It’s the bottom of the eighth inning. Men are on first and third base, there’s one out and your team is down by one run. The opposing team has one of the best ground-ball pitchers on the hill, and the infield is playing back and is looking for a double play. All you need is a fly ball to tie the game and significantly swing your chances of winning.

So who do you want at the plate?

It’s likely that the opposing manager will either bring in a ground-ball specialist or just tell the pitcher to stay away from pitches that could be hit in the air to the outfield. Knowing who you’d want to hit requires an understanding of what pitches are the most likely to induce a ground ball — and what hitters manage to hit fly balls against those pitches most often.

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Apropos largely of nothing — except his notable performance, I suppose, in this past Saturday’s Arizona Fall League Rising Stars Game — I’ve dedicated considerable attention to Reds (now) outfield prospect Billy Hamilton in these electronic pages over the last 48 hours.

Hamilton, because he has a tool (in this case, speed) considered by many to be generational, has produced excitement among prospect analysts. In some cases, that excitement is analogous with optimism about Hamilton’s future as a major leaguer; in other cases, it’s more of an aesthetic judgment than any sort of projection about Hamilton’s career.

I wanted, briefly, to speak to the first point — and, specifically, to establish some sort of framework (however rough) for what speed is actually worth in terms of runs and wins.

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Everyone knows that bunting runners over is the key to scoring and winning baseball games! No, wait, it’s dumb, and should never be done! Okay, bunting is sometimes smart, sometimes not. Isn’t sabermetric analysis of strategy great?

Jokes and stereotypes aside, it does seem that discussion of the pros and cons of bunting around the nerd-o-sphere is more nuanced than it used to be. While the allegedly old-school first inning, runner-on-first auto-bunt has fallen out of favor, we also realize that bunting can make sense for a number of reasons in certain situations: keeping fielders honest, increasing run expectancy, and occasions where playing for one run makes sense. As yet another annual tradition, let’s check out some of the most successful bunts of the 2012 regular season as measured by Win Probability Added (WPA).

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So much of what makes pitchers effective at the major league level is their ability to keep hitters off-balance. Sure, a 95 mph fastball with movement and a Lord Charles curveball help, but even these physical tools are only as effective as a pitcher’s ability to create uncertainly in the hitters mind from pitch to pitch.

One — admittedly crude — way of looking at this is whether a pitcher throws the type of pitch that’s expected in a given count. Does a pitcher throw fastballs in “fastball counts”, or do they throw off-speed pitches? Pitchers that throw counter to expectations are often said to “pitch backwards”. The Rays’ James Shields is someone that has been referenced as such a pitcher over the past few years.

But exactly how backwards does Shields pitch? And who are some other pitchers that fit into this category?

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That’s right: end of the season, time for me to hand out awards based on semi-goofy. questionable stats. Along with the Carter-Batista Award, this is one of the first I started publishing.. In fact, my very first post at FanGraphs (three years this week! Time flies when you’re wasting it.) back in 2009 was a King of Little Things award presentation. You can also check out the 2010 and 2011 versions for the thrilling results. So which 2012 hitter contributed to most his teams wins in ways not measurable by traditional linear weights?

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At this writing, we’ve had four incredible playoff baseball games in a row, and the Yankees and Orioles have a chance to make it five. The third of them featured the Giants eliminating the Reds in a decisive Game 5 by a 6-4 final. Good starter Mat Latos started for the Reds and was mediocre, and good starter Matt Cain started for the Giants and was also mediocre. The Giants surged out ahead 6-0 and then hung on the rest of the way as the Reds frittered away too many opportunities. That’s how the Giants completed their series comeback and advanced to the NLCS.

In a game like this one, nearly every single individual pitch is important. Any given pitch could be swung on and missed, and any given pitch can be hit for a dinger. Additionally, every given pitch changes the sequencing of the pitches that follow. For example, in the top of the fifth, Latos started Brandon Crawford out with two borderline fastballs, each of which was called a ball. If either of those goes for a strike, maybe Latos doesn’t groove the third fastball, against which Crawford tripled home the first run. And then who knows how the rest plays out? Limitless possibilities, and all that.

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Given everything that happened later on Wednesday, you might have forgotten that, earlier on Wednesday, the Giants won another must-win game over the Reds in Cincinnati. The Giants won a game that was started by Barry Zito, which lately has not been unusual. Barry Zito himself was quite terrible, which lately has been more unusual. The Giants won mostly because they finally started to hit — they finished with 11 hits in 33 at-bats, eight of which went for extra bases. But another crucial contributor was one Tim Lincecum, pitching in long relief.

Lincecum was not the first guy Bruce Bochy went to out of the bullpen. After Zito discovered a way to walk Dioner Navarro with two outs in the third, Bochy called on George Kontos. Kontos began the fourth, and then was replaced by lefty Jose Mijares, to face lefty Joey Votto. Mijares struck Votto out for the second out of the frame, and after that bit of unplanned strategic genius, Bochy signaled for Lincecum. Lincecum got out of a jam by striking out Ryan Ludwick, and then Lincecum just kept on pitching through the eighth.

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So far, the San Francisco Giants and the Cincinnati Reds have played three games in their Division Series, with the Reds winning two of them. In one game, the Giants’ offense finished with seven hits and six walks in nine innings. In another game, the Giants’ offense finished with two hits and three walks in nine innings. In the last game, the Giants’ offense finished with three hits, a walk, and a hit batter in ten innings. From that information, spot the Giants’ lone victory.

It was the last one, by the way. In Tuesday’s must-win Game 3, the Giants racked up all of three singles in an extra-innings contest, but good pitching and a timely or untimely error by Scott Rolen allowed the Giants’ postseason dreams to stay alive. They might not survive through Wednesday, but given Tuesday’s offense, it’s a minor miracle they’ve gotten this far.

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Episode 257
First, imagine FanGraphs managing editor Dave Cameron. Next, imagine all baseball. Now, imagine Dave Cameron analyzing all baseball. That’s precisely what follows in this episode of FanGraphs Audio.

Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.

You can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or other feeder things.

Audio after the jump. (Approximately 34 min. play time.)

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The Giants lost to the Reds 5-2 in Game 1 of their NLDS on Saturday, but for San Francisco, it wasn’t so bad — there were identifiable moments where things easily could’ve gone differently. One break here, one break there, and maybe it’s the Giants instead who’re leading the series. The offense, certainly, didn’t look as bad as its ultimate two-run total. While every game is important when there can only be three, four, or five games, at least the Giants could come away feeling like they hadn’t been badly outplayed.

In Game 2, the Giants got themselves slaughtered. The Reds scored nine runs, the Giants scored zero runs, the Reds racked up 13 hits, and the Giants racked up two hits. In Game 2, the Giants were badly out-hit, and accordingly, in Game 2, the Giants were badly out-pitched. With Madison Bumgarner pitching at home against Bronson Arroyo, I can’t imagine there were many people out there who expected the Giants to lose by the score of a forfeit.

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