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Pittsburgh

Pirates’ stolen base strategy baffling

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If you have been following me on Twitter tonight, this may seem a bit repetitive. But I felt this deserved its own post. After Alex Presley was thrown out trying to steal second in tonight’s game, I decided to check out some of the Pirates’ stolen base stats. Consider the following numbers, which were current entering today’s games.

Pirates MLB Rank
Stolen Base Attempts 20 6th
Stolen Base Success 55.0% 28th
On-Base Percentage .269 30th

In other words, the Pirates are the worst team in baseball at reaching base, they are among the worst at stealing bases and they are among the most aggressive at trying to steal bases. How does that make sense?

These numbers come from a small sample size, of course. Maybe the Pirates feel that the team’s true ability to steal bases is much better than what they have shown so far. But while they are struggling to reach base, while they are struggling to steal bases, while they are gaining a reputation for running at every opportunity, maybe they should take the foot off the gas for a bit and stop giving away free outs.

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