It’s challenging to stop these plays!
My wife, daughter, and I attended a last-gasp game for the Giants on September 22. To have any chance of making the playoffs, San Francisco would have to win their last six games, starting with this first game against the St. Louis Cardinals. They lost that game and the next day as well, and were eliminated from the 2025 playoffs.
During the course of the game, I observed an unstoppable play. With speedy Cardinal Jose Fermín on second with no outs and left-handed batting Victor Scott II at the plate, shortstop Willy Adames was shifted just to the left of second base; the Giants would not be able to employ the wheel play if the Cards elected to bunt. The wheel play is where the shortstop runs over to cover third base while the third baseman and first baseman charge to field the bunt. The wheel play only works with a right-handed batter, where the shortstop can play roughly halfway between second and third base.
Sure enough, Scott laid down a perfect bunt toward third. Third baseman Matt Chapman charged it and made the only play possible, a beautiful one in which he just nipped the speedy Scott at first. But now Fermín was on third. He would later score on a single.
That made me wonder if other baseball plays cannot be defended against.
When executed correctly, the safety squeeze is one. Cleveland Guardians manager Stephen Vogt frequently employs this tactic. Most notably, he used it last October in Game 4 of the American League Division Series against the Detroit Tigers. David Fry, who had pinch-hit a two-run go-ahead homer in the seventh inning, came to bat in the ninth inning with Bryan Rocchio on third base and one out. Vogt asked Fry if he’d be comfortable executing a safety squeeze. “I told him I wasn’t a very good hitter in high school, so I’m pretty confident; I had to bunt a lot,” Fry joked.
It was probably the last thing the Tigers expected, given Fry’s previous home run. He laid down a perfect bunt to the right side. The right-handed pitcher fielded the ball and tossed it backhand to the catcher, but Rocchio beat the throw with a beautiful headfirst slide to give the Guardians a 5-3 lead, important because the Tigers scored once in the bottom of the ninth and fell short, 5-4. The Cleveland win tied the series at two games apiece, and the Guardians won the next game to take the ALDS.
As Joe Noga said on the Cleveland Baseball Talk podcast, “What’s so great about that safety squeeze play is the helplessness that it leaves defenders feeling afterwards. The runner is hauling it down to first base, and the run comes across the plate, and you’re standing there holding the ball like, ‘What just happened?’ So it’s a helpless feeling if you’re the defense on that play, and it’s worked.”
Paul Hoynes, on the same podcast, added, “Vogt repeated time and time again, if you do it right, there’s no defense for it. You can’t stop it.”
This next one may not be unstoppable, but it is pretty unexpected. With a man on second base, keep the shortstop and second base at their normal positions, with no attempt to hold the runner on. Then the center fielder runs in to cover second base, and the pitcher whirls and throws it to him. The San Francisco Giants tried this in 2015, with Gregor Blanco running in from center field. But the batter saw what was happening and signaled to the runner, who scrambled back to the bag in time.
The next one requires a little cooperation from the runner. With a runner on third and less than two outs, when a fly ball is hit to the outfield, the outfielder holds his glove up as if to catch the ball above his head. But at the last second, he drops his glove to make a basket catch. This deception could be just enough to cause the runner to leave third base prematurely, allowing the defense to appeal at third.
This next one is unstoppable—if the runners don’t know that there is no infield fly rule on a bunted ball. With runners on first and second and no out, if the batter pops up the bunt and the pitcher lets it drop, the runners must try to advance.
On July 13, 1995, the Seattle Mariners hosted the Toronto Blue Jays. In the top of the ninth, the Jays had Alex Gonzalez on second and Shawn Green on first with Sandy Martinez at bat and no outs. Martinez hit a bunt fly in front of the mound. Mariners pitcher Jeff Nelson allowed the ball to drop to the ground untouched. He then fielded the ball and threw to Luis Sojo covering second base. Sojo kept the force alive by wisely tagging Gonzalez for the first out before stepping on second base, forcing Green for the second out. He then fired to second baseman Joey Cora covering first base to complete a triple play.
And here’s an unstoppable way to stop a seemingly unstoppable play. When the offense has runners on first and third and less than two outs, a common strategy is to have the runner on first start casually walking toward second base, hoping to distract the defense so that the runner on third base can score. To defend this, once the walk-off has occurred and everyone yells “walk-off,” the pitcher steps off the mound, freezes the runner at third, and quickly throws the ball to the second baseman. The second baseman must judge the speed at which the baserunner is moving and take an angle so he can catch the ball a few feet in front of the runner and in the base path. The baserunner will not expect the ball to be thrown to the second baseman, and it can result in a quick throw and tag play for the defense.
