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Not sure if I'm reading the thread correctly or not, but I'll take a great pitcher over a great hitter any day. I've never seen a great hitter shut down a defense, but I've seen plenty of great pitchers drop the hammer on great offenses.
Hitting is huge, and for position players, it is a necessity...but I still like quality arms over ANYTHING else.
Gee thats a shocker! No really, my son once played for a tournament coach that thought speed was, by far, the number one thing. He stated, " I want to create havock on the basepaths!" He would have boys with a .400+ batting average, that were team leaders for the team in RBI's, average with men on, and on base percentage on the bench while a couple of other boys with a 1 to 2 tens faster speed in the 60 (we're talking about 7.2's vs. 7.4's and 7.5's here) played and turned in their .200 batting averages. Then he couldn't figure out why the team was only a 50/50 type team and couldn't score runs. These .200 batting kids also had the 2nd & 3rd most errors on the team. One of his relatives lead the team in errors, but in this case he had a good bat, just had a hard time in the infield. The really funny thing, neither of the kids were related to him and other parents on the team couldn't figure it out.
I think the original topic "Hitting ... the most important tool" is intended to apply to the individual player, i.e., not everyone on the team is going to be a great pitcher, but really goood teams have an abundance of individual good hitters, and elite position players are first and foremost great hitters before their other atheletic attributes come into play. This doesn't mean they can only hit ... just the most important attribute of being an elite position player is hitting, then your defensive abilities.

In viewing the success of an entire team in comparing the importance of team pitching versus team hitting you can simply ask: How many teams that have dominant and deep pitching but average or worse hitting are successful? Lots ... because in a 0-0 or 1-1 game, luck does have a role. How many teams that have average or worse pitching but dominant hitting are successful? Not many ... you just can't consistently put up double-digit run games or make up 7+ run deficits while your pitchers are throwing BP.

Of course the best teams try real hard to have both good pitching and hitting Smile.

Speed? Can't use it if you can't get on base. I've seen several kids come up that had blinding speed but couldn't hit the broad side of a barn ... they quit baseball and stuck to football where their speed was a great asset and their lack of hand-eye coordination wasn't a liability ... the hard part is holding onto the football while someone cleans your clock.
Last edited by pbonesteele
"It ended up being one and done for Clemens, as he allowed five hits and three earned runs while striking out two. The six-time Cy Young Award winner threw 35 pitches in the inning..........Even a sure-fire Hall of Famer like Clemens can be prone to such an onslaught."

Coach Knight, that's what can very well happen when a great pitcher faces great hitting.......
Last edited by BlueDog

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