WHAT WINS GAMES

[radness]

Does anyone think that the more prevalent method of victory changes as the players age?

younger teams - more of a possibility the team that bats last wins.

middle teams - pitching starts to take over and the best pitcher wins

older teams - hitting catches up with pitching and you have an offensive game

Once again -NOT EVERY TIME but a trend I have noticed here.

Noticed!

 

[radness]

Perhaps ingrained in me is the proud accomplishment for my team at Long Beach.
That we did not have the powerforce line-up of our competition...
We had scrappy and hard hitters with different swings and approaches. Including small ball. We could 'get the ball in play.'
Our defense however was like
an impermiable net.
Astounding plays that kept us well into extra innings.

Playing against the best hitters in the nation.
I remember our deffense!
Way to go BEACH !

We beat ucla for the first time partially because errors put runners on for us.
Tisk tisk.

 

[Tango]

With great pitching, who bunts and plays the bunt the best.

 

[ANNASDAD]

Pitching, catching, defense, and hitting, all important for winning!

But I’ve only ever heard lots of college coaches say…..if you can hit, you’ll play! Must be something to it?

 

[Westwind]

Yup. Japan’s superior defense carried the day for them.

I see what you did there! Well played!

How many runs did we score total in Japan? Man those other teams must have had mighty tough D too!

 

[fistafury17]

Pitching, catching, defense, and hitting, all important for winning!

But I’ve only ever heard lots of college coaches say…..if you can hit, you’ll play! Must be something to it?

If you follow the Moneyball formula, assuming the team has average but solid fielding, hitting and baserunning and serviceable pitching, I think a team could win a lot of games, but said team will not win championships without shutdown pitching. Behind every shutdown pitcher is a great catcher and I would build a team around that.

 

[Westwind]

9 runs for Team USA. This Grinch says: Stink/stank/stunk.



Team USA had the lowest ERA. Japan was third.

Team USA committed 3 errors during the games, Japan committed none.

But Wait! There’s more!

Team USA committed one error while playing Japan. But it was during the game Team USA won.

I still think Team USA needed to score more runs. I’m also not convinced that there were not players out there that would be offensively dangerous as well as effective on defense. I really don’t want to discuss individual players.

 

[Nimrod]

.... but said team will not win championships without shutdown pitching.

I might be taking your comment out of context, but did the WCWS champion have shutdown pitching?

 

[Westwind]

I think Montana Fouts will be a shutdown pitcher next year. I don’t think she was quite there yet in 2021.

Was she the best pitcher in WCWS? Didn’t Plain get hit pretty hard by UCLA? I’m too lazy to Google it right now.

 

[Nimrod]

To the poll question, adding one more hit is more valuable on average than subtracting one error, IMO.

As for what wins, a team can separate itself in lots of ways – pitching, hitting, base running, defense, etc. My DD played on all manner of winning and losing teams, and they each had their unique brand of excellence or futility, whichever the case.

That said, winning is most highly correlated with good pitching. That’s simply because the best pitcher (1 person) is usually farther above the mean than the best hitting lineup (9 persons).