Forget Juiced Bats, Dodgers Need Punch

A conversation between the Dodger hitting coach and his players:

“You must be very selective. The pitcher will throw strikes. So you must take the first called strike. That way you now have the pitcher at your mercy. Then on the next pitch that is out of the strike zone, you foul it off and the pitcher is yours. Now you must wait until he throws the ball in the dirt, then close your eyes and swing. Then go sit down and wait for your next time at bat.”

Any other team’s hitting coach talking to his players:

“When you get up to the plate, you are up there for one reason and one reason only and that is to hit the ball as hard as you can. Remember, you can’t strike out if you never get two strikes on you, so don’t stand up there and take strikes. Also, I am sure you know if you don’t swing, you can never hit .300.”

Robert M. Freedman

Los Osos

The Times reported that in Monday’s loss to the Giants, after Jason Romano’s 11th-inning leadoff single, Adrian Beltre tried to lay down an unauthorized bunt.

Jim Tracy was quoted: “If I want you to bunt, I’ll give you the bunt sign....”

What insane manager does not give a player a bunt sign with the go-ahead run on first and no outs in the 11th inning? What inane manger admits that he didn’t give the sign? What inept manager implicitly admits that he has not taught his player a fundamental of the game that is necessary to win ballgames?

Alan Amitin

Montrose

When will Jim Tracy finally learn that you must not bring the game’s best closer, Eric Gagne, into a game that’s tied in the late innings? He’s done it twice this year, and both times the results have been a disastrous, un-Gagne-like loss! There are reasons guys like Eric are called “closers” -- their job is to come into a game leading by one to three runs in the opponent’s last at-bat and then close it out.

Why does it make a difference? Several reasons: No. 1, the closer’s mental attitude is different when he’s protecting a lead. No. 2, opposing batters have a different mental attitude when they know this is their last chance to pull it out -- they’re usually pressing and swinging at pitches they never would swing at with the score tied.

And then there’s the big question: Let’s say your closer gets through the tied late inning unscathed. Now he has to pitch another inning, and if he gets through that one, then what? Someone else will have to come in, and that’s the someone who should have come in in the first place.

Joel Rapp

Los Angeles

Memo to Jim Tracy:

Tell Green to move back a step in the batter’s box.

Tell Beltre not to swing at the balls off the plate.

Tell Perez to “get over it.”

And where is Eric Karros when we need him?

Patricia Sovich

Cerritos