous.
 

SouthernBoSox

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Yep. A lot of that is his ability to judge that ball off the wall. It went to him like a magnet. And then when you can throw 100mph on a one hop... your done.
 

Saints Rest

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I could watch that all night. Love that he plays it in the middle of a jump toward the infield to set up the throw.

Props to Kinsler on the reception too. Both those guys making it look easy.
His setup is astounding. We’ve all seen hundreds and thousands of plays where an OF sets up to make a throw on a tag on a fly ball. JBJ did it on a carom. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen that before. And as noted, the fact that he corrals it on a hop step puts just tremendous momentum in the right direction with no wasted time. Astonishing!
 

Buzzkill Pauley

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His setup is astounding. We’ve all seen hundreds and thousands of plays where an OF sets up to make a throw on a tag on a fly ball. JBJ did it on a carom. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen that before. And as noted, the fact that he corrals it on a hop step puts just tremendous momentum in the right direction with no wasted time. Astonishing!
JBJ’s technical proficiency is a real marvel: playing the caroms, timing his rolls and jumps to avoid injury, cradling his glove so the ball doesn’t pop loose, angling his routes for glare and footwork and momentum. Kiermeier is more physically gifted, but JBJ is the #1 guy I’d tell my outfielders to watch, if I were a high school or college coach.

And if he were anywhere as quick afoot as people believe he is, we’d be looking at an all-time great instead of just a GG-caliber CF on a 100-win team.
 

Boggs26

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And if he were anywhere as quick afoot as people believe he is, we’d be looking at an all-time great instead of just a GG-caliber CF on a 100-win team.
My God, can you imagine what he'd pull off if he was as fast as, say, Mallex Smith? Statcast has Smith's Sprint speed 5th among CFs at 29.6ft/sec, while JBJ is 23rd at 27.8. if he had an extra 2ft/sec I'm not sure anything would ever fall in the outfield...
 

Savin Hillbilly

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The wrong side of the bridge....
Does a play like that figure into UZR or defensive WAR or any of the other defensive metrics?
Not sure about UZR, but DRS has a specific category for "Good Fielding Plays" (rGFP in the Fangraphs "Advanced Fielding" tab), which are described thus on the Fielding Bible page:

A Good Fielding Play is recorded when a fielder does something to prevent an advancement or record an out that we wouldn't typically expect from a fielder at the position. It is a play that is made when, had the play not been made, no one would have faulted the fielder for not making it.
However, Sox fans may be forgiven for doubting that this part of DRS is being calculated with optimal accuracy, considering that JBJ's current total in the rGFP column is....wait for it..... -1.
 

Al Zarilla

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According to fangraphs, Jackie’s got 2 DRS vs 18 for Lorenzo Cain, 12 for Michael Taylor and 11 for Ender Enciarte. I obviously don’t unnerstand fielding statistics. Mookie has a decent lead in defensive stats over Aaron Judge of all people in RF, except in ARM, (arm strength). Anyway, JBJ leads all AL CFers in the overall fangraphs defensive metric with a 7.9, Hicks next at 5.0. Jackie’s got this.

One other thing: the ESPN and MLBN announcers have been all glowing about JBJs defense this year, for whatever worth that is. Like he’s Paul Blair, for those that remember him. Jackie’s got this.

Edit, when’s the last time a team had two gold glove outfielders?
 
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pantsparty

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Does a play like that figure into UZR or defensive WAR or any of the other defensive metrics?
Both UZR and DRS have a component that accounts for how often baserunners are either held to fewer bases or thrown out attempting to take an extra base relative to other similar plays, but I don't know all the low-level math involved.
 

pantsparty

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Swihart ruins the day of another would-be base stealer and Xander shows off his arm on an off-balance throw.
 

pantsparty

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I have yet to get tired of watching Swihart throw out idiots that think they can run on him.
 

Humphrey

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Betts and Bradley are so good that when one of them doesn't quite make a play it's a disappointment. Thought for sure Mookie would throw that guy out at home in the 9th inning last night.
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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Betts and Bradley are so good that when one of them doesn't quite make a play it's a disappointment. Thought for sure Mookie would throw that guy out at home in the 9th inning last night.
Mookie fielded that ball awkwardly and wasn't in a position to make a good throw. I don't know if he took a mis-step or the ball took an odd hop but he ended up fielding it to far to his left which forced him off balance and to have to rotate around to get in a position to make a throw. It's at about 1:26 of this video.
 

pantsparty

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Initially ruled safe but overturned. Bogaerts also made another good play later in the game that unfortunately wasn't included in mlb.com's highlights so I don't have a way to post it.
 

Doooweeeey!

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Initially ruled safe but overturned. Bogaerts also made another good play later in the game that unfortunately wasn't included in mlb.com's highlights so I don't have a way to post it.
It was another play deep in the hole at short. Looked like a sure base hit.
Xander got to it and released very quickly, getting just enough on the throw to bounce it to Holt, who picked it easily.
Good stuff!
 

Spelunker

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Is that just the camera move, or is that whiffleball jump to the viewer's left actually real?
 

TheYaz67

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IIRC, it was "real" - Sandy set up on the outside, but out of his hand the pitch just took off inside (which should have "helped" Kemp) like a two seamer on crack - crazy movement he put on that pitch last night (certainly compared to his sometimes dead-straight four seamer)....
 

Al Zarilla

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IIRC, it was "real" - Sandy set up on the outside, but out of his hand the pitch just took off inside (which should have "helped" Kemp) like a two seamer on crack - crazy movement he put on that pitch last night (certainly compared to his sometimes dead-straight four seamer)....
If it’s real, I think Kelly is breaking some laws of physics. Or, he got another planet’s atmosphere down here for a second. That is too much break to be believed IMO.
 

TheYaz67

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If it’s real, I think Kelly is breaking some laws of physics. Or, he got another planet’s atmosphere down here for a second. That is too much break to be believed IMO.
Well, looking it again, not just the grip but how he is manipulating his hand & the ball release, its almost more of a screwball than a change up. If you notice on the slow mo from overhead, the first 15 or so feet the ball is still adding to the spin he imparts to it and is traveling relatively "straight" towards the plate - by 20-25~ feet the ball spin has accelerated and is now imparting maximum force on the ball, which is when it appears to "bend" inward toward Kemp somewhat drastically. I don't think it is camera trickery, but that camera may not be tracking it exactly "straight" which could somewhat make it appear to move more than it does. But it is totally "real", just not many guys can do that!
 

Al Zarilla

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Well, looking it again, not just the grip but how he is manipulating his hand & the ball release, its almost more of a screwball than a change up. If you notice on the slow mo from overhead, the first 15 or so feet the ball is still adding to the spin he imparts to it and is traveling relatively "straight" towards the plate - by 20-25~ feet the ball spin has accelerated and is now imparting maximum force on the ball, which is when it appears to "bend" inward toward Kemp somewhat drastically. I don't think it is camera trickery, but that camera may not be tracking it exactly "straight" which could somewhat make it appear to move more than it does. But it is totally "real", just not many guys can do that!
The ball almost makes a right turn. I've never seen that. Relooking at it on a laptop instead of phone, the view from behind Kelly looks right, like a screwball as you say. The view from behind the plate is bonkers.
 

BaseballJones

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The ball almost makes a right turn. I've never seen that. Relooking at it on a laptop instead of phone, the view from behind Kelly looks right, like a screwball as you say. The view from behind the plate is bonkers.
I’m sure many here remember the incredibly nasty pitch Daniel Bard threw that moved completely sideways.

I’m sure that .gif is around here somewhere.
 

StupendousMan

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You can find a view of this pitch from center field on reddit:

https://www.reddit.com/r/filthypitches/comments/9r1ptb/joe_kelly_bamboozles_matt_kemp_with_a_changeup/

The GIF shown above is deceptive, for two reasons: first, the number of frames per second changes during the animation. Time is slowed greatly at the start and end of the ball's motion, but speeds up in the middle. That's why the spin rate appears to change. It's not real -- just an artifact of the way the frames were pasted together to make this GIF.

Second, the camera pans slightly to the right (toward first base) as it follows the ball to home plate. This motion of the camera is responsible for much of the sudden bend that the trajectory appears to take.

But not all of it. If you go to BrooksBaseball's web page for Joe Kelly's pitches last night (thanks, Jnai!), you'll see that the pitch did break inside by about 12 inches. That means that, relative to a pitch thrown with similar speed but no spin, this changeup moved sideways by a foot. Kelly threw three other pitches like this one during his single inning last night; they just didn't get as much publicity.

The reason that his changeups last night had such a pronounced horizontal motion is the way his low arm slot and grip combine to give the ball an almost "side-to-side" spin angle. A ball which spins over-the-top or under-the-bottom will break up or down, while one which spins side-to-side will break left or right. Go to the reddit link above and watch its version of the animation, which can be paused and rewound and resumed. Watch the release point, at 0:08, and look at the way his wrist bends in order to cause the ball to roll off his fingers in a nearly horizontal direction. It's beautiful to behold, but I suspect that it's not a completely natural motion.