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Montana’s lack of stolen bases

alabamagrizzly

Well-known member
So I’m not sure if this is a coaching philosophy choice or just a lack of necessary speed on the roster but there is a major deficit when it comes to stolen bases by the Griz. Normally I wouldn’t care about stats just for stats but I bring this up because run production seems to be an issue for this team and at times last year was too. We are not the power hitting team we were in ‘16 and we are beginning to have to find other ways to score. I’m not calling coach Meuchel out on this either because it was also coach Pinkerton’s issue last year. Last year our team leaders in SB’s was McGill and Martinez with 7, granted McGill probably would have had a few more had she not missed half the year. To the contrary, Weber State had 5 players with more and 4 with twice that much and their leader had 24. I think we have the speed with some of the girls. McGill and Martinez have proven they can steal in the past with Martinez holding the team record with 18 in ‘15. I also believe Hayton who is the primary PR to have the speed and Petrino is probably likely to steal a couple also. I’m wondering why we don’t attempt more. When we do steal, we have a 77% success rate which ain’t great(3rd to last in the con, WSU and ISU both lead with 88% and over 100 SB’s as a team), but I’m guessing it’s good enough to try more.
 
alabamagrizzly said:
So I’m not sure if this is a coaching philosophy choice or just a lack of necessary speed on the roster but there is a major deficit when it comes to stolen bases by the Griz. Normally I wouldn’t care about stats just for stats but I bring this up because run production seems to be an issue for this team and at times last year was too. We are not the power hitting team we were in ‘16 and we are beginning to have to find other ways to score. I’m not calling coach Meuchel out on this either because it was also coach Pinkerton’s issue last year. Last year our team leaders in SB’s was McGill and Martinez with 7, granted McGill probably would have had a few more had she not missed half the year. To the contrary, Weber State had 5 players with more and 4 with twice that much and their leader had 24. I think we have the speed with some of the girls. McGill and Martinez have proven they can steal in the past with Martinez holding the team record with 18 in ‘15. I also believe Hayton who is the primary PR to have the speed and Petrino is probably likely to steal a couple also. I’m wondering why we don’t attempt more. When we do steal, we have a 77% success rate which ain’t great(3rd to last in the con, WSU and ISU both lead with 88% and over 100 SB’s as a team), but I’m guessing it’s good enough to try more.

I wondered that last year, but didn't follow enough to know the speed of the group as a whole. I think speed kills on the basepaths and that can get players into scoring position. I think the contrary, though, is that can get them out of an inning when they are already struggling to score and baserunners are at a premium. I always liked being aggressive on the bases, but that is just me.
 
AZDoc said:
alabamagrizzly said:
So I’m not sure if this is a coaching philosophy choice or just a lack of necessary speed on the roster but there is a major deficit when it comes to stolen bases by the Griz. Normally I wouldn’t care about stats just for stats but I bring this up because run production seems to be an issue for this team and at times last year was too. We are not the power hitting team we were in ‘16 and we are beginning to have to find other ways to score. I’m not calling coach Meuchel out on this either because it was also coach Pinkerton’s issue last year. Last year our team leaders in SB’s was McGill and Martinez with 7, granted McGill probably would have had a few more had she not missed half the year. To the contrary, Weber State had 5 players with more and 4 with twice that much and their leader had 24. I think we have the speed with some of the girls. McGill and Martinez have proven they can steal in the past with Martinez holding the team record with 18 in ‘15. I also believe Hayton who is the primary PR to have the speed and Petrino is probably likely to steal a couple also. I’m wondering why we don’t attempt more. When we do steal, we have a 77% success rate which ain’t great(3rd to last in the con, WSU and ISU both lead with 88% and over 100 SB’s as a team), but I’m guessing it’s good enough to try more.

I wondered that last year, but didn't follow enough to know the speed of the group as a whole. I think speed kills on the basepaths and that can get players into scoring position. I think the contrary, though, is that can get them out of an inning when they are already struggling to score and baserunners are at a premium. I always liked being aggressive on the bases, but that is just me.

I agree with that stolen bases attempts can get you out of an inning as quickly as it can manufacture you some runs. That’s why I wonder if it’s a philosophy choice or a skill(or lack of) choice. I think we’ve tried to recruit for a good mix of power and contact hitters but haven’t focused on speed as much. I know Knauss should bring some speed also. She averaged over a stolen base per game last year in high school.
 
I don't remember which game it was, think it was the 2nd weekend of play, the game recap mentioned that we had a couple of errors on the base paths that lead to outs and took us out of possible big innings.

I think if the bottom half of the order starts hitting (hopefully soon now that they have some games under their belt) we can get more aggressive on the base paths.
 
84GRIZ said:
I don't remember which game it was, think it was the 2nd weekend of play, the game recap mentioned that we had a couple of errors on the base paths that lead to outs and took us out of possible big innings.

I think if the bottom half of the order starts hitting (hopefully soon now that they have some games under their belt) we can get more aggressive on the base paths.

Ya, I think one was a stolen base attempt and the other was a base runner trying to score from 2nd.
 
Alabama Grizzly, I was looking at stolen bases from the first three years and the number of attempts per game is pretty close this season compared to last season at just under an attempt a game. So I don't see a big change of philosophy there. They have been behind a lot this year and teams tend to run less when behind. Plus, as my dad used to say you can't still first. I think the hitting will heat up.

I was looking at your post from a few days ago. The Griz hitting last year as a team was .280 (2017), .322 in (2016) and .280 (2015). .280 is pretty decent team average and still will win you a lot of games if pitching and defense are clicking. Right now they are hitting in the .220s and the defense and pitching has also struggled. I can't wait to see them when all three come together. They have played a tough schedule and feel that they will get untracked soon.
 
So far this season the team is 8-for-13 in steals, with McGill and Petrino having the most success (each @ 2-for-2). With a healthy McGill at the top of the lineup, it's possible we'll see more aggressive running as the season progresses. Hard to pickup any change in offensive strategy without being able to see many games yet. There have been some signs that newcomers may add some punch to the Griz offense.
 
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