October 01, 2008
Cameron's Explanation
Mike Cameron explains here why he misjudged the ball that led to the Phillies runs.
"I cut across like it was going to go down but it kept rising," said Cameron. "My first instinct was that it was not going to travel, because of the way the wind was blowing. It just kind of took off."
Mike chases fly balls differently than most outfielders. Instead of tracking the ball all the way, Mike developed an excellent pattern recognizer that allows him to judge where the ball will go off the bat and run there without following the ball too closely. Today, that recognizer made a mistake. Despite that, he almost made a great catch.
Posted by David Pinto at
10:37 PM
|
Defense
|
TrackBack (0)
I still think he would've made that catch in SD against the rockies in the tiebreaker game last year :)
Yes, he would but it was at Coors Field.
Cameron is living off his reputation. He's no longer a particularly good center fielder. This year he placed ninth among the nineteen qualifiers in zone rating, and an embarrassing seventeenth in range factor.
It's not a huge surprise that he didn't make the play. He's at best an average center fielder now. But fielding reputations die hard, because the numbers aren't followed nearly as closely as hitting and pitching stats.
Not to state the obvious but that's how everybody plays the outfield and that's how they teach you from Little League.
Cameron made another poor play today in 2nd game. At some point, even the great Willie Mays lost some of his ability.
