[nolemmings]

Perezchica waved him home and then changed his mind– halfway down the third-base line. Ideally Walker would have had his head up and been able to get back to third, but the coach could have handled it better in the first place. It isn’t just knowing the outfielders’ arms– the runner does not know if there was a bobble or a slip and is relying on the coach’s eyes.

As for the game situation, I don’t disagree that the standard call there is to hold him at third. But the Diamondbacks play chaos baseball and try to put pressure on the defense as much as possible by forcing them to make a play. Unfortunately, the ball took a room service hop and was handled cleanly by Garcia right in stride and he made the play. Worst case happened, but it still left a man on second with one out; i.e., in scoring position with a faster replacement runner.

Walker is neither a fast nor a slow runner, so I can understand why he would bear down and not look up once he saw he was being waved home. I assume that if he picked up the stop sign– which again was a change by the coach– he would have made it back to third. Then again, I remember a rookie Joe Mauer facing that same situation in a regular season game and getting hurt when he slammed on the brakes to get back. Hurt as in knee injury and surgery, a 21 year-old hitting .300 with pop and gone for most of the year– thanks a lot coach.

Dbacks looked like they were pressing a bit last night, but they had other chances over the next seven innings. So yeah, Walker can own most of that momentum killer, but he was not alone.