IMHO, steroids killed the bunt. Yes, managers are still stupid enough too call for position players to lay down a sac bunt but most of them can't even do that.
In the pre-steroid era, guys knew the strengths and weaknesses and also their place on the team. Little guys with no power were supposed to make contact and either get on base or move guys over for the power guys. The power guys were supposed to swing for the fences and not take marginal pitches that may or may not be called balls.
Then the Steroid Era happened.
After that, EVERYBODY was swinging for the fences. They didn't care about fundamentals only get extra base hits. Why? MONEY!!!!!
The more power you displayed, the bigger your arbitration raises were, the bigger your free agent contracts were, the bigger your contract extensions were and the more likely you were to be able to stick around a few years after you normally would have retired.
So, for almost 20 years, guys got into the habit of swinging away and NOT caring about striking out or doing things fundamentally right. Why should they? Doing things the fundamentally RIGHT way took real work and practice. Not much work or practice needed to take steroids, lift weights and then swing from the heels EVERY plate appearance.
Because of that, the same attitude has trickled down to the lowest levels of baseball. Young kids now don't want to work at things. They just want to swing away.
This is why if I were an owner of a MLB team, I would MAKE guys at the lowest level learn how to bunt, at least for hits. If they didn't or couldn't, I would either trade them away or ORDER the managers to NOT have them try and bunt.
David
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