While we're on the subject of MLB baseball as mano-a-mano, gladiatorial showdowns...

Just last night, on TV, they were discussing the Griffey Shift.  ...John and I went to the first Rays game, and couldn't believe where their second baseman was playing -- halfway between the infield skin and the right fielder.  There was literally 0% chance of hitting any ball through the infield on the right side.   Not 1%:  0%.

I thought of Vic Braden's "solid net" in tennis -- to train beginners, he puts a drape over the net, to get across the idea that you can't possibly score if the ball hits the net.  Would Griffey swing away if there were a giant curtain stretching from 2B to 1B?

Yet that is what the Rays put up against Junior, and he hit ten balls into that net.

Griffey could have had a free hit, if he wanted one, simply by bunting or chopping the ball to the left half of the diamond. 

Suppose Griffey were to come to the park and practice bunting?  Unthinkable in America.  It would be unthinkable not to do so in Japan.

(In fairness to Griffey, he has had a couple of hits by taking grounders the other way recently.)

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Blowers, on TV Thursday night, quoted Barry Bonds talking to Junior.  Bonds told him, hey, suppose you do tear the 1B's mitt off, and you're out, but you hit the ball hard.  You have done your job.  Your job is to hit the ball hard.

Blowers completely agreed with this:  that Junior's job is to hit the ball hard, whether he's out or safe.  That when the shift is on, Junior should continue to swing normally, because his job is to be Junior.

I wanted to ask, supposing that the 3B moved over to the right side, too, Mike...

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I'm worried that Junior's power may be gone, to the extent that his best shots are going to finish on the warning track.  Hey, it happened to Ted Williams in his 40's; it happens to everybody at some age or other.  If it happened to Griffey at 40, and if he continues to swing away into shifts, he's going to BABIP about .180 this year.

The Mariners are assessing Griffey as we speak, and if I were them that would be the dominant question on my mind.  Is his power limited to the warning track now? 

Because if it is, and with that shift, he's got no chance.  Not even walks, because what's there to worry about if you bring in the center fielder to throw a batting-practice pitch.

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Junior wants to stay in the bigs for one more year, he no longer has the luxury of playing against a shift.  He's got to bunt now.

Griff isn't the only one not hitting, obviously.  And he's squaring up some balls.  At first I worried that his current 5:14 EYE was unprecedented for him in any month in his career, but he had a 2:18 eye in September 2007 when he was hurting.

The M's will be able to tell whether the use-the-legs and go-the-other-way adjustments will carry him towards one more season in the sun.  He is a lefty hitter who has the luxury of facing selected RHP's if he can get it going.  But absent a 20-25 homer projection, that shift has got to go :- )

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My $0.02,

Dr D