LOS ANGELES, CA — From the opening line of the famous television show “The Twilight Zone” in the early 1960s:
“You’re traveling through another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind. A journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are those of imagination. That’s the signpost up ahead—your next stop, the Twilight Zone!”
Yes, Major League Baseball has stepped into the “Twilight Zone.”
Let’s begin with the ending of the Dodgers-Phillies game earlier this week on Tuesday night in Philadelphia. On a rain-soaked Citizens Bank Park infield with one out and runners on second and third for the Phillies, in the bottom of the ninth inning, and the Dodgers clinging to a 2-1 lead, Philadelphia’s Brandon Marsh hit a soft grounder to third baseman Max Muncy.
This past Tuesday night was not the first time a Dodgers-Phillies matchup had blunders on the bases as LA and Philadelphia’s 2025 NLDS included several costly mistakes – Image Credit: Bill Menzel/Latino Sports
Justin Crawford, stationed at third, took off for home as Muncy fielded the ball, which followed with him throwing to LA’s catcher, Dalton Rushing, who ran Crawford back to third, and then made an accurate toss to Mookie Betts to tag him out for out number two.
Inexplicably, 13-year MLB veteran J.T. Realmuto, who was two feet off of third base, had started to go back to second base before Crawford was tagged out by Betts. Realmuto’s job was to stay close to third, and if Crawford was tagged out, he just needed to step on third. Pretty simple.
Meanwhile for Marsh, he would be doing the same thing at second base, tracking Realmuto from first base. The result should have been runners on second and third again, but with two outs. This would have given Philadelphia one more chance to either tie or win the game. Instead, Realmuto was doubled up at second, and the Dodgers won 2-1.
“I don’t know what JT was thinking there, honestly, because he got to third,” Phillies interim manager Don Mattingly, a baseball lifer, told reporters postgame.
“With contact on, just hoping (Crawford) stays in (the rundown) long enough to get Marsh to second, and you end up in the same spot.”
Realmuto described the costly mistake as “just a lapse in judgment,” adding, “I thought Crawford could get out of the rundown for some reason. The chances of that are so small, you just can’t take that chance there of making two outs on one play.”
We used to practice this play over and over again in high school and I’m talking about as a team, consistently harping on it, knowing this situation or something similar is bound to come up in a game.
Hopefully it is still being taught today by coaches at the amateur level. I’m not sure about the Majors.
We have seen so many things in baseball over the past number of years that are not what we were used to viewing in the past, with the emphasis on analytical baseball produced by many who never played the game at this level and have a different idea about player development. So much so that they are not using the treasure of very good baseball lifers like Mattingly to their advantage who has spent years studying the game and later teaching the fundamentals of the game.
For the most part, they have all been sent out to pasture. More and more year by year. So now, these “Clown Show Stoppers” as some would call analytics departments have become the norm, giving us a feeling of living in an alternate universe.
Welcome to the “Twilight Zone.”
Not just in Philadelphia, but across Major League Baseball.
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