Contreras slows down on his grounder (to Elly) in the 11th, costing himself a base and the team an out.

11 comments

1. Gotta run it out..but I think I still consider him to be a net positive for the team lol

2. It’s subtle, but as someone who literally watches these sprints and determines whether or not they’re “full effort” as part of my job, it’s clear he slows for a step or two in the final stretch. And I’m more than willing to say in 90% of cases “the play wasn’t close, the game itself isn’t close, the player is gassed, it barely matters at all” and excuse guys for less-than-100% effort on running out grounders. But this decision not to go fully 100% had a significant effect on the outcome of this game, and it’s pretty dumb and inexcusable from a guy who went 0-5 and was literally DHing, there is no “catcher has tired legs” excuse.

   I don’t think William is particularly lazy or anything, catchers do a mindblowing amount of pregame prep and it’s ridiculous to assume these moments are anything more than momentary losses of focus/misjudging how close a play is, but these things matter and this game could have ended differently had he bothered to just fully run out a grounder after sitting on the bench for the last 45 minutes in a row.

3. Well he has been catching for 11 innings that day, and on top of all the catching he has done this last few days. Squatting 130+ times a day isn’t easy.

4. Back off this guy. Period.

5. Yeah yeah I get it but I’m not gonna trash a guy for catching/playing in 4 games in 3 days in the August heat. Plus the extra innings. Shit happens. On to the next

6. I was at the game and temperature wise it wasn’t terrible, but it was full sun. This whole series has been over 90 and full sun. Contreras was DH today so that’s not as much of an excuse for him, but he’s human and we all make mistakes from time to time.

7. I think we can afford to pick our battles here. I’d much rather he didn’t get hurt digging out a ground ball.

8. Elly makes insane throws (he threw out Chourio on a hard play just a couple days ago). I don’t blame him one bit if he thought he was out regardless what he did. He’s got sneaky speed but that wasn’t the time to use it. That’s how you get injured.

9. I love Contreras as much as everybody here, but…I have noticed he sometimes doesn’t hustle and his body language can be a little too “cocky” at times. Oh well, nitpicking.

10. It’s a ground ball in game where they won 3 straight on the road. You’re acting like Billiam is the only MLB player to do this.

11. Get the man some time off before the postseason, please