A Thought on the Luis Robert Non-Throw

Tuesday night, the White Sox lost a heartbreaker to the Cleveland Guardians. Maybe not a heartbreaker, since any White Sox fan’s heart has been chewed up, digested, and well you know.

The game ended on a sacrifice fly in which Luis Robert Jr. caught the ball in centerfield but chose not to attempt to throw out Andrés Giménez at home. This non-throw has been the talk of White Sox Twitter for the past few days. I enjoy chaos, so it’s been fun watching all sides debate this. As for my personal opinion: It’s a dumb argument. He wasn’t throwing him out so feel however you want. I did see a tweet that made me think about something else.

The distance Luis caught the ball at is nearly impossible to throw someone out at home from, especially with Gimenez’s speed (28.9 ft/s in 2024). He was going back on the ball because he was playing at a depth where he might be able to throw out a runner. But why not position the outfield more drastically?

Let’s assume there is a perimeter in which outfielders will not throw out a runner. And let’s also assume the White Sox have some mediocre to below average arms in the outfield (looking at you Beni). Why not bring them all much closer to the infield? In fact, the shift rule permits you to have an outfielder play on the infield dirt. Only the opposite is not allowed.

In a position like this, would it make sense to bring in Danny Mendick for Benintendi and have Danny as the 5th infielder on the dirt? Positioning the outfielders in more of a right center and left center. The ball exceeding a certain distance ends the game no matter what, so would it make sense to fortify the areas where you can actually affect the outcome? It doesn’t change the outcome here, but nothing would have. If a grounder slipped through the infield or a blooper dropped in, I feel like something could have been done to prevent that.

Just a thought. Now please get back to arguing about him not throwing.

-Chorizy-E